Grit

[Austesus]

I agree with both of you, Slim and Judge. Most guys around here are running a lot of dogs on the ground and I’ve seen some that people thought were rough, but they’re only rough when they have help. To me that’s no different than a bay dog that helps a bulldog catch. My version of rough is such that the dog doesn’t need a team with him to fight. My dogs will catch one by themselves. Dum Dum hung several trophy boars with no other dogs around, and I have had others that will do the same. He was out of a pair of dogs that were bred 3 different times. Out of those 3 liters every one of them made a dog, obviously some better than others, but they were all hog dogs. Out of all those dogs I can only think of 3 or 4 that are still alive. Almost all of them have been killed because they were suicidal. Dum Dum was that perfect in between but I never got to breed him.

I do think dogs tend to get cut less if you are running a bigger pack of true rough dogs. 4-6 REAL rough dogs will control a pretty big pig. I have killed several big boars that didn’t even cut a dog because they were caught on both ears, the nose, and the sides of the face. They didn’t have much ability to move around and fight. A lot of this goes back to a dog being intelligent in my opinion as well. I used to hunt with a RCD that was a really nice bulldog but he was dumb. He would stick step for step with a lead dog and was a hammer. Every single set of teeth we caught he would get cuts all over his chest because he would grab a ear and then lay across the pig so they were face to face and the pig would just go to work underneath him. I called it early on that he would get killed, the guy that owned him didn’t run any cut gear on the dog. He ended up getting killed by a huge boar that probably weighed between 400-450. Biggest body pig I’ve ever caught, and the dog more than likely would have died no matter the circumstances because he was only with one loose baying dog that wouldn’t touch a pig and they had that pig stopped for hours before we could get there. Bulldog got killed and the other dog kept the pig bayed until we got there. Long story that I won’t post here and I don’t hunt with that guy anymore.


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[l.h.cracker]

1-2 grown dog's and 1 young dog on the ground at the time for me.I really prefer 1 and 1.I understand that sometimes people have to bring their dog's to and it gets a bit crowded but even then I generally will not turn mine loose and take turns.I can't stand a giant cluster of uncontrollable dogs.Luckily my boat holds 4 dog's and one spot is for a bulldog.I do have buddies that have looser baying dogs and 4-5 dogs will still bay a hog and that's cool to.I really don't like chewed up hogs I see pictures of hogs faces chewed off, legs chewed up, missing eyes, that stuff is ridiculous to me.I know it happens on shoalts sometimes but not mature hogs.I believe if you're gonna kill the hog do it as quickly and humainly as possible.A hog being held by the ears and stuck is not the same as being mauled by 6 - 9 bulldogs or bulldog crosses.I hunt places where hogs have to be killed too and get it but there's a right way to do it imo.I also agree that you can't judge a dog when there's a dang half dozen plus on the ground.If I can't drop a dog by itself and find and bay a hog without help than it don't live here Period.Even when I ran straight catch dog's they had better been tough enough to do it Solo.But to each their own I reckon.

[l.h.cracker]

Maybe I shouldn't have posted that I was feeling crotchety this morning lol.

[WayOutWest]

Can't say you're wrong tho.

[The Old Man]

I've been fooling with these dogs for lots of years, and the hardest thing to get right "for what I like" is one that is rough enough when he needs to be and not too rough the rest of the time. I want one to never put a tooth in anything that will stand bayed or drive without running off but still hang it on something that breaks then let it alone if it stands to fight or heads back to the bunch. I kill anything that will catch baby calves (have only had 2 in 38 yrs). By the not too rough the rest of the time I mean one snatchin and grabbin around a bunch that is standing bayed, or trying to shut stock down that I am driving, since I leave my dogs working up front when driving stock. I can usually get one to back up as needed but they are still not a natural lead dog. It's really all about position and pressure/how much and when to or not to if they are in the right position. It applies to cattle and hogs. Sure you can get by with a grabby dog on a bigger bunch in fairly open places but put that same dog on a small snorty bunch where it is rough and you will wind up getting them one at a time.  Ever wonder why you don't get many rallies on hogs these days ?
Now if you are catching single outlaws and gonna have to load'em on the nylon turn the catchy dogs out (most dogs learn that game anyway and want to catch singles) and for hogs if he's gonna be rough he needs to be committed to sure enough stopping that boar and not be picking at and pinching constantly while bayed. Lots of different preferences and styles we just have to pick one and not try to mix'em.

[Slim9797]

Old man that’s kinda where I’m at these days. Try to treat hogs the same as cattle and my expectations for a dog don’t change much when it comes to using them on one or the other. Not this past year but 2019 we bayed 31 rallies on the year in around maybe 100 hunts. I had 4 dogs really jammin like I wanted them to that year. I still think most hogs will bay sooner rather than Meyer if you give em a chance too.


