EAST TEXAS HOG DOGGERS FORUM

Ive been inspired by another thread. ;D

What would you folks consider hot, medium, and cold nosed to be?
I've got my own thoughts on this and they seem to differ from what I've seen in other post. I sure ain't claiming to be right now. I am just wondering what other folks think and how far off I am in my way of thinking.

What I think:

Hot - 0 - 4 hour track

Medium - 4 - 12 hour track

Cold - 12 hours plus

I've seen dogs take a 24 hour old track and put a hog at the end of it. I guess I consider them to be "super cold nosed" dogs.
What do you think?

ninja
 i would have to agree with your scale.

I would like to know how often people actually know that the hog they bayed, is the same one from the original track. I know that with my crummy old dogs, I have seen a hog come out of a canal, and they did not pick up the 10 minute track :o

Alan,

I'm glad at your age you still get inspired.  :D

I think this really depends on the climate, terrain, and a list of other things.  I hear guys out in Idaho talk about running a lion track that is 7 days old.  However, that is in the snow.  As you know, snow can lock a scent in where it will remain until the snow melts.  That being said, in the dry desert, I don't see the same dog, tracking 7 day tracks period.  Way too many variables to put a solid # on what cold, med., or hot tracks are.  I am a firm believer that you have to be in that situation to determine it for yourself.

JMO!!!!!!!

Josh

Thats a good question. Get into a place with lots of hog sign and who knows!?
Occasionally I cut dogs loose on a track from a hog that was sighted and thats the only way I can really tell for sure. Other than that Im just guessing. Reading sign, knowing hog movement, and the country Im hunting helps with the guessing but its still guessing.

Me too! Not much inspires me these days.lol.

Im inclined to agree with you also CBK. As much as I hate too. ;)
Its a lot to do with the moisture in and on the ground I think.

Ive seen dogs grind out an 8 plus hour old track in a river bottom and put a hog at the end of it. I've watched the same dang dogs in South Texas stroll right over scalding hot tracks that I witnessed a hog leave only minutes before, never giving it a second look. :o
The difference? Damp river bottom verses powder dry brush country.

Why are you always so dang loud when you give your opinion CBK? lol.

Soil makeup has a certain amount of variables to it as well.  It is not just moisture % in my mind (yes, it is a little mind).

IN MY OPINION, I CAN'T ANSWER THAT!!!!!!!!

4 hour track is a decent amount of time. We have put good dogs on the grou nd on a track that is min. old and not came out with the hog. Too many factors I think to really label a dog. My dogs wont touch anything that isnt fresh. I really doubt many people on here have a dog that will take and find a 12 hr track.

I really doubt many on here have seen a dog take a 4 hr old track.  Most places dogs like that aren't needed.

  The longest I've seen that I know for fact was 6 ish hours.  I saw the hogs and they criss-crossed the road in front of the truck 3 times over a half mile of driving.  We put Kevin O's Stoli dog on the track from the field where I first saw them.  She left out on the track and everywhere the hogs had crossed she would cross in front of us.  We caught 1, then she rolled out and we caught #2, then she rolled out and we caught the last one.  Then Kevin locked his keys in his truck as the blizzard started.  Lol

I would consider any track over one to two hours old to be cold a hog can, when he wants to, travel a long long ways at a walk in a single hour.  If a hog comes and eats at my feeder and beds down 30 yards behind it and they strike him 3 hours after the feeder threw corn well you see where I am going with this...
MG

How would someone put a time on a track?  I understand if you are sitting there the whole time and know exactly how long it has been since the hog passed.  I know it is probably just an estimate, but it seems it would be pretty easy to over estimate. 

there are so many variables that it is really hard to time.  I have seen my tracking dog find a hog after 23 hours.  then loose a trail after 2.  soil, vegetation, moisture, time of day, wind, all play a part, and probably a bunch of things i haven't mentioned.  Granted a tracking dog is not a hog dog, but the same basic concept applies.

Lance I will definitely agree that, too many variables to have a concrete answer on time.  The point I was trying to make with my previos post is that a hog can cover more country in an hour than a hog can make up given the opportunity.  I have watched hogs in west texas come to a feeder from over 2 miles away, stop eat and I would lose sight of them 2.5-3 miles away in the opposite direction.  All of this transpired in less then 30 minutes.  I have never hunted with a dog that could pick up a track and trail a group of hogs that far and have a cought hog at the end of it.  At the rate they were moving they would have been 10 miles away in an hour.  Most of the time where we hunt if a dog takes a track and follows it for more then .5 mile with the track really heating up or finding the hog then then they turn back and make a loop.  I have seen dogs impress the fire out of me and on the same hunt not be able to smell a hog that ran across the road 30 seconds ago.  There are alot of things that can't be explained when it comes to scent and tracking ability.
Matt

 Are you talking about a blood trailing dog.  If so, when they are trailing there, is physically something(blood) there.  Trailing a hog, they are just smelling they scent left behind.

Typical hill country hunt with no blood, just where a hog crossed the road on an avg day for temp, wind, dew and all the other many factors.

Hot - 0 - 1 hour track

Medium - 1 - 3 hour track

Cold - 3 - 6 hour track

I have followed some of the best hounds in this part of the country on hogs of several diff breeds, and 6 hours is the top where a hog can be assured at the end. Anything more than that and you are sure eoungh cold trailing which just means they know one was around and want to work it out but just cant.

