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Author Topic: How did you decide on the dogs you hunt  (Read 870 times)
t-dog
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« on: February 16, 2023, 09:12:27 am »

I’m sitting here bored out of my mind at the moment and as usual about all I can think about is sports and hog hunting. I want to know how everyone else came to hunt the dogs they hunt today? What made you decide that this was the breed, style, etc. that you wanted to hunt?

My choice was influenced by several factors. First off I was a poor kid. I didn’t have the means to scour the entire country for what I was looking for. Second, I was fortunate enough that I’m close to many different terrains so I was able to hunt with a lot of different people with a lot of different styles of dogs and different breeds/crosses. I had super mentors that were old enough to be my father or grandfather. They were all my best buddy and I hunted with. I guess I adopted their style for the most part because most of them lived close to me so they hunted the same terrain I had to hunt and they were successful. Their ideology made sense to me and I was in for the same reasons they were, the love of watching good dogs work.
They all had good dogs for the most part but one of them owned a freak. This dog never ceased to amaze me. I probably learned as much from him as I did his owner if not more. He set the bar for me. I got to see the different levels of good let’s say. I got to see the difference in a good high school athlete compared to the freak pro athlete is the best way I know to describe it. Not long after that dog got killed, because his owner didn’t appreciate him enough to take him to the vet, I lucked into my old Clyde dog. He was unstarted and reluctant to bay at a hog because he had been thrashed (more than once) for killing domestic hogs that the guy let run in his pasture. Once I convinced him that I wanted him to bay it was Katy Bar The Door. In my opinion he was a freak as well. I hunted him with lots of good dogs that were well respected and he would shine. Both of these freaks were hound/cat crosses and the they both inherited the best of both worlds in my opinion. I had access to more of clydes kin folk. He was an out cross because the line had gotten so tightly bred that they were starting to show it. Long story short I was able to get blood that was beneficial and I just started selecting and tweaking and still doing it today with the help of a couple other good friends and hunting partners. I scraped and saved and spent a lot of money on dogs that were supposed to be what I was looking or at least really close and weren’t. I still to this day have a bitter taste in my mouth about some of them. Those experiences helped me to decide that I would just make a go at trying to raise my own.


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HIGHWATER KENNELS
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« Reply #1 on: February 16, 2023, 09:39:13 am »

Just like you man I grew up in poor country..  We made a trip to town once every two weeks to get groceries and that was it.. I was raised mostly by my grandfather and he had his own cur dogs that he would use to mark his hogs and raise them in the woods.    The question was soon answered though that those hog dogs would not be suitable for the ever changing hogs that we hunt today.  I had never heard of a Russian blooded hog when I was little.   And open woods was the norm back then ,, where a man could take two dogs and bay a whole sounder ,,,  LOL.. Now its every hog for its self around my neck of the woods.. 
Hunting cur dogs then when I was young and could really walk the hogs up and place the dogs on their backs was easy..  Well I soon found out that I wasnt gonna stay young forever and I wanted my son to have a adequate style of dogs to adapt to the hogs we hunt now all over Louisiana..   A buddy of mine come up to hunt with me one morning with two young dogs (one was 11 months old and the other was 9 months old).  I had drove them to a corn pile with a camera that let me know that the hogs had been there at 2:30 that morning.  He turned them two young plotts out and I thought they wouldve never been able to work that track out in that clear cut and surely not put a hog at the end of it.. LOL.. Boy did my eyes open up on what hog dogs could be at such a young age...   They didnt bark much on track at all and cold trailed them hogs off of my lease on the NWR and fell bayed after they ran a boar hog for over 2 miles and never quit or loss the track ..   I was simply amazed at how they had the bottom that I wouldnt see in a 6 yr old cur dog or the abiltity for that matter.   After we were done with the hunt,, I knew I had to somehow dig deep in my pockets to offer him something that was gonna hurt the pocket book but put my son in a position to not have to struggle to do the sport he loved so much ..  And it was worth it..   Money is made to be spent .. and I was blessed to have the opportunity to give my son a connection that will last for his lifetime and hopefully his kids..
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NLAhunter
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« Reply #2 on: February 16, 2023, 07:32:24 pm »

