Starting rough dogs...

[Noah]

Got a piece of 2x6 sittin' next to me to knock on as I type this... LOL... but, now that I got Whaler on the mend I been thinkin' a lot on how I want to train him over this next year...

First off, he's got a lot of old rough Florida Curs in his ancestry... most of those rough dogs were hunted alone because of this.  Put two of 'em down and it's a caught hog, no matter what...

Although I breed his momma Shiner to a fine dog with no head-catch..  I guess I forgot to tell Whaler that...    He's a tuff bird... not afraid to take a lickin', that's for damn sure 

He is my pick of the litter if you haven't figured it out yet.. alot of thought, effort, and money brought him to this point... I've been careful not to hunt him much and really want to make sure I keep his ass alive to see what he'll become... hopin' he'll make me a breeding dog...

So now that you got the 411 on what I'm workin' with... I'll tell ya about a conversation I had with an old Florida hunter that been huntin' these dogs a long time...  When talkin' about this very subject I asked him about a recent litter of his... how he planned on starting them...  Specifically, I asked if he was plannin' on puttin' the pups down with his best male(Whaler's daddy) to show them the ropes...

"Hell no" is what I believe he said... Caught me by suprise at first to tell you the truth... this male dog wasn't in the least bit head-catchy, even with other dogs, so it took me a while to understand what he was thinking...

"He'd just put them in a spot they're not ready for"... thought about this next statement for a good spell, and this is how I view it now...

Basically, runnin' a young dog with a finished dog that consistently bays up bad hogs is just setting the young dog up for catastrophe...

... now this dude doesn't start his dogs till they're over a yr old, when he does, he runs each dog BY ITSELF.  He turns out trap hogs, one after another, after another, whether the dog can stop them or not... eventually, the dog either learns to do it or it doesn't...

The main problem I see with this method is that, without a "teacher dog",  it takes a dog sometimes much, much longer to start producing than those dogs that are "jump started" right off by an experienced dog...

Learned this the hard way with my Spinner dog... her and my lead dog Shine(Spinn's momma) clicked early off, neither dog is head catchy... but Shine has a real bad habit of bayin' bad hogs up... so it should of been no suprise to me that Spinn got whacked... but I was just not patient enough to let the dog learn on it's own... now I've got a tremendous young dog with a hell of a limp... 

I believe when you let a dog develope on it's own, it for the most part, is only able to bay hogs comparable to it's own skill level... i.e. the dog probably won't bay dangerous hogs up till it's been educated by lesser hogs along the way...

... Goes without saying, this method makes for a LOT of empty runs... but the end outcome, I believe, is a better dog that has (hopefully) not been caught in a bad spot to that point because of a more advanced dog...

This is my understanding of this technique anyways... forcing myself to stick to the plan will be the hard part...

[Noah]

It ALSO goes without saying...

... for this technique to work.. you must have a young dog with THE ABILITY to stop hogs by itself... which, even in this line I work with, is not an assured thing with every pup...  and this fact bites... especially when you figure the amount of time you spend training a dog like this... only to find out at a year and a half he's nothin' but a help dog....

... very specific type of dog this method is designed for, but exactly what I prefer to hunt...

[Florida Curdog]

   I wouldn't call a dog baying bad hogs a bad habit. I thought that's why we hunted. I would rather catch one big nasty then ten little ones.  As far as a young dog only baying hogs comparable to it's skill level. How is that gonna work ? I don't think they are gonna run from hog to hog until they find one they think they can handle.

[Noah]

Haha  I was being a smart ass about Shine bayin' bad hogs... that's why I like her!

As for young dogs baying their own skill level hog wise...  a young dog, typically, isn't gonna have the physical/ mental ability to handle a trophy/smart hog right off... those "runners" usually get away from all but the more experienced dogs... I'm just saying that maybe that's not such a bad thing.... until the young dog has the skills to work that type of hog once he does actually learn how to stop it...

[shankem]

I would so love to have a steady source of trainer hogs to buy; I would try his method in a heartbeat.

[makenbeans]

If anyone has the recipe on how to start a ruff dog I am all ears!
These are a couple things I would do different on my next dog ( considering he is from a ruff lineage.)
1) introduce him to a hog in a later age preferably min. 1 year of age.
2) first couple encounters dog and hog not in the same pen ( hog on other side of fence )
3) work his nose by letting him wind, trail , blood scent etc and always rewarding him with a hog at the end of the road.(behind the fence)
4) when i see the dog has built up enough interest in a hog i would try introducing them to each other.
5) first intro should be a decent size hog or a pair of hogs.
I also believe a well excersise and fed dog when hunting is important. I like the technique of releasing trapped hogs and letting the dog see  the hog run away ( i like when my dog is after one and he looks up frequently to see if he sees the hog running in-front of him, chasing  on sight rather than on scent my dog tends to be much faster). I think the dogs lineage should be considered (ruff or bay) on how it should be trained. Also i would keep my ruff dogs away from the dog (not in the same kennel). Always hunt the dog by itself. Always switching types of landscapes if possible (thick, open, wet etc). Is their a correct way on doing this??? All i know is that if I would  have a dog with to much bay then I would probably be sayn sht i need a dog with more bite and vise versa. At the end of the day my ruff dog has produced me plenty of hogs and wouldnt trade him for another.