My question would be if you are good eoungh to tell the age of a track to be 12 hours old why do you need a dog, trail it up your self.
Unless you are standing there watching the hog cross you dont know for sure how old a track is and as one said in a reply here, 4 hours on a hog can be many miles away.

  I could easily agree with this discription for most places I've hunted.

Thats pretty much the same as here.Takes a cold nosed dog to take a 4 hour old track,around here.Plus the dog would more than likely come accross another hog.

I would like to see a dog that could take a 24 hr track in the hill country or well in any country for that matter, just dont expect me to follow you unless he stays on the road................never mind on second thought leave him at home and we can hunt some hot/hot/hot nosed dogs and catch more hogs.

When I hunt in idaho with hounds I wont turn my dogs out unless I know the track is from within 24 hours or so, even then you have to stay with the dogs no matter what the terrain, idaho is not flat like texas, if you relesed a dog on a seven day old track you probably wont even get a bark out of the best hound on that old of a track.And if your best dog does take the track you will regret ever putting that dog on the ground, if your lucky the wolves wont find him before you can get a cat up a tree.The only way to really age tracks in Idaho is hunt fresh snow from the night before, when you cut a track and turn the dogs out you can be sure that it is fresh and your dogs have a chance of catching up and treeing the cat.
                                                                           Jason

yes,this is a blood tracking dog I am talking about.  One advantage he has over our hog dogs, is that when we are called out to track, we are normally looking for a hog/deer that is already dead, or wounded enough to bed up, or only hit superficially so we're not gonna find him anyway.  on almost all of the tracks we take, I am able to tell the age of the trail just by asking the hunter who took the shot.  On the 23 hour old one, It was shot the evening before and I just couldn't make it until the following evening.  The track was in a well shaded area, there had been a little dew the night before, and there had been no wind to blow the trail away.  It was late afternoon when we took the track, which is my favorite time, it just seems like the dog has a better time of it then.  It was also a pretty short trail.  started with blood there but it petered out which is why we got called in the first place. There are plenty of blood trail dogs that could take a 24 hr old trail almost anywhere, given the right conditions.

for example : http://www.texastrackers.com/stories/Hunter's%20164%20buck.htm

 I guess the two don't compare as well as I'd hoped.  I was just trying to agree with matt, with regard to how conditions can change things.  

i think it depends on the ground conditons...hard, soft, wet, dry, etc..

also, i think the weight and size of the hog matters too...bigger boars leave bigger and deeper tracks. Bigger boars have bigger smells.. :P

what do i know though...

my opinion... ;D

hot- 2 hrs or less...

medium- 3-6 hours...

cold- 7-24 hrs...

My dogs do well when they've been there in the last hour!! ;D :P

most my dogs do better on a hour old track but i have a couple that do good on a few hour old

i got to say this how in the heck can ANYBODY say that is a ten hour old track did somebody watch the hog go by an start the stop watch an then ten hours later put a dog in the track how does anybody really no how old the tracks really are

I want to know how anyone knows how old any particular track is?  ;D

Steve

Its stamped right there on the bottom of there feet! ;D

ok fellas, we're thinking a little to hard about this.  you all know you can tell a fresh track from an old one.  If you pull up to a tank, and see a muddy swirl by the edge, is the track that comes out of it going to be fresh or old.  If you see a track in the mud with nice, clean edges , without leaves and grass and whatnot blown in it is it fresh or old?  I the track is dried out and crumbling on itself, is it fresh or old.  You don't need to time it perfectly.

Hunt after a heavy rain and all old tracks are beat down, all fresh tracks will be easy to pick up. Hunting for tracks is a fun way to start the hunt on a rainy night.

Welcome to the boards and welcome to Texas, its not all flat.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_adXvtM_GcPg/SdLcrFbh8FI/AAAAAAAADis/T61IuEM-clQ/s1600-h/Hill+Country+view+near+Vanderpool.JPG


Does a 12 hour track headed north smell the same to a hot nosed dog named slingshot who was born on a leap year, as it does to cold nosed gyp named princess with three legs?  No, it smells the same.  The difference is does a dog have the desire to follow that track.  Which is why I don't really think of it as a cold nosed dog more of a cold trailing dog.  But ofcourse it really depends on what context you are talking about hog hunting or panther hunting?  In my opinion a cold trailing dog is simply one that has the disire and instinct to take a cold track.  Hounds have that cold trailing instinct curs for the most part do not to some degree or another.  I just figgure a cold trailing hog dog is one that will work a track that is older than 6-8 hours, and dogs that don't are just not cold trailing dogs.

The thing is a cold trailing dog is no good to me and would just slow me down, I know where the hogs are likely to be and all I gotta do is take a dog to one of those spots and they will hunt it out and come back if nothing is around.  Keep moving on till we find a hog or run out of place to hunt on.  I can find hogs faster any day with a good Cur dog than I can with a cold trailing hound.  But I'm not the type that likes to sit at the truck and wait for dogs to find something.  If I did that my dogs would just stand there and wait on me.   Ofcourse I get irritated if my dogs stay gone for a while in a random direction or on old sign without checking back in.  Its like.. what the heck does that gyp think she is a danged hound or something? 

Waylon