Who gets the credit for a great hound??????

[eddywilliams]

Hurry up your exactly on ,on this topic , 1st of all the person that shocked the dog in the check is simple minded also a lot of handlers will run young dogs solely in a pack because they are either too lazy to solo one or they dont care to bring out the best or the worst in a dog .You either find out if they can do it or they are a me too type dog .

[hurryup]

You know me solo..solo..solo..and then solo..Take a good book along. Don't want to say names but you know a couple people I talked about in my prior post, shocking dogs.
Oh well, I guess i still feel like the trainer has the biggest impact on the dog, getting back to post. I guess IMO if you truly enjoy running dogs it doesn't matter if you sell them, they win and someone else gets the credit or not. It the fun and enjoyment you get from starting the young ones. Its always been more enjoyable to me to just plain hunt, than to enter a trial. I run dogs day after day alone listening to them, watching them.
Don't get me wrong its fun when you win but it shouldn't be all about that.
You guys can remind me of that next time I get red faced on a cast. .LOL..

[jdmart]

This is a very interesting post. I will agree breeding is the beginning of any great dog. Many a great dog has never seen a trial or knew what champion of FC title was. I believe that! I also believe with the right training you can take a dog and improve its skills immensely. No, you can change major faults. I run almost everyday, dogs are just like athletes, some have natural ability and some have to work for what they get. So for the guy who busts his butt with a dog that doesn't have all the good given talent in the world but turns out to be a better dog than one with all the nautral abilities. The trainer/owner deserves alot of credit. But also the dog had heart and it went back to the breeding, so it is full circle. I have seen several guys with very good dogs show up for trials only to become disappointed because their dog was not prepared. The dog may have been very talented but couldn't hold up to the long day. Just think about it there are several factors to make a good dog. If you prepare a dog right, I'll bet you 50% of the time you are ahead of the curve already. This doesn't mean 2 days a week. They may run great and may kick my %^& but they will never reach their full potential unless they are Michael Jordan. Lol Have fun and love what you run and run what you love!

[J.C. Blair]

This is a very interesting post. I will agree breeding is the beginning of any great dog. Many a great dog has never seen a trial or knew what champion of FC title was. I believe that! I also believe with the right training you can take a dog and improve its skills immensely. No, you can change major faults. I run almost everyday, dogs are just like athletes, some have natural ability and some have to work for what they get. So for the guy who busts his butt with a dog that doesn't have all the good given talent in the world but turns out to be a better dog than one with all the nautral abilities. The trainer/owner deserves alot of credit. But also the dog had heart and it went back to the breeding, so it is full circle. I have seen several guys with very good dogs show up for trials only to become disappointed because their dog was not prepared. The dog may have been very talented but couldn't hold up to the long day. Just think about it there are several factors to make a good dog. If you prepare a dog right, I'll bet you 50% of the time you are ahead of the curve already. This doesn't mean 2 days a week. They may run great and may kick my %^& but they will never reach their full potential unless they are Michael Jordan. Lol Have fun and love what you run and run what you love!

Good post Jeff!

[Bunnyblaster]

And after I thought about it a little bit more the other day it kind of reminds me of the old saying every coach used at least once............."There's no "I" in the word team." It takes all of the above to have a great hound otherwise maybe it's just like "the chicken or the egg???"

[old blood beagles]

OK the poll has ended and here are the results:

Pedigree- 31 votes 25% of voters
Breeder- 36 votes 29% of voters
Trainer-45 votes 36% of voters
Owner-11 votes 8% of voters

I started this poll to start another topic after if was finished just to bring out more discussion about how our sport of beagleing has not revealed the true houndsman out there.

We give credit to the hounds with HOF reproducer and Sire and Dam of the year (pedigree)
We give credit to the Breeder with Breeder of the year
We even give credit to the owner with all the stud adds kennel adds and titles and news reports that their hounds have earned

But we dont give any awards or credit for trainer of the year. The recognition of great hounds should start with the individuals that have put in the time and effort on these hounds. We ask for owner and handler when we fill out our papers to run in trials why dont we add an extra line and ask for trainer information?

[billi]

I think what some of us call training is more like someone taking the time to drive a dog to a place where there is plenty of rabbits to run then turning him loose. Im sure many hounds never reach potential due to the owner not having time to devote to the dog. Training to me would be calling the dog to come, sit, any commands. How many dogs can you think of that someone bought and started running the dog much more than it had been but the dog was doing pretty good and turned out great. No training just gave the dog the opportunity to run more tracks. I guess you could say one was getting the dog in better condition and this may be considered trainging. However it still comes back to just dropping the hound out to run. What do some of you call training? Maybe knowing when to shoot a gun so dog is not gun shy?

[Tim H]

The dog deserves all the credit. The dog hunts for the rabbit, finds the rabbit, pursues the rabbit.

How do you "train" the dog to do that? And if you have to "train" it to do that then you are not going to want to take credit for that dog.

The dog is what it is because the genes it got passed on by it's parents, by the way, they are dogs too. The breeder can't control what genes the parents pass on, the parents pass on the genes not the breeder.