I hunt some old stock cur dogs from right in this area that has been bred and raised here to work stock in the woods since when everybody had stock in the woods splashed a touch of hound in them and I get along with em ok they are not the best and are not going to work for everybody but I got a style I like and that's how I am going to hunt I don't care if a hog gets away because of the style every now and again we will catch him another day I don't like rough dogs they stay cut up to much if you catching many big hogs and they are to hard on hog population chewing up every pig they come across will beat population down real quick we like to work hogs and catch big Barrs can't turn loose chewed up hogs so I like looser baying dogs that cast and go get a hog found I am not finding it for em stay with it till they get it bayed and stay bayed till I get there when bulldogs catch I don't want my cur dogs putting there mouth on the hog they need to go on get another one bayed I am a firm believer in stock sense in a dog if they don't have it they can't hardly keep a hog bayed much less a group of hogs bayed we regularly bay some pretty good groups of hogs still and I love to watch pair of cur dogs work a group of hogs I know that style ain't for everybody but its how we like to do it and that's kinda dogs we are hunting and breeding for

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t-dog
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« Reply #3 on: February 16, 2023, 10:33:14 pm »

Cool story Highwater!

NLA, I don’t believe there’s a right or wrong style. Like you say, it’s a preference and everyone has their own. At one time I wanted the exact style you describe in your dogs. As time went on, more and more people started dogging, trapping, thermaling, trying to run over them, lobbing bullets at them anytime they stuck their heads in the open, flying helicopters, etc. and hogs evolved. I came to the conclusion that I needed to evolve with them. I don’t want kamikaze rough but I want enough bite that they turn hogs when they can. I want hard track drivers so that the hog doesn’t get rest and time to recover. Like any specie, fatigue creates bad decisions by the fatigued. I also don’t want to chase a 50-100 pounder for miles. Too much or too little is a fine line and one of the most difficult happy mediums to achieve in my opinion. I totally agree though, too rough leads to no hunting because of injury or feeding a bunch of dogs so that you always have something to hunt.


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NLAhunter
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« Reply #4 on: February 17, 2023, 05:15:01 am »

No doubt they better try to stop em and not just trot along behind one I don't want dogs that had just assume run one as they had to bay one either I have seen several dogs like that some dogs are just better at getting hogs bayed than others I have seen dogs that wouldn't not no matter what put a tooth on a hog that could just flat out get bayed in hard hunted areas where hogs run bad like you said no right way or wrong way and no way is 100%

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Shotgun66
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« Reply #5 on: February 17, 2023, 07:40:29 pm »

I acquired my passion for hunting & working dogs as a kid. My dad had two friends that were both like uncles to me. One was a coon hunter, the other was a greyhound man. I worked for the greyhound man cleaning pens, feeding & watering dogs, & helping start them in the field and on the track. This man made his living with his dogs and was really ahead of his time on facilities & dog care. I learned a lot about how to handle & care for a dog from him.

I hunted with the coon hunter as much as my parents would allow during the week and on most weekends. He ran grade walker hounds that were tailgate to tree hounds. You opened the dog box, got out of the way, then sat on the tailgate and listened to em work a track or run a race. No tracking systems. Learned alot about how woods dogs work from this man.

Both of these men impressed upon me that CONSISTENCY of Performance was the most important trait a dog could possess.

We had game chickens back then and for some reason always had a bulldog around. Looking back, I’m not sure why we had the bulldogs. They were high drive dogs that would kill any animal that hit in their chain space. Can’t imagine how many times I broke them off of stray dogs, neighbor dogs, and everything in between.

Got into football, girls, & partying. Had my son at 20 & didn’t have time for hobbies. Went on my first hog dog hunt in 2009 and it rekindled the flame. I was fortunate to be able to tag along on quite a few hunts with every type of dog /pack you can think of early on pretty much all over North, East, & West Texas.

I realized that I enjoy being part of the hunt with the dogs. I did not like rough dogs or dogs with endless bottom but no bay stopping ability. I really liked dogs that handle well. I learned to appreciate how cur dogs work with you, not for you. I was also aware that my hunting spots were relatively small 500 to 2000 acres on average. I also didn’t want to feed more than a few dogs. These experiences led me to the short/medium range stockbred cur dogs that I hunt now. I walk, road, rig, & horseback hunt these dogs mostly. I hunt em solo or in pairs for the most part. Occasionally put a third dog down if I’m bringing a pup along. They will hunt pretty hard out of the truck but I want them with me until we get in sign or I send them. I can send them into a set of woods and they will hunt it 300 to 500 yards deep and check back in if there is no sign. Dead silent until bayed, capable of trailing or winding. They have miles of bottom and relay consistently. They handle well and can be toned in at anytime. Their baying ability & willingness to stay bayed is their best attribute. Definitely not the type for everyone, they would probably get exposed in free casting/thin sign scenarios. They ain’t gonna keep burning the woods up in no sign. I’m ok with that.

