Matt, 700-800 circles is ideal to me too. Actually the nose and bottom is whats needed most. Ive tried couple different brands of curs, and none of them would hunt out over 200 yrds max. And were hot nosed. You pretty much had to walk them over a hot track, which makes it tough up here in the mtn. Im not knocking curs, I'd still like to find some like I keep hearing about, but like i said before, they are heavily guarded and not available to the public, which I can kind of understand.
and what I meant by not catching 10 hogs a day, I didnt mean that the hounds couldn't do it, but after running couple miles in these mtns wrestling and tying a hog leading dogs and dragging hog, you wont feel like catching anymore, atleast I don't.
there ain't no roads where I hunt, its all on foot.
As far as bottom, I want them to stick til it bays or has a heart attack. If I turn loose at daylight, I want them to at least stay hooked til the sun goes down, and im talkin hog and bear both. Some of these guys have dogs that will stay all day and all night, and can go in the next day and track their dogs up and re-pack fresh dogs in. But those are few and far between.
Hounds just work better up here, just like curs work better down there, the terrain plays a big part. I wouldnt even consider hunting a silent dog up here before the Garmin came out. Since they screwed the hog hunting up, up here I now have to hunt down south, so ive got two bird dog pups, im hoping will give me the range and nose im looking for in a silent dog.
Wmwendler, okay, I am a plott man but have a good cur dog. I can see your point if you have some jam up curs, a few people I know have them also. I also belong to a couple of other sites and I found this post....what do you think this post made on another sirte?
.......Finally this thread is generating the discussion I was looking for
I do know that hounds can make good hogs dogs. I have hunted behind good ones as an adult and a child. My dad hunted with them when I was a kid. But, I just do not prefer them and I honestly think Cur dogs are far better suited for hog hunting than hounds. Here's why: First and foremost because thats what they were created for ~150 years ago. 2nd.....Cur dogs are silent on track. Yes you can bay hogs with open dogs but it is not the ideal. There is no need to give the hogs a heads up that dogs are coming before they even get there. The hogs WILL start to leave when they hear that coming if they know anything about dogs. In todays world with the ammount of hog hunters around its hard to find hogs that are not educated. 3rd......Hounds do not have the livestock working instinct that
good Cur dogs have. Hogs, no matter how wild they get, will always be livestock and they will always behave like livestock. A dog with stock working instinct is a definate advantage. 4th.....Curs have a more effecient hunting style. They hunt for you not for themselves. There is an understanding that they are there to work with you that I personally have never seen in a hound. When I unload my cur dogs from the truck, they wait for me to choose a direction and then they hunt out roughly in that direction. I much prefer this over a dog that leaves out hunting in which ever random direction from the get go. Thier hunting track follows where I travel. Now they make their loops, hunting out, which is all on them to choose which way but they loop back in and the general direction that we move in is based off of which way I am traveling. I Know the areas. I know where the hogs bed down. I know where the hogs are hanging from scouting or info from the landowner. I can put them close enough to find sign they will take and put hogs at the end of it. I can do that faster than I could by takeing a hound and randomly casting them on cold sign. Thats what I mean by more effectient. 5th... there are those traits that are almost intagible, which I will touch on a little atleast for now. Things like being aware of multiple hogs and baying them togther on purpose. I say on purpose becuase It can happen occasionaly by accident with any dogs but a good cur dog with do it on purpose and more often. That goes back to the livestock working instinct. Rolling out on the other hogs after you shoot or catch one from the bay. Being conscious of what thier doing when it comes to multiple hogs and trying to locate the bunch to keep them stopped and together rather than just blindly running the first track they come across. Those are traits that you find in good cur dogs and why in my opinion they are better suited for hog hunting by a long shot than hounds.
Waylon
T.hillbilly makes some excellent points but then so do you...I will give my point of views and it is somewhere in the middle.
I agree with T.Hillbilly that it is hard to find a good cur dog...I don't have much experience with hounds but back in the 1980's I never really saw a stock breed that I would feed except for 1 bmc. The majority didn't have any range, very hot nose, bout had to stumble over a hog to find one and the ones that hunted sometimes wouldn't find a hog even with fresh sign, but then you turn loose a good dog right behind and in 5 or 10 minutes have one bayed...the dogs that I saw back then that I would feed had walker or plott or redbone in them with some type of cur like cat but usually bmc. They were middle of the road kind of hunting dogs. To this day I don't shop around for a stock bred dog but I am sure there are some real good ones out there but I will say they probably have a hound in the pedigree from way back to have captured some of the hunting traits of the hound. Having said all this I wouldn't keep a hound but would breed to a good one if I needed the hunt and nose.
An open dog can catch lots of hogs if he does not open on a track until he locates and then runs semi silent or opens some but is running to catch or stop the hog. But if the dog opens an an older track and spends 5 or 10 minute locating the exit track then the hog that is dog smart will burn up the woods leaving out. If you listen you might here the sound barrier breaking.
Like I said earlier you can't give me one of those (3) stock dog breeds but that does not mean there are not any good ones out there. But I believe that the percentages are lower to get a good one to hunt as compared to a dog that is bred for hunting.
I remember a time when these guys turned out 2 plotts and they burned a deer or coyote and never saw the dogs again that night and a week later they got their dogs back...I sure don't want a dog like that..that is way too much hunt for me. especially with the tracts of hunting land getting smaller and smaller as they become devided.
Waylon, the way you descibe the cur dog I do like and you must have a good line of curs...
The only way I could get what you describe was by using the mtn cur.
I crossed some bmc once in about 1990 to get a little more size and tighter mouth on the mtn cur. but these mtn curs hunted with me and made the 800 yard loops around me and hunting pretty hard. I say about 4 hundred yards in any direction around me for a total of 800 yards give or take. These dogs when turned loose I had better be ready to go because they were going hunting...but, they would always hunt around the 4 wheeler and always checked in. I hunted 4-6 dogs but if I didn't see a dog in 5 or 10 minutes I stopped and listened and if out of hearing range I would check the tracker. When this happened they were all together running a track or bayed. I would wait a few minutes and check again. If in the same spot it is caught or bayed. if moving then I just moved in that direction at a slower pace...but I always said...if the sign is fresh I gaurantee the hog will be found...and a good cur dog will stick until he can't go anymore or stops the hog...if the cur dog smells the track he will go to the hog even if the hog is a good ways off but usually the hogs will be located within a mile...but might run for many miles after that. but a cur dog that don't hunt like this is a dog that won't stay too long in my yard...that explains why I am still looking for a few dogs right now...
not trying to put down any breed at all but just telling it like I see it...
