The American Beagler Forum

Hey Guys and Gals,

My young female that is 8 1/2 months old is ranging a little in the check area when she is run with our dogs. The pack range in age from her 2 litter mates and a 2yr old female. if she doesn't find the rabbit in the check fairly quickly she will reach out into another area until she finds one.

any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

Find another dog to replace her. At that age she may yet settle down some but it has been my experience tha they usually get wider as they gain experience.

solo her give her some time to build her skills when she get to a check and starts to range out call her back dont let her go wide, when she gets the hang of this run her with one close check dog if she has the drive she will stay close to get the rabbit first, ive seen this work time and time again. good luck but remember some dogs nature is wide than others.

follow Acesdog advice.Along with that, hunt her in thickess brush you can find. Good luck.

Keep working her - she is young. Direct her back into the loss area and don't allow her to range. If she has brains and is loyal to you she will want to please you. It takes time and effort.

How far is a dog "supposed" to range when working a check?

Big Mike is right solo and good thick cover. She might be a little competive and trying to get first!! good luck

i agree with ringo dont give up this early , be consistant when working with her solo her until she gets the hang of it, then run her with a close check dog til she makes it a habit.

My best bitch used to range too wide when she first started, and she didn't even do that until she was about 9-10 months old! She's be right on top of the line, then go off after a check and just completely missed the mark. She lacked confidence & experience at that point, but didn't just quit. She ranged wide but evenutally (after 10-15 min) got back on and followed the line tightly.
What also helped was for me to lay down tracking scents for her. Just very short, straight lines at first to get her confidence up. Then varied it and made the tracks harder until she was sticking as close as possible to the line.
Just tracking scents and lots of chances to gain experience helped with this and she is now my lead dog.

Hey Guys,

Thanks for all the help, I'll try to solo her more, she is very competive wants the front all the time. I'll try to keep ya'll informed of how it turns out



Thanks

Run her where rabbits are hard to come by.
If you run where there are a lot of rabbits, I have seen many dogs that will start going very wide in hopes of crossing a hot track. If there are a lot of rabbits, they will often jump another and run it.
It only takes a couple of times before the dog realizes, "Hey, I come to a loss, I take off and find a rabbit to run".

You get the same result by running a dog in a well stocked training pen too long. They won't work a check, just run paths looking for another rabbit to run.

If you take it to an area with few rabbits, the dog is forced to come back and work the check because that is the only rabbit scent in the area.

If you are looking for areas with few rabbits, just go south of the Ohio River [laughing].

Take her and put her in a 6 by 6 box,that is a pretty close check and just let her go,when she gets dizzy and falls over just stand her back up,it will not take long.