I have ran the gamut on catch dogs. Pits, AB’s, Dogos, staghound crosses, etc. I prefer an athletic catch dog that handles well, first shot accurate, with the wind to recover between catches. I like them to be able to catch hogs in an open pasture or as a lead in. I’ve seen outstanding dogs in all of the breeds. So far, I like small framed AB females & the 3/4 bulldog, 1/4 stag hound.


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t-dog
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« Reply #6 on: February 17, 2023, 10:49:40 pm »

Shotgun I like the fact that you know exactly what you want. I also agree that a dog, no matter the job or breed has to be consistent.


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Shotgun66
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« Reply #7 on: February 19, 2023, 04:56:29 am »

Thanks TDog. It sounds like we all went through some common experiences to get some balanced dogs that can consistently stop hogs in the county we turn them loose in without taking too much damage.
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Highwater- Kudos to you for investing time & money into dogs for your son. A quality set of dogs to make your hunts enjoyable is hard to put a price on.

NLA - your speaking the truth about the type of dogs required to stay in the game for the long haul. I’ll pass on the vet bills, abbreviated hunts, & educated hogs that come along with alligators!


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Leon Keys
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Austesus
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« Reply #8 on: February 20, 2023, 07:24:38 pm »

One of my favorite books as a kid was Where The Red Fern Grows, and it really gave me a burning desire to have hunting dogs. As a kid and a teenager I was always training yard dogs and had some experience messing with some of my uncles bull dogs. When I came back from BCT and AIT I got my first dog that was MINE. A 6 month old bulldog off of my uncles stock. He was just a house dog at the time but I really enjoyed putting a good handle on him. When I met my now wife, and we started dating, I was browsing Craigslist one day and found an ad for some Ladner Black Mouth Curs. I was 19, she convinced me that if I really wanted to try to get in to hunting dogs I should just buy one and try it.

I made the call, went and got one, and then went back and got another littermate. Those dogs didn’t amount to a whole lot but it gave me a good connection with the guy that got me really going with hog dogs. We are no longer on good terms but back then he taught me a lot and took me under his wing. I would hunt with him every weekend and would handle dogs and just watch and learn. We walk hunted, and would hunt for 12+ hours almost every time we went, often walking 15-20 miles on a hunt. He didn’t like talking on a hunt, so I just stayed quiet and tried to learn by observation or asking a question here and there. He liked “silent and violent” dogs. He was a very good outdoorsman and just had a knack for knowing exactly where to go to put the dogs in good sign and catch pigs. Back then he caught 500-600 hogs a year with a lot of them being big teeth, and that was more than anyone else I knew about. He hunted 5-6 days a week as a full time job and made his living by training dogs for guys and by starting and selling dogs after they had been on a few hundred pigs. He would occasionally sell a nice finished dog as well, but rarely would keep one long enough to really finish it out. His enjoyment came from making dogs, and so his yard was a constant revolving door of dogs.

I got my first good dogs from him, they were off of a super cold nosed long range Ladner  BMC bred to a game pit. That Ladner was a freak dog that was on a different level from anything else I had seen. The off spring of that litter were hell on wheels and came out like clones of each other. I watched a lot of them in the woods and always liked them. I got two of them from him, and started my own pack of dogs. Fast forward a few years and almost all of those dogs had been killed from being so rough. Quite a few of them were killed before they were 2-3 years old. Everyone that had those dogs loved them, and there were some random scatterbred breedings off of them but nobody had really bred them with a purpose. After multiple setbacks I realized that if I wanted to keep myself in good dogs consistently I was going to have to breed them myself because nobody around me had an actual plan or a breeding program. I started making an effort to turn it in to a legitimate line, and I have really taken a passion in the breeding and genetics side of things.

Up until this past year I was only able to walk hunt, and I loved very very rough dogs. What attracted me to them was a lack of races, and the warrior aspect of a dog that isn’t afraid to fight like a savage and give it everything he has to do his job to the best of his abilities. There was just something about that kind of dog that commanded respect in my eyes. I had not seen hardly any dogs have success by baying on the properties I was hunting, which were dogged very hard for years.

With that being said, my Ranger dog that I bred and raised off of unrelated stock, changed my mind. He showed me the benefit of having a dog with a LOT of bottom, that was a one dog show. He would stop them, and then back up and bay until you got there and told him to catch it or another dog got there and then he would catch out with them. He made me a believer in a bay dog that had enough bite to quit the running problem. He was killed last year, which left me with nothing as far as good going grown dogs outside of the best gyp on my yard which is very rough stock. I currently have a litter on the ground off of my rougher stock, that is bred very well in my mind, but I’m not sure if I’m going to stick with them.

