OT: coursing rabbits and coyotes

S

stevomiller

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May 4, 2001
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I have wanted to hunt rabbits and coyotes with sight hounds ever since I was a wee lad and read Teddy Roosevelt's escapades.

Do any of you have any first hand experience with this? Just something so primordial about this. I would also like to do falconry and ferreting at some point.

Steve
 
I've hunted rabbits with and without dogs (beagles). But for coyotes I use a rodent squealer or sometimes an electronic caller to bring them within gun range. Sometimes it works, lots of times it doesn't. Depends on the wind, the setup, time of day, etc.

If anyone else here hunts coyotes with dogs, I'd like to hear about their experiences too.



Semp
 
