The American Beagler Forum

I started a thread in the the supplies section on lights by Tracker for Night Running, so I dont want to focus on that. What I want to do is focus on in this thread is how many of you run your beagles at night????

What are some of the benefits and what are some of the pitfalls.

My experience is when you run at night you find a whole lot more rabbits out and get a lot more running. Ive also found that the scenting conditions are usually twice what they are during the day. It think it is a great way to get your hounds on rabbits and get them conditioned. So far no problems with coyotes. With summer heat limiting day running how many of your run at night?

In the south where it gets really hot, is night running more plausable. Do guys run rabbit dogs at night in the south? What about in the north are they in danger from wolves in Michigan and Wisconsin and other states with increasing wolf population.

Hey Duke I run here at night in NC its just to hot in the day.The only thing that I donot like is rabbits out everywere dogs donot have to look one to run him.I think if you do this all the time it will make a dog lazy come hunting season.Beside going in the thick they go around.When you have not jump a rabbit in a long time. I seen dogs just give up.And make sure you got some trash proof dogs.

If you want to keep your dogs in shape around here you have to run at night. i too am from nc and no way am i going to put dogs out in this kind of heat I agree with rabbitearl, gotta watch em or they can get lazy. 9 times out of 10, when i open the box the dogs will have one going in less than a minute. Sure do get to hear some good races though

I run mine at night. I especially like to run them in cornfields. It's a great way to beat the heat, and I also run mine at night during our firearms deer season.

i live in ga, run at night and early morn. went this morn had two good runs and a couple hit an misses with small bunnies. dry as all get out here. i took my sunday walk with jesus,yea i took my dogs, he musta liked what iz doin cause rabbits
wuz everwhere, thne i went home cleaned me up, went an set in a pew, that man looked at me said I want you
lll, thank you for a nuther day.

I'm from Mississippi and running at night is pretty much a given especially during the hot summer months. Actually I run at night all through the year even during hunting season some. I like the peace and quite and hounds just sound good burning one up with the moon out with a good dew on the ground. Especially when it is about 65 degrees out. It don't get any better than that. I also believe it helps my hounds because they depend more on their noses than on sight. Seems to me a competitive hound my have more opportunity to get nasty when he can see better. I don't care for the nasty. Some of the best races I can recall were at night. Of course this comes from a 20 year fox hunter retired to beagling. I guess the night running is just in me. I also believe that night running tunes my ear into more of what my hounds are doing individually and in the pack and who is caring the pack and working hardest. Daytime running you depend on your eyes telling you what your hounds are doing. Watching a hound run is limited to crossings and especially in the south where we don't have the terrain to see a lot of the race.

We've been having some BIG running here in Arkansas at night. I've always had some good summer running, but never like this year. We like to turn loose at 2-3 AM and run 'till 8-9 Am. I've never had trouble with coyotes in Arkansas, but i seen the Skeeters trying to carry a pup off!

i run at night thrughout the year even thru the winter. i work days and if i didnt run at nights i would not run at all. also i live in southeast ky and you cant do much running in the middle of the day thru july and august. biggest problem with running at night is that i dont like to run real young days i like to wath them as much as i can.

I got into running at night last year when it was so dang dry and hot here in Ohio. For us a whole month of 90 and above is way hot. What surprised me is in places it was hard to even find a rabbit during the day, you could be on rabbits as long as you wanted. I really started thinking about it a lot this year as it got hot. You tend to let the dogs go a bit in the summer and next thing you know its rabbit season. With Indiana opening in October, if you dont runnem hard your into hunting season just after it cools down.

I figured you guys in the south ran a lot at night but never talked to guys about it much, as its not near as popular up here.

Running at night... I wouldn't suggest having a bunch of dogs down at once...

I generally only run 2 dogs at a time and by doing this i've yet to see any adverse effects...

Great for conditioning and feeding a young dog plenty of rabbit tracks...

Jack Chapman...

April through October we run hare more at night than during the day. My hunting buddy and I like to put down a big pack of dogs and listen to the race. Some of the best running there is. It sounds kind of like a fox chase, loud and fast and all over the place, in and out of hearing.

We have wolves here, see tracks all the time in some of our spots. Where we do our night running the wolves just travel through once in a while and don't seem to stay. Never had a problem with them. Honestly, if there was one close by and they heard that big pack of hounds running I think they would clear out

I'l try and post some video later.

sounds very cool, I guess there is safety in numbers, but finding them if something happens might be tough at night unless you have tracking collars on them and then it would be no problem. Dont most of you northerners run tracking collars?

Yeah running at night can be great for conditioning. This time of year its easy to get behind the 8 ball in conditioning.

Ran last week with a buddy till 10:30. The dogs jumped at a little before 9. We just sat around the cooler listening to the dogs run big loops around the cut overs. Some young dogs got tightened up on that run. I have been running just before dark for a while, but I plan to stay longer the next few weeks. I never have worried about rabbits being too easy to jump. The dogs have to work out enough tricks in the briars not to get lazy. If I see a rabbit cross the logging road I let the dogs run it. The dogs I own have been kept because they hunt reasonably well for the intended game. They just need more mileage and I think running at night will get them just that. I guess the negatives would be coyotes and snakes are more active as well as bugs.

Duke, I have seven tracking collars and sometimes use all of them. We also train our dogs to come in when called. Of course, they mind much better when they are wore out

I run so much at night, I don't know if they can run a rabbit in daylight