I recently got a well bred female pup (Thomas you know the pup I’m referring to) that should be closer to what I was looking for with my Ranger dog. I have really got to where I would prefer the deep hunting solo bay dog over anything else. Today I brought home a dog from the same fella and the same line (with an outcross) by the name of Doc (Thomas I believe you’re in the loop on that one as well). I’m very excited to put him in the woods. I refuse to be kennel blind and although I have greatly enjoyed this rougher stock, and I have really enjoyed trying to learn and work on the breeding and genetics side of them, I am now in a position where I may be able to have dogs that better suite the bill for me. I am unsure of the future for the rough dogs. I may keep a few for catch dogs, I may keep some for smaller properties, or I may cut my ties with them completely and place them all with friends. I currently have 9 pups on the ground that are a week old so I’m not sure what exactly the plan is for them.

But, I have learned a lot from this forum over the years and I believe in staying a student, so if the new blood is outperforming the old blood, then it will likely be time to cut ties and move forward with my yard. I imagine many of us have started in the same position of just using the best dogs that we could get our hands on at the time. Either way, I’m having a slow start but 2023 will be a good year for making some new dogs!


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t-dog
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« Reply #9 on: February 21, 2023, 07:53:19 am »

Austesus I’m glad you have those two. I hope you get what you need out of it. I never hunted with the Doc dog but I know both parents. I know he’s been through some mishandling so I’m hoping your patience and direction will be what it takes to put him back on course. If he’s true to his ancestry, he’ll have brains and drive. That should get him back to his previous self. As for the pup, I have extremely high hopes for those. I know the same cross only flip flopped created a really solid litter of go getters. Hopefully yours turns out the same.


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Austesus
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« Reply #10 on: February 21, 2023, 10:05:46 am »

I sure hope so. I believe I can get Doc going good again. After hearing what he was going through with treatment and handling I think he just needs some TLC. Just after getting
him to the house and spending some time with him he has warmed up to me a lot. He was very timid at first and he’s already wanting me to pet all over him. I think he just needs to come out of his shell and get treated better than he was before. He for sure has a lot of motor in him. I’m hoping he will be a good puppy trainer for this gyp I’ve got.


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Cajun
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« Reply #11 on: February 21, 2023, 03:33:20 pm »

  I started with cur dogs, Catahoulas that were used on free ranging cows and hogs. Didnt know how lucky I was to fall in with a couple of those guys. Sal Smith gave me a 8 month old leopard male and he was a natural. A lot of times we would have to listen for a hog to squeal to know where he was.. Got some tracking collars in the early 80's and then I could keep up with him. Had all day bottom. Crossed him on a Robert L. Hobgood gyp that was Mason bred and got some pretty good pups. I had started hunting bear and had gotten into Plotts. Around 2000 my last good Catahoula just could not reproduce himself and to be fair to him, we never bred him to anything in his caliber. So I just stuck with the Plotts mostly because they were as hardheaded as I was. The first couple of years I was trying Plotts I just could not find anything that suited me and I thought they were the sorriest breed going. Finally got a dog from Joe Hudson and that set the bar. Went thru several Weems bred dogs and they were pretty sorry and that is when Weems meant something. Finally found another Weems bred gyp and she was everything a Plott was supposed to be. I mixed some Swampland Plotts in and that is what I have been breeding for almost 40 years.
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Bayou Cajun Plotts
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Austesus
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« Reply #12 on: February 21, 2023, 03:40:18 pm »

Cajun, how do you like your current Plotts compared to your original catahoulas? Are the Plotts better dogs overall, or do you just prefer their style, etc.?


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Cajun
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« Reply #13 on: February 21, 2023, 05:28:49 pm »

  I have had a couple of Catahoulas that would compare very well with my Plotts but they were exceptions. If my Plotts did not have the nose as good as Dawg or a couple of others they were culled. In a lot of hogs they were much better at relaying then the Plotts altho I have had some Plotts that were very good at relaying. After that last male cur dog that I had, it was just easier to get good dogs out of the Plotts. My current dogs have everything I like in a Plott. Nose, speed, grit and hunt. I hunt them anyway you can hunt a hog. I cast, track hunt, they are exceptional rig dogs. They are not perfect and sometimes leave me scratching my head but most of the time they suit me.
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