Question for those with tracking dogs

[lovemylegacy]

I love these threads. I agree with bboswell, but, it is in any canine to track. If you have the option, go with a proven breed.

[bakin7005]

I would say no. You don't want a dog that tracks animals as this means you never know what its tracking. You want a dog that tracks blood because it may have to track through dozens of other animals tracks to stay on the blood track.

So what makes the difference? Breed? So a "blood" dog has no desire to sniff out animals or vice versa?

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[Acmanwarwas111]

Awesome thread. I've lost a few deer that I wished I had called a dog in for thinking "I hit him good - just need to give him time". The 2 occasions I've used a tracker they said the first 12 hours are critical for having a good trail to follow. After that your chances of recovery really drop.

[Sika]

This is a good thread. Love this story.
Can any dog be a tracking dog if they have a great nose? All my boxer wants to do is track squirrels, cats etc when we walk in suburbia. She goes nuts when I come home from hunting especially if I have harvested. She wants to smell everything for hours. I'm probably ignorant but just curious.

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No, it takes a special dog with the right kind of drives. They need hunt drive, prey drive and fight drive and a lot of it. It also takes a very smart dog to be able to sort out a wounded animal from a herd of healthy ones.
Once you have weeded through a lot of dogs and found one with all the right drives it takes A LOT of hard work to train him. You have to put them lots and lots of deer. It takes 100 or more real tracks to really finish a dog.

[Sika]

I’m confused by the question. Is the OP asking what the conditions are that lead someone to require a dog or at what point should the hunter stop trying to recover a deer on their own and call someone with a dog?
The most obvious reason for needing a tracking dog is the deer cannot be found. The blood trail runs out or the hunter has already jumped the deer and it’s gotten ahead of them. Marginal shots, gut shots, quartering to shots where stomach contents plugs up the wound channel, and busted legs are usually going to require a dog for recovery.
Ideally, the hunter should start making efforts to find a deer tracking dog as soon as he realizes there is a problem. If you track a deer 200 yards and still haven't found it, stop, call us, and wait.
If you don't disturb the area, and the deer is mortally wounded, we have a good chance of recovering him.
There are a lot of reasons an experienced tracker might not take a call but that’s another thread.

[bakin7005]

No, it takes a special dog with the right kind of drives. They need hunt drive, prey drive and fight drive and a lot of it. It also takes a very smart dog to be able to sort out a wounded animal from a herd of healthy ones.

Once you have weeded through a lot of dogs and found one with all the right drives it takes A LOT of hard work to train him. You have to put them lots and lots of deer. It takes 100 or more real tracks to really finish a dog.

Any special breed?

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[GarGuy]

I have used several breeds. SMART is the key. Curr/hound crosses have done great for me. The two Best I ever had were ridge back /curr crosses. Both would not run a deer that wasn't wounded and were great squirrel dogs . I could take them where a deer was shot and immediately know ifxthe deer was hit by their reaction. Even after I hissed them up, if the deer wasn't wounded they would just trail a but and look back at me. If hit, you could see the excitement level quickly.

If a trail was a day or even two days old I often made a big circle down wind. When the dog hit the scent of a dead or wounded deer it was obvious.

I have seen several threads this year where a tracker turned down a track that was shoulder hit. I loved those. A broken leg or shoulder was near 100percent recovery. Of course I had big gritty dogs that were capable of catching a deer.

My dogs were with me constantly and could read my mind. Gosh I miss having dogs. Might gave to do it again.

[bakin7005]

So it sounds like, by some of these posts, a great (not good) track dog has to be a certain breed and requires hundreds and hundreds of hours working, training, tracking. A good bird dog doesn't require that much experience....
I only ask and comment because I'm curious. I've seen some threads that show the deer recovered by a "tracking" dog that looks similar to somebody's lap dog.

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[Sika]

So it sounds like, by some of these posts, a great (not good) track dog has to be a certain breed and requires hundreds and hundreds of hours working, training, tracking. A good bird dog doesn't require that much experience....
I only ask and comment because I'm curious. I've seen some threads that show the deer recovered by a "tracking" dog that looks similar to somebody's lap dog.

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Specific breed, no...hundreds of hours working and trailing YES.
And because you have to shoot a lot of animals for your dogs, most people don’t have the kind of training opportunities it takes to really train one correctly.
Those golf course tracking tests are no substitution for the real thing. Finding dead deer is only part of it. In a typical season we find maybe 1 in 5 dead. The rest we have to bay and dispatch. Most hunters just don’t understand that.


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[GarGuy]

Specific breed, no...hundreds of hours working and trailing YES.
And because you have to shoot a lot of animals for your dogs, most people don’t have the kind of training opportunities it takes to really train one correctly.
Those golf course tracking tests are no substitution for the real thing. Finding dead deer is only part of it. In a typical season we find maybe 1 in 5 dead. The rest we have to bay and dispatch. Most hunters just don’t understand that.


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There you go. That what I was talking about on shoulder shot deer. A good dog will get him.

[tex4k]

I've helped find and tracked without recovery more "perfectly hit" deer than you wanna hear about! IMO the biggest factor is people not knowing where a true kill shot needs to be.

[bboswell]

I've helped find and tracked without recovery more "perfectly hit" deer than you wanna hear about! IMO the biggest factor is people not knowing where a true kill shot needs to be.

Or knowing full well but not processing all the movement that can take place between shot release and impact with a bow.

I helped track a Bull elk this year, both guide and very experienced bow hunter swore shot was behind the shoulder mid mass, I was spotting from 300 yards and called the shot dead in the shoulder / non-fatal. They argued to the point of getting angry so I just shut up.

We trailed muscle blood well over a mile.

I got video of the bull last week alive and well.

[msodolak]

I’m not an expert but a liver shot seems to get the best of some bow hunters. It appears to the hunter to be a “decent” shot and the arrow is usually covered in blood (even though its darker). Blood trails on liver shots in which there is a complete pass thru usually produce a trail that can be pretty easily followed for the first couple hundred yards. Since it appeared to the hunter to be a “decent” shot, blood on arrow, and initially a good trail to follow they go too soon and bump the deer. On shots further back that hit guts most people know to give them time. On liver shots though they don’t distinguish between the bright red blood of heart/lung and the dark liver blood. Typically an un bumped liver shot deer will bed within the first 300 yards and die within 6 hours or so. If bumped I’ve seen them travel darn near a mile.

As for broadheads it’s common to see penetration or deflection issues with mechanicals which leads to a whole different debate where you can find thousand of opinions.