Coon Hounds & Coon Hunting.........
 

We watched the Westminster Dog Show last night and the 1st Class was Hounds. They had a Blue Tick, a Red Bone, a Black & Tan and I think a Walker Hound as well as Beagles & a Basset, a Blood hound and various Wolf Hounds.They had a bunch of Sight Hounds too. But I never hunted with any of those.
I grew up with Beagles & Bassets. DDad loved to Rabbit Hunt. We always had 2 or 3 or more rabbit Hounds around the place.
Our neighbors & Cousins were all Coon Hunters. I've spent many a day following those rabbit dogs across the SE Indiana hills. Many times getting our limit on rabbits. I've spent more than a few days, shooting Bob-white quail, over some good bird dogs.too.

And, I have spent many a night chasing those Coon Hounds through the night, over fences, through sloughs & creeks, and over those hills. It's a Sport you just gotta Love, to stay with it very long. You get all muddy, wet & cold. But.......It's the thrill of the Chase. I kinda miss it, even if I am too Old & out of Shape, for it now.

I haven't seen anything on the Forums about Coon Hunting, any other kind of Hunting, with good Gun Dogs. Does anyone on the Forums do that kind of Sport, nowadays?

In the Great Outdoors section they will sometimes talk of coon hunting. We own 4 coondogs, 3 Walkers and an English Red Tick.

http://forums.ukcdogs.com/index.php?

http://coondawgs.com/forum/

These are two sites that are pretty good and deal with coon dogs as well as other hunting dogs. Hope this helps!

John, you might not realize how moving those words are, because I could have written them myself.

I spent many weekend nights of my teenage years hanging out with my uncle and cousin while listening and following a black and tan in the woods.

I watched the groups at Westminster as well, interested in the hounds because I'm looking for a "retired" Bluetick or English Redtick, either something that is being placed because it doesn't have a strong enough hunting drive or is too old/arthritic to keep up and needs a retirement home. I had a friend years ago that showed Bloodhounds and Bassets and another friend that had Borzoi who showed and also did lure coursing with them. Watching the hounds, I found the Plott Hound interesting ... first year they have been recognized, I believe they said.

I've never owned a hound myself, but years ago in Nevada, I rode with some people a couple of times who hunted mountain lion in the mountains with hounds ... mostly black and tan dogs, as I recall. A few times went with a cousin who had a friend that ran coon hounds.

I do enjoy listening to them. We have someone that drives on the paved road just below our farm and has a Bloodhound who rides shotgun, with his head out the window, baying all the way.

I have hunted rabbits and jackrabbits with my whippets and Ibizan hounds. This would have been in Wisconsin, Illinois, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas, years ago. The dogs did all the work and I didn't have to shoot anything (not opposed to shooting, just not good at it). Try it, you might like it!

These were dogs bred for racing, coursing, and hunting, not show or pet dogs.

Peg

I have been coonhunting since I was 8 yrs old, I guess that makes 52 yrs. Not color blind , I run what tree's bluetick and walker mostly. I also start pups for people. I have coon hunted form Ala to Texas-Kansas-Mo-MS-La-Ga-Tenn-Ky-Indiana- Va-WV-SC-NC.

We raise black and tans, red bones, bloodhounds, and crosses of those. We do hunt coon, but also bobcat, cougar, bear, coyotes. We do have a state license to track animals known to cause agricultural damage. In Oregon, they (dumb city people) made it illegal to hunt regular season with hounds, and as a result, predator populations have skyrocketed, and many people are losing livestock to cats that never had problems before. The dumb city people have cougars walking in their neighborhoods. There is a bill currently in process to repeal the ban. We are hopeful. When we could freely run our dogs, we would tree lots of cats - once - and those cats moved on to less populated areas. Now they aren't afraid of dogs, including livestock guardians, and are also decimating our native deer and elk populations.

Redbones and walkers have hot noses, blue tixs and blacks have colder. They work great together. The bloodhound crossed in makes them relentless. The dogs are pack trained but we pay attention because different dogs are better suited for different animals. We start pups for other people and do quite a bit of field trials. We send a lot of pups back east, where the powers that be aren't so dumb about predator control. Hounds rock. Most people don't realize how affectionate, gentle, downright goofy and fun they can be. They are awesome family dogs, and it's a myth that they can't control their urges to run off. Ours are not kenneled, and we typically keep 8-10 dogs at a time.

Two of our boys
http://h1.ripway.com/nehalem/hounds1.JPG

We had Blueticks for years, and our friend that we hunted with had Black and Tans. Sure do miss hunting. Loved taking nice long walks in the woods at night and listening to the dogs. Figures the first time in years that I didn't get to watch the dog show they would finally have a blue dog on.

My brother had some treeing walkers. I went with him coon hunting and the dogs did real well. I was impressed.

Oh my, you sound like my father-in-law. I don't know the first thing about coon dogs, but he had two world champions years ago or maybe even more. I don't know for sure, but his house is full of trophies!

All of my in-laws go coon hunting and have either bluetick or black and tans coonhounds. We had to put down our older mutt-terrier that my husband hunted with. He's talking about getting a beagle this go round as he prefers rabbit and squirrel hunting over coon hunting.

Go with a mountain cur for squirrel. They're bred for that. Beagles are bred mostly for rabbits. Never heard of a beagle treeing squirrels.

-I used to coon hunt when I was still in school. I had a Walker. I always called it a Tennessee Walker, but found out later that it was a Treeing Walker. She was a good dog and I loved to hear her bawl when she was hot on the trail. With the river, creeks and old Ohio-Erie canal running through where I grew up, we had coon heaven there. Haven't done any kind of hunting in years though.

L8R,
Matt

No advice as mine have only ever hunted the best spot on the couch :rolleyes:

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a2...eandcletus.jpg

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a2...121/shiloh.jpg

i coon hunted for years, have had beagles all my life. i hunt my beagles all year. i have a Mt. Fiest i squirrel hunt & a very good German Shorthair i bird hunt with. i dont hunt unless its with a dog.

DH used to coon hunt, we had a coupke of Walkers. I really loved those hounds and would have another in a heartbeat. IF I didn't already have 5 dogs....

My DFIL & DH raise black and tans, & DD9 is really becoming interested in the sport enough to pursue it seriously. We have eight right now including a litter of five that were born in October. They do it strictly for the enjoyment anymore because it is just not worth it to collect the hides around here anyway. Because of that, when they hunt the dogs it is really just coon harrassment as opposed to hunting, but some local farmers appreciate their efforts just the same.

I too coonhunted all my life, up till we moved to the upstate of SC.
Spent many a night following my blueticks thru Pee Dee swamp.
Had a great stud dog out of Grand American Champ Carolina Chip.
Lots of Hammer blood, you bluetick people know what I'm talking about.
When he passed on to the woods in the sky I loss a lot of my coonhunting drive, then after moving up here I just never got back in it. To many highways to lose good dogs on. Sure do miss it thou. Great memories......

Hank

http://www.doublemfarmandchuckwagon.webs.com

I like to hear the dogs in the night. But only at a distance. I sure hope nobody ever moves in next door to me with a pack of hounds.

I've run coyotes with Borzoi, Salukis, and Deerhounds.

Coyotes have no respect for dogs, so it is a hoot to see the coyote loafing away, and then looking over his shoulder and seeing the hounds coming down on him like a freight train. It's just like a Warner Bros cartoon. The coyote does a double take, his eyes bug out, and then he kicks in the afterburners, to no avail.

Even a big head start won't save him A Deerhound can keep up their top speed for a couple of miles over rough ground.

You're right! I asked my husband and he said "no honey, the beagle is for rabbits and I would probably get a feist or something similar for squirrels".

:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

I dunno, mine does. And he points birds too. Whatever trail is the hottest. We haven't worked him for any of it - but about a month after we move to a place there is not a squirrel to be found. Then the bunnies finally take the hint and start moving to a lower pressure area at which point he takes to pointing birds. He prefers rabbits, but will take what he can get and I'm sure if we dedicated any time to "Yes, we want you to hunt squirrels" he'd be pretty good at it.

Hi all. Hubby is an avid hunter of all and everything. Although, he says that beagles and almost all breeds will hunt if something runs in front of it, prey drive and all that. He is currently working out a deal with a buddy for a "squirrel dog". Most times, it is a terrier of some kind, Rat, Manchester, Jack Russel, etc. We met rabbit hunting, he had and still has, the best rabbit dogs. He also got me into fox hunting. Not the kind on horseback. We have Walker dogs, same as coon hunters. Unfortunately, like someone else said, we can no longer hunt on the "outside" - running the hounds through the farm land. People who move out to the country, buy 2 acres of land, and think they own the entire countryside. But that's another topic. We now hunt in fox pens. Large tracts of land fenced in, and the dogs are judged for speed, trailing, tracking etc. It is really a great time and the fox is not killed. I love to hear the hounds especially when they are first turned loose. Hubby has a bumper sticker, "Once the tailgate drops, the BS stops" Take care, Rebel

I hunt humans with my bloodhounds...

Search and rescue dogs. My girl has 2 capital murder conviction assists, and 3 Alzheimer's walkaway finds. My boy hasn't had a find other than training due to few callouts these days (he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer,) but he's got a heck of a nose on him. Fortunately, few missing persons out my way in the past few years...

The bassett hound is our vertically challenged bloodhound. She's also the most opinionated of the lot. Oddly enough, we found her while conducting testing for search and rescue a few summers ago. She's definitely a daddy's dog, drapes herself over DH and refuses to leave him.

I have a couple of neighbors who hunt coyotes with walker hounds.They start the hunt with two real rough looking tough old dogs and they have six other dogs they use.They tag team them-----when one pair gets tired they release a second pair.They run the coyote until he can't go anymore.It is a sight to behold.Another neighbor thought he would try it.He turned his dogs onto a coyote and they took off,pretty soon here they came running to the truck with a coyote hot on their tails.Talk of the neighborhood for a while.

When I was breeding Rottweilers I used to work with a search and rescue group locally. Very interesting training and fascinating work. I never got to the point where I had a certified search dog, but one I raised that went to Colorado was the first Rottweiler to be certified as a search and rescue dog in that state.

Several of my dogs went into police departments (as personal dogs but used with the small local departments) and they had basic search training as well.