The Science of Stop

stopping a pig...

my opinion;

it all depends on many factors as to how a pig will react once he realizes the dogs are on to him.

I am talking about hogs started in the open...

if he has never seen or never has been bothered by a dog he will more than likely stand his ground until he realizes his mistake...at that time he is caught or he breaks for cover...he probably won't run far thinking that the dogs will give it up...depending on the dogs he could be right...some dogs will bay loose and the bull dog shows up and it is over...or maybe the dogs are just gritty enough to keep pushing the hog and the hog will be educated...good gritty cur dogs will hammer down and probably catch them in the open...of course it has to do with how far the pig has to run to reach cover...I believe the average wild pig can reach speeds of up to 30 mph for short bursts of speed...but will drop off between 20-25 mph...my cur dogs can run 28-30 mph and they do not have a problem running down and catching in the open...but more often than not we see a pig or pigs cross a pipeline and each side of the pipeline is pretty thick...so where we hunt the hogs has a lot to do if they get caught or not even with good dogs...if they are dog smart and will not stop and keep hitting the thick stuff the dogs will not keep up because they are having to trail...and it takes a good dog to stick with the track for hours...I am not a finder holder dog man but I know some about most breeds...these dogs will run quite a bit faster than the average cur dog and their chances of catching the hog in the open is better for that reason...if a finder holder is true to his name then it will be a caught hog if he catches it in time before it gets off in the thick briars...a finder holder is supposed to catch if not he is a cull...so any time he is able to reach the hog it should be caught...if the hog makes it to the briars he will stop pretty quick to listen and he probably will get caught by the finder holder if he is not dog smart...if the hog is dog smart he will run and run through mostly the thick stuff...the average finder holder will probably trail the smoking hot track for a little while and give it up...because the few I have seen do just that...they are sight hunters first and wind hunters second...and trailing a distant third...

my observation of wild hogs in the years gone by has led me to develop a theory on why some run so much and and those that stopped to fight got caught pretty quick...at least that is how I saw it in my neck of the woods...I saw that the barnyard looking hogs with the flop ears did not run as fast and they tended to stop to fight more often...the hogs with the most russian influence tended to run more often and once they do they tend to run further...we as hog doggers have done our part in educating them...but that is a minor environment issue...the real problem is that we have really sped up the evolutuon process by catching the slow ones first and so the hogs have evolved into hogs that will and can run for hours...those that survive tend to pass on there genes more often than not...it is called survival of the fittest...

and a huge factor in whether or not you will catch hogs has to do with where you are hunting...open type woods with good dogs and plenty of hogs...it will be a good day...

in the thick thick jungle where the hogs have been dogged and you will be lucky to catch one every now and then...

When I was a little kid I knew where to hunt when it flooded w/dogs or w/gun...knew where to hunt in droughts...

and when rabbit hunting with my dogs I knew where we could catch as many as I could carry in less than 2 hours...and I knew where not to go with my dogs because we would not catch one but every now and then...I had dogs to hunt and jump and had lurcher types that would catch...if the rabbit made it to cover the small flusher dogs would catch in the briars or flush them out to get caught by the hunters or lurchers...

the lurcher types would not trail much but would wind some...they tended to follow the trailers/jumpers...these dogs caught deer that I would shoot with a 22 on account I liked my dogs running them down and catching...to see the lurcher types really work was when we got on a jack rabbit or deer...they were at their best when they had their eye on the game...