The American Beagler Forum

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I like ARHA PP so they get my vote.

I am a rabbit hunter first and I perfer to hunt behind pp style dogs.

I think that AKC FCs overall carry the most weight as far as respect goes, but I don't know that it is necessarily warranted. AKC has several formats to serve each person this is more about personal taste and I personally don't care for the slower hounds, they just don't suit me. I don't knock them. When you speak of respect I think that most people would breed to an AKC FC over another from a different registry, but that doesn't mean that you are necessarily getting a more superior dog. I didn't actually vote on this poll because I would prefer to lump all of AKC together as I don't think one format necessarily deserves more respect than another.

Big Dog

As far as running hounds goes, I can't say one way or the other about AKC. I have a hard time giving credit to AKC for anything because of the strongarm way they treat their CUSTOMERS. I made a mistake on a set of papers the other day and it cost me $15 to get it fixed. At typo! This is nothing more or less than extortion. I know that AKC registration is valuable and carries a lt of weight because of the age of the organization. How many hounds out there are going to remain as pure as the paper shows when AKC has become so unreasonable? They seem to me to be encouraging people to commit fraud in order to avoid ridiculous fees. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. My whine session is now officially finished.

i like akc midwest because they run a hard hitting and hard check hound and they are fast! also i like the fact that they fire a gun over the cast as this eliminates gun shy dogs. they promote a hunting hound

what is the differance between akc midwest and spo?

Guest... AKC Midwest is an SPO assocation. We run under the same SPO rules as any other federation/assocation does. However with that being said, Midwest Assocation runs a stronger, faster, more aggressive, and in some cases rougher hound than what the majority of other SPO sects run.


Besides SPO in the Midwest Assocation I've ran Progressive Pack a few times in the past. Like many others here I respect the fact their champions must solo their own rabbit before they're award their titles. However on the flip side there's a few things about their organization that I don't like. In the end, nothing is perfect and we all like what is more available to us.

My best advice to any new trialer is to try each and see which one suits your hound and yourself better. Best of luck to you in whatever decision you come to.

We probably all prefer what we're used to but I'll always prefer AKC Large Pack. Our hounds have been combined over the years with CKC hare hounds and many were sent south to put some hunt and fire into the cottontail bloodlines. Many of the Midwest Association's hounds come from hare bloodlines out of CKC and Northeast Large Pack. Some of our hounds are the wild, rough hounds that you've all heard about but most can run hare or cottontail anywhere you want to run them. I also put a very high value on the fact that Large Pack is the only format which tests for endurance, something very important to the serious hunter.

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Steve, you're right, my mistake. I didn't purposely leave you guys out- Michigan has had great hounds just as long as us in the northeast. I guess I was lumping all of us together under the heading of hare hounds. Not that our hounds are better, but the brace influence never made any headway up here. I know very little about ARHA.

The United Beagle Gundog Federation (UBGF) is the largest federation (by far) in AKC…looks to me like they’re already well respected.

I guess mabye I should have included that these are organizations " in my area that I would be interested in running in" . Large Pack is just too far away for me to run, UBGF is just too slow for my dogs to run in, and not interested in CKC, it also just too far away. Thanks for the reply's so far.

From the poll results, it look like ARHA Little Pack is "running away" with it! Some of the best dogs I ever seen run a rabbit were while competing in ARHA LP.

I don't field trial much at all , but how can you not respect ARHA P.P. the most, it is the only division I know that makes dogs go out and solo a rabbit for a full circle and shoot a gun over them before they become a champion. Maybe they are other oganizations that do this that I don't know about, but I think this is the best idea I have seen yet.

Swing, why can't LP run, before giving it the title, a qualified Champion by itself and shoot over it like PP does? That would sure put the icing on the cake for me and bring the PP and LP folks closer in agreement.