EAST TEXAS HOG DOGGERS FORUM

Well let me start with my three main dogs. They went from finding hogs with no problem and not trashing at all, to trashing and not finding any hogs. Then theres my two younger dogs ive raised from pups and were getting really good and now theyre trashing even after trash breaking them. Ive used several measures of breaking them from this some more severe than others. Nothing has seemed to work.  These dogs had a good reputation and now theyve become a pure embarrasment. Need some sugestions before I get rid of all of them.

What kind of hog numbers do u have. I have trashy dogs as well. I find that mine prefer to run hogs but when the hogs get scarce they trash lots more. If I hunt a place with good numbers or good sign regular they don't trash. Lay off very long or numbers and sign get low and it's back to square one.


Shotgun
Arkansas

It generally varies. The place I went yesterday was over run with hogs and they did the same thing.

A couple notes:

1) Most of us have had some type of similar experience, not matter how long we've been hunting....you are not alone.

2) You are your own worst critic and you are probably judging yourself pretty hard.  I bet if you went out and caught a giant boar tomorrow, you would keep the dogs that found him.

3) Starting over and being back at square one, doesn't necessarily mean you will be better off.  Some of the best dogs I've seen were trashy at some point.  Some dogs just have so much hunt that their nose and desire to run and bay/catch takes over.

4) Before you do anything...wait a little longer.  Some people say "doing nothing is not an option".  I say in some scenarios " doing nothing is the best option".  Keep trying the dogs.  Do something different or switch places or partners.

Don't know if this helps....if none of this works, I guess start over. 

What are they trashing on? Anything and everything or 1 animal in particular?

Hoghunter71409 you're right I am pretty hard on my self. I'm still pretty new at this hog hunting thing and I get pretty aggravated when my dogs don't act right after all the time I've put into them.  And justincorbell, they only trash on armodillos, nothing else. Only thing I haven't tried is a shock collar. I've tried everything else I've been told. Just haven't been able to afford a shock system.

my buddy's dogs are some of the best ive hunted behind, and they go through stages where they trash on armadillos too. ive always been told that armadillos have a similar scent to a hog, im not sure if its true, but it makes since considering your dogs and my buddy's dogs will ONLY trash on armadillos.

Dillers smell just like a pig and our young dogs trash on them occasionally. Best thing that has worked for us and has been a long time trash breaking technique is let them go ahead and catch it. When it kills it take a piece of mule tape and tie that driller to the dogs collar and let it ride the dog for a week or so. I promise you that dog will hate a driller so bad after that it wouldn't bat an eye at one the next time you run across one.

my dad had a ab that would chase all his chickens and kill them. so he zip tied a dead chicken to his collar and left it on there until it stunk so bad that you could smell it as soon as you went in the back yard. me being the son, my dad had me go cut it off, the daggum dog picked it up and finished eating what was left and went after another chicken! needless to say, my dad built a chicken coop the next day haha

that's funny

Junior Seffern, I've been told that trick by several people. Really been worried about that smell. But I guess it's worth a shot. Thank you.

It works but it does stink! It's worth a week or so of stench for a broke dog though

Cooter56, im sendin you a pm.

Just lettum kill all them dillers and get em out of the way. That's what an ol timer told me he did when his coon dogs trashed on possums.

Wish dillo's was all mine trashed on. Atleast they don't bay them they just kill em.


Shotgun
Arkansas

I always look at a armidllos kinda like a dollar bill the wind is blowing. If you see a dollar bill blowing your gonna chase it! That's the way dogs see armadillos! Maybe you need to go out one night and leave the dogs at home take your 22 and kill a few or change the place your hunting to where there's more hogs than armadillos. Sounds to me like they are getting bored and just wanting to kill something. I know myself when I'm out hunting for a certain animal and not getting much action after awhile there's no animal safe!

The older two of my three main dogs will not bay at one in a hole, they just kill them and move on. But when its a bunch of armadillos back to back and no hog it gets old. My younger dogs will def bay at one in a hole, and even run one for a ways. I live and hunt in north florida and the hogs are plentiful but the armadillos are more plentiful. SCK, every time I see an armadillo I either shoot it with my 17 or run it over with my truck. Ive grown a pure hatred for the little daddy didn't marry mommys. Junior Seffern, Im def gonna try it. What can it hurt?

If you've killed one FOR your dogs, herein lies part of the problem......I killed a yote for mine because he was putting up a pretty good fight, BAD MOVE on my part!!!!

Ante up and get a shock collar.

This seems like some pretty good advice. There are times when I get impatient though not with dogs as much as when I'm deer hunting and squirrel hunting and nothing is safe like SCK said

Sent from my LG-P769 using Tapatalk

Try this.  Instead of just casting your dogs, put them on a lead and walk them over tracks or rooting and if you know they smell it, turn loose.  If I walk one of my hounds across a track and they dont pull on it or show me that they smell it, I load and go on. 

If they are winding or rigging, check and see if you think it is a hog.  If you have a lot of hogs, turn out on what you think is the freshest.  Some hogs will root all the way to the bedding area.  I would not cast dogs or put them on the ground until I was sure it was hog sign.  Keep feeding hog tracks and sign.

And...its okay to get frustrated with dogs.  We all do!  Just keep hutning them.  Nobody on here or anywhere else has perfect dogs.

I bet my dogs would like to trade me out and start from scratch to sometimes!!!!

hoghunter71409 thanks for the advice. It makes alot of sense. And to think of it they dont trash as bad if its really fresh sign.

I dont let mine out the box or off the rig chain unless I see tracks or sign.  If I did, Id have deer races and coyote chases all the time.  Even the best of dogs get off game sometime, just becuase they want to run, bay and catch game.

Good advice guys, in my opinion, a dog that'll find deer or dillers and run em'll do the same to pigs, just consistency with getting em on pigs and correcting them when they trash. Hate to see people ruin good dogs with electricity. Training collars are a great tool but you can also cause one  to not hunt at all.

Using an e collar on a trashing dog is the quickest way I think to break a dog from trashing. I know you said you don't have one but maybe you could borrow one or pick one up pretty cheap some where. The little cheap ones work fine for these situations because normally you are pretty close to them if you know they are trashing on an armadillo. Just use your brain when using the shock collar. I do believe a dog can be ruined with one so be sure that you use it at that exact moment when they are in the wrong so that there is no mixed messages to the dog at all. My best dog was baying cattle really bad. I beat and banged and whooped with no ground gained. I put a collar on him and about two times of shocking him while in the act of baying cattle, he was done and will not even acknowledge them now. Just my two cents...Good luck bud

I'd like to thank everyone for their advice. There's a few tricks I've been told I haven't tried. Honestly this thread has made me have a different outlook on my dogs. Any other advice on the shock collar? I surely don't want to ruin them all together.

Cooter, you have 1.5 seconds to correct a dog. It takes a sober person 1.5 seconds to react to something that happens. I think you will have great results trying what I told you before. If you are interested in a shock collar I will tell you the only time I use it is when I can't get my dogs to break from hunting. They will sometimes come within 100 yes from me and catch an old track and go right back to hunting. At that point I can correct them with a shock and calling them to me...in my opinion this is the only correction a shocker is needed for while hunting. At work with our k-9's some of our shepards don't out, subsequently we run shockers on them to assist them with outing. Both of these situations we the human are in total control of and the reactionary time to correct a dog does not come into play as much. Good luck to you.

Junior Seffern, I'm def gonna try the least expensive means of trash breaking first. Just want to get an idea of the watch outs of using a shock collar.

I can assure you that if you shock a dog WHILE  they are crunching on an armadillo,  it will not ruin your dog lol......