A general forum for the discussion of hunting with beagles, guns, clothing and other equipment and just talking dawgs! (Tall tales on hunting allowed, but remember, first liar doesn't stand a chance)
wvmuskyhunter wrote:Im with Mo. Beagler 5000. I have a dog that is alittle mouthy. Most of the time in UKC she will minus out. Does that make her not a rabbit dog. I wont go hunting with out her. She does ok in AKC because it doesnt matter if you are alittle mouthy before the rabbit is jumped. I have a few decent upcoming young trial dogs. I have a year old female that wont bark until the rabbit is jumped and nothing extra. She has a 1st and a 2nd in the three trials she has been entered in. The mouther dog is by far my best female. I feed her because evertime she barks she will jump a rabbit. She will run to catch and has excellent check work. In all the trials I have entered her in she has been the continuity of the pack. She keeps things moving when it breaks down. I have a Branko male that is very similar. He barks early too. Now Im not talking cold trail early, but you are always wondering if you will beat the clock. I uess what Im saying is these dogs I run in AKC. The tight mouthed female I run in UKC. They all are rabbit dogs. If you trial them pick the format that suits the dog.
AYE, and there's the rub, man made subjectivity vs. the real life scorecard! Joeyman never seemed to do very well in the trials with his dogs but he sure could pile the tailgate full of bunnies. I'm thinkin maybe he has some rabbit dogs regardless of whethre they have a man made title on them!
my dogs suck iv seen them look like one of those 5000 dollar dogs a few times then the next day or the next week bam back to being a crap eating dumb as$.i love my dogs for different reasons.i herd one time all dogs have holes and every dog has its day i think that is true trial dog or rabbit dog i call them the same.i think if you go judge a trial and start looking for just the bad you could be missing alot????
Compeditiveness seems to be a quality bred into them just like hunt or line control or other traits.I don't trial much anymore,mostly pleasure run and hunt.I like a 3 or 4 dog pack.The dogs that have the compeditive and independant qualities that make them stand out in a trial and score well haven't been the most outstanding gun dogs I've had as far as their willingness to pack up and work smoothley within the pack.They were good rabbit dogs by all accounts,but for me there is nothing like 3 or 4 dogs of the same speed that have been run together,know eachother and have really gelled as a pack.When you get it right it's hammer down hard almost check free running.It all depends what you are looking for.I'm sure that there are dogs out there that can do both,and there may be a format out there that is full of them.The style of hound I run is a Mid-West or ARHA LP type of hound and when I pull the real compeditive ones out of the pack,the pack smoothes out.And the ones that are the best pack hounds have never scored well for me in trials,they didn't usually do anything wrong they just didn't score well. Most of the time I end up getting rid of the ones that are more suited for trialing.Again I guess it's just a matter of what are you looking for....