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[Judge peel]

My loose dogs have good grit but they use it to bay that only comes from brains

[The Old Man]

On the same lines as this thread I'll tell a recent tale. Saturday my wife and I went to pen two sets of cattle for a guy over west of here about 40 miles, he told me he had between 5 and 6 hundred of cows but he wanted a set of 60 pairs penned on one place and a set of 28 pairs on another. So I commented to him these must be the bad ones, he responded no just the closest ones to you. We get there about 8:00 and get started, there was a small group about 600 yds from the pens and there was a ragged barb wire lane from the pasture to the pens, pretty much all flat clear and open. I figured it was gonna be an easy gather. That small group let me know these cattle were terribly pen sour, we "finally" got the small group in and cast dogs towards the back of the place and the rest of the cattle, they went together pretty good and quit trying to break away as a group after a half dozen attempts so we started moving them around a little, "I was riding a very green horse so wasn't able to quickly respond". we got them up to the mouth of that half mile long lane and those cattle were scared to death of it, took us 45 minutes or more to get them to take that lane, but we did finally get them penned. The hired hands then informed me that last year they had a guy bring some rough dogs in there and they never did get them bunched much less penned, they roped and tied down over 30 head of them, that was the best an entire crew of men and catchy dogs could do. Now my wife and I were there over 3 hrs total but just she, me on a two handed horse, and some dogs that do decent job at staying shaped up did get them all penned. On to the next group.
They took us to the next pasture gonna leave us gathering and go finish working and haul some out of the first place, they had told us that the pens here were terrible, just barb wire and some old beat up panels, I wondered how they would keep then in once we penned them, they said not to worry but there was this one cow the boss said he definitely wanted out of there, I figured she was a real outlaw. There was a lane on this place as well and these cattle bunched up and went in there real easy "pleasant surprise" got up to the ragged pens and the cow they wanted for sure crawled through the lane fence, we eased the others around and got them in the pen. The other cow hung around close coming and going, she had a big calf in the little pen, Lisa and I stayed with the pen guarding the old barbed wire parts of it to prevent any others from crawling out until the hands could get the trailers there to haul them out of there to a pen they could sort and work them in. When they showed up they got two big trailer loads out of the pen and what was left were able to be closed up in the stronger part of the pen. I had told them it cost more to catch cattle than to pen them and they called the boss he said catch her, so I swapped Lisa horses, left the dogs in the trailer, with it being mostly open and flat I figured I could get a decent run at her and catch her without eating her up any. When the cow saw me she headed out, I was able to ride around her and haze her back sort of towards the pen at high speed, the next time she veered off I roped her, she was a black bald faced eared cow with horns. She wanted to fight some, with it being open and her horn roped that made it easy to get the 5 or 6 hundred yards  over there to my trailer, I didn't think we could keep her in the pen so loaded her in my trailer. Lisa on the green horse couldn't help any except make the cow go if she stopped but we got her to the trailer, dogs in the front section, the cow tried to go around the trailer I guided her to the door, she quit the door and made a pass at me, I got her wound around again and she was back at the trailer door shaking her head at the dogs and loaded herself haha. When they got back with the other trailers I backed up to to one of them to off load her. We were finished, the hired hand said "man I will get home before midnight this time" haha apparently it is really western whenever they gather and work any of this old fellows cattle.  He had asked how these were to gather as they had never saw a dog before.

[chestonmcdowell]

My possum dog will stop one pretty good but will then give the hog enough room to not feel threatened my gyp on the other hand will stop one and continue to put unneeded pressure on the hog until it breaks probably the reason she ran one 2 miles by her self today. I hate it because she is actually a decent dog but it’s trouble when she shows up a lot of broke bays. Half of me wants to give her away or retire he but she’s a good team player. Just getting tired of running hogs. She ain’t got the ass to back it up either she’s kind of on the older side, I wish I knew the stories of the scars she has. My lead dog ranger idek how he stops hogs he’s not fast and will not touch one until the cd gets there he’s kind of like an annoying flea that after you run off just all the sudden pops up and starts baying his head off you run and hide and he just pops up again. It’s about that time of the year where I can really start hunting my young dogs hard and get them going they will put teeth on one. but I’m starting to figure out less is more but what I hate about this sport is your always training the next ones replacement they can’t learn nothing at home. It even seemed like  I had less running hogs when I used to run ranger will a July that wouldn’t even bay but she stayed by his side and she was faster than a bullet.

[Austesus]

Lh, I agree with you. 99% of people around here run big groups of dogs that are rough. I used to always run 4-6 myself, but now I’ve shifted my way of thinking and I’m starting to only run 2-3 dogs. The hard part is making sure dogs are getting hunted since I don’t hunt as much as I used to with not having a ton of time at the moment. I’ll ramp up a little once deer season is out, and probably run just my lead dog with my 2nd best dog and let him get some more woods time and experience, so hopefully he’s able to run lead by spring time when I can start fooling with my 3 puppies. Then I will add one pup to them and rotate the pups out.


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