catch dogs

I got lucky with my pit bull Baby a couple weeks ago. Heard a bay a couple hundred yards off and cut the catch dogs loose. Apparently, on the way in Baby saw the big boar that broke behind her and went and caught him. She's 50# he was probably 250#. By the time we got to the first bay and sorted things out then found her, 600yds away, she'd been fighting with this hog about 20 minutes. She didn't get hurt but was spent and it coulda been worse. If I'd had the catch dogs on the lead still I could have turned both of them on the big boar and come back to the bay.

Then Saturday evening, I was hunting an area with extremely heavy brush and Palmettos. I tried to lead the catch dogs all the way in to the bay and the hogs heard us and ran every time. I think if I'd turned the white dogs loose a little further out we could a caught some of those hogs.

Seems to me there's no set answer as to when to release lead in catch dogs. Every time I go in the woods I learn a little more.