anyone hunt ringtails in here?
 

just wondering if anyone coon hunted anymore...it seems like around here no one hunts anymore, all the old timers are gone and just a few of us left around lathrop that hunt..just wondering...season is almost open and my boys are wanting to get out! i've taked them a little since it's gotten cooler, but can't shoot em' out for them, soon as november 15th gets here we can!

Use to but I just Trap them now.

big rockpile

Raccoon "calling" Hunting
 

I use to raise bluetick hounds and had a few really good ones quite a few years back. I was injured and told by the doctors it be a few years before I would be able to go into the woods again. So I sold the dogs........two months later I had recovered and was in the woods, problem was I could not get my dogs back. Never found ones as good so I gave it up. I have trapped since I was eight years old so that became the main means to pursue the masked bandets. About ten or twelve years ago I got into calling the animals with moderate success. Since then I spice up my harvest season with one or two nights of this activity. Its a lot diffferent having animals hunting you than you hunting them. Good luck this season :hobbyhors Trapper

i do, but not the way you do. i use a greyhound mix & spotlight them. he either catches them on the ground or i drag him away from the tree.

There's still a lot of coon hunting around here but most of it is just competition hunting only. Hardly anyone kills a coon anymore with their dogs. Just tree'm and move on.

Hides are just too cheap over here in Oklahoma. All the northern and easterners get bought up first and that drives our prices down. No one thinks there worth skinning out.

However, there's big money in the competition hunts if you have a good registared coondog. I tried my luck at this with Walker hounds and just couldn't never get them trainned right. Plus, too fat to keep up with them.

If I ever get back into coon hunting it will be with something a little slower running then them Walker hounds. I like to hear a long bawl of a Black&Tan on the trail.

well it seems everyone around here spotlights them also, almost every dog i've tried in the woods was used for spotlighting(or ran deer and was sittin on the porch the next morning) most of the hounds were like that. the owner tells me "yeah go ahead and take him/her for the next week and try them before you buy" the next day they always went home, i finally gave up trying to find a good dog here, and went to nebraska and bought 2 B&T pups...boy it wasn't easy training them with out an older dog, but i did it! i also have a redbone, i proably shouldn't have done it but i crossed my B&T with her,came out with 14 pups last sunday evening, boy thats a pile of pups! 6 are B&T and 8 are redbones with black masks only 4 males in the bunch! I think i'm going to try the UKC test hunts at the end of this month, or in november...my grandpa used to run walkers and won a lot(on the real hunts) what i don't like is that you can't shoot the coon out for the dogs, mine are young and they need all they can get! never been on any nite hunts before, i might drive all the way down there and my boys end up looking like fools!!! that'd be my luck! they don't have any bad habbits (yet) until i go on that hunt!!! there are so many coons around here, they need to be thinned out a bit! my moms bluetick is almost a year old and we took her out a few nights ago, boy she sat down on a tree and before we got there she moved then sat on another a few yards away, then she moved again, she treed on five different trees we thought she was just being a pup and not trusting herself, nope there was a coon in every tree, little coons, but they were there! i was so happy, i didn't like the way she left the trees but i think she caught the coons on the ground and they all ran different directions, she's not a kill dog at all, but boy can she beller on a tree. man i can't wait until season opens and we can shoot em' out for the dogs! they deserve that reward!

the hides last year here weren't that bad, 15-20 for a large coon green hide, not too bad, heck you can make a lot of money just picking them up on the road, as long as they aren't coon burger. Is there money in nite hunts? i thought it was just for the title, my boys aren't good enough for the big "real" hunts thats why i thought i'd try the test hunts, and if they aren't good enough for that i'll be just as happy hunting them for the pleasure! I'm happy hunting anything! fall is my favorite season, no skeeters, ticks, spiders, and i can hunt all day and night,(as soon as the crops are out) deer, turkey, coons, squirrel, ya got bow season(deer or turkey)firearms season, furbearer, trapping...fall is the best!!

I know several people that take dogs out but mostly just for competition or practice for the dogs. No one really is interested in the hides...

[QUOTE= Is there money in nite hunts? i thought it was just for the title, !![/QUOTE]

Not a hole lot of purse money, but if your dog is good enough to get the so called big title "World champion grandnite champion pr.bred Smoking Joe,etc.etc." then it's much like having the winning horse at the Kentucky Derby. You'll have a dog that people will pay big bucks to have their dog bred by yours.

Back some 20 years ago I coon hunted with a fellar I went to high school with and he had just got back from some place in Georgia where he had taken his high dollar female coondog to have it bred by a Grnd Champion. He paid something like $2000, for the breeding. He figured he would get all of his money back including some extra off the pups.

Never did find out how he came out on that deal. But I darn sure wasn't gonna buy one of his pups.

whew! i bet those pups went for a lot! i don't think i'd ever pay that much for breeding! heck with 2000.00 i could buy more dog food!LOL!well i found out something when i took the boys out last night...they will not hunt if there is a man around! my dad went with us(mom and I) last night, they wouldn't do a thing! they have only had wemon influence, since they were pups, boy they were terrified of dad, and he's only seen them a few times. i'm going to have to get them used to men if i'm gonna try any UKC test hunt, that wouldn't be funny, take them all the way to sweet springs MO and have them sit at my feet! my mom's bluetick did the same thing, scared to death of dad! I know it's because he isn't sround them at all. well it doesn't matter much if my boys don't like men and never get used to men, won't hurt my feelings any! they'll hunt for me! less chance they'll get stolen off a tree, they'll see a man coming and turn runningLOL

I've hunted them ringtails all my life up until a couple of years back. I sold a real good dog and kept my best dog to hunt, Then she died, and like another poster said, looking for one to take her place is wasting time, it won't happen. She was every thing I wanted and then some, for a coon dog. In my humble opinion, nothing can come close to the pride and enjoyment of raising a coon hound puppy, work with and train the best you can and then on a cold December Night, you walk up to the tree where that same puppy you raised, Has his front feet proped on that tree and he is blowing the top out, telling the whole world that he is no longer a puppy but a COONDOG. Heres to you RED. :)

all i gotta say now is you are so right eddie buck! that was so nice to hear!

I still coon hunt, live just north west of you mandersgoaters, near maryville. problem around here is that everyone and there dog (haHa) has started trapping, for A. bobcats or B. thinking they will accidentally snag a mountain lion. I don't like to turn my hounds out on an area I know is being actively trap, good way to loose a good dog. Any how thats my $.02 worth. Happy hunting.

Jeez, are ya tryin' ta make me cry? 'Cuz it worked. :Bawling: It's been about 30 years since I've heard that sound. Gramps always had Redbones, always named Red. We tried other names, they just weren't right. The dogs and the man remain head & shoulders above the rest. I gotta get a tissue.

yes that is a problem, but thankfully all around here NO one hunts coon or traps them anymore...(the ones that do hunt spotlight them)i do some trapping, just for coons and muskrats (little pond ruiners!) there are so many coons around here i think maybe thats why my boys have a hard time locating one..or maybe they just suck!LOL last night mom took her bluetick out and she has a heck of a time, the girl taps on so many trees, but won't stay on the tree..mom said she's gonna have to work on that with her, boy she does have it in her i will say that much! she's a dedicated dog! every tree she tapped on had a coon in it! we checked after we too the dog home, don't want a spotlighter. we went back and got her, took her back ot where she FIRST tapped and sure enough she treed, and stayed treed! she's just young i htink and doesn't know she has to stay at the tree yet! but hopefully she will! now my boys whew...thats another can of worms!I wonder if they'll EVER take OFF!!!

chrisl...I meant to ask what kind of hounds do you hunt...got any tips on training?LOL i need all i can get!

Blueticks, and on you female tapping trees be patient. If you are on an ole sow coon with a litter, that sow will put them kittens up in different trees, before she goes up. The kitten coons don't have as strong of smell as the old sow. I've seen hounds get into these deals and if you wait alot of the time they will work it out and tree the ole sow. After I had the ole sow treed, and if it were season dead, I would try to work the hound back by the trees with the kittens with out spot lighting any of them. I've seen hounds over the years tap 5 trees close by sit down on one finally and tree, we shot that coon out, the hound makes sure it has a dead coon then goes back to the last tap tree, trees and so on and so forth until it has got all five coons. So next time this happens give the hound some time and see what happens, if you can get her trained to go back, you will have one heck of a coon hound.
chrisl

I took one of my boys out yesterday morning after the hard rain, it was 3AM and we didn't get in until daylight!he did really good! all by himself, and he could hear the other one barking and howling, but he never paid one bit of attetion to him! he's getting better, he even barked on track this time..but as MY luck would have it the coon was in a hole in the ground!(it was steaming so i know the little buggar was there!) but thankfully he knew he couldn't tree him, he knew he couldn't get him...I didn't have too hard of a time leading him away from the hole, but i know he went back and checked it! mand why couldn't that buggar get up a tree! Ah well thats hunting, one of theese night's were gonna get a hot one up a tree! and that'll turn my boys switches on!

Still lots us coon hunters down here in Alabama, I hunt 3-4 nights a week from Sept to june, give the dogs the summer off when it get too hot to hunt.

Used to. just so ---- many new houses going up with ignorant city people now that it isn't worth the hassle.

We took the dogs out last night to get them in shape. Mikey ( walker coonhound) had one treed in 2 minutes flat. Nice looking one too. Then he had another treed about 5 minutes after we took him off the first tree. This one was big and fat too. Can't wait til we can shoot them here in another 2 weeks. He does so love to fight them coons :) Mindy however ( the blue tick/walker) is useless when it comes to treeing but she sure does love a good fight. To train your dogs I would trap one in a haveahart trap and then take the dog over there, let it bark at the coon, on lead, let the coon go and then let the dog go shortly after. Then if it keeps running off the tree, tie it up close to the tree, let it bawl its head off, and praise that dog like crazy. lf they are any good they will learn real quick. Also we use to drag a coon hide all over the yard on a string and let the pups chase it. Mikey is an awesome coon dog and would trade him for anything. Good coon dogs are hard to find so if you got one, take good care of it.

My mom's bluetick's light got turned on last night!!!she's not a pup anymore she's a coondog! treed 2 coons!! i was so proud of her! man there's nothin' like hearing your pup open up and blow the top out of a tree!!!!