Owning a dog will not make it better or worse, most the dogs I've owned don't even think they are owned by anyone, so I don't think it is the owner.

The pedigree is a piece of paper that we type up cause we ain't got that great of memory but the dogs is even worse, they don't think about the pedigree when they are hunting, finding or running a rabbit (or at least I don't think it's on their mind).

So if
it's not the pedigree
it's not the breeder
it's not the trainer
it's not the owner

It must just be the dog that should get credit for what the dog can do. These dogs were doing this LOOONNNNG before we started trying to take credit for what they do.

[bucks better beagles]

Thought I was done with this thread but then Billi and Tim H. chimed in. I just couldn't disagree with them more. It takes many, many hours in the field and much experience to train a beagle. They absolutely just don't learn on their own. Examples of things they cannot learn on their own: no trash, no back tracking, when to come, barking in the pen, proper tally ho, simply loading and unloading from the dog box, growling, social interaction with other dogs and handlers, etc., etc.. They are born with certain assets but these much be honed and added to. Improper handling can ruin a well bred dog. IMO

Bob

[mdbeagler]

The dog deserves all the credit. The dog hunts for the rabbit, finds the rabbit, pursues the rabbit.

How do you "train" the dog to do that? And if you have to "train" it to do that then you are not going to want to take credit for that dog.

The dog is what it is because the genes it got passed on by it's parents, by the way, they are dogs too. The breeder can't control what genes the parents pass on, the parents pass on the genes not the breeder.

Owning a dog will not make it better or worse, most the dogs I've owned don't even think they are owned by anyone, so I don't think it is the owner.

The pedigree is a piece of paper that we type up cause we ain't got that great of memory but the dogs is even worse, they don't think about the pedigree when they are hunting, finding or running a rabbit (or at least I don't think it's on their mind).

So if
it's not the pedigree
it's not the breeder
it's not the trainer
it's not the owner

It must just be the dog that should get credit for what the dog can do. These dogs were doing this LOOONNNNG before we started trying to take credit for what they do.

With all due respect do you really believe this?
True it is the parents that past on the genes, but who made the decision to put the cross together in the first place.
The dogs don't think about who they should breed with to reproduce certain traits, and most dogs do know who their master/owner is if they have any kind of brains.
Dogs were not trailing game in the manner that they do now long before we started trying to take credit for what they do as you say.
Man bred each breed of dog with a general purpose in mind, to perform a certain task; including the beagle.
Why do you think some dogs will trail game silently, which is an undesirable trait that was bred out thru selective breeding.
What wild dogs do you know that trail game by scent, while giving full cry the whole time.
Domesticated animals became what they are thru selective breeding, not due to their own thought process of breeding this to this to create this.

[mdbeagler]

The dog deserves all the credit. The dog hunts for the rabbit, finds the rabbit, pursues the rabbit.

How do you "train" the dog to do that? And if you have to "train" it to do that then you are not going to want to take credit for that dog.

The dog is what it is because the genes it got passed on by it's parents, by the way, they are dogs too. The breeder can't control what genes the parents pass on, the parents pass on the genes not the breeder.

Owning a dog will not make it better or worse, most the dogs I've owned don't even think they are owned by anyone, so I don't think it is the owner.

The pedigree is a piece of paper that we type up cause we ain't got that great of memory but the dogs is even worse, they don't think about the pedigree when they are hunting, finding or running a rabbit (or at least I don't think it's on their mind).

So if
it's not the pedigree
it's not the breeder
it's not the trainer
it's not the owner

It must just be the dog that should get credit for what the dog can do. These dogs were doing this LOOONNNNG before we started trying to take credit for what they do.

With all due respect do you really believe this?
True it is the parents that past on the genes, but who made the decision to put the cross together in the first place.
The dogs don't think about who they should breed with to reproduce certain traits, and most dogs do know who their master/owner is if they have any kind of brains.
Dogs were not trailing game in the manner that they do now long before we started trying to take credit for what they do as you say.
Man bred each breed of dog with a general purpose in mind, to perform a certain task; including the beagle.
Why do you think some dogs will trail game silently, which is an undesirable trait that was bred out thru selective breeding.
What wild dogs do you know that trail game by scent, while giving full cry the whole time.
Domesticated animals became what they are thru selective breeding, not due to their own thought process of breeding this to this to create this.

[Newt]

Tim I gues you believe that you could hunt just as well with a pack of wolves. Supposedly that is where all dogs came from before the "breeder" stepped in and started selecting breeding stock for the characteristics he liked best.

I couldn't tell, was that little man just fanning the flames or stirring the pot?

[Tim H]

Tim I gues you believe that you could hunt just as well with a pack of wolves.

What's ironic about this is that you would have me believe the pack of wolves couldn't hunt rabbits without me.

[ANTHONY KERR]

Tim H on Tue Jul 28, 2009 7:13 pm

Newt wrote:
Tim I gues you believe that you could hunt just as well with a pack of wolves.

Touche'

[Cutemloose]

Tim I gues you believe that you could hunt just as well with a pack of wolves.

What's ironic about this is that you would have me believe the pack of wolves couldn't hunt rabbits without me.

well played sir i think your spot on in your thinking its all about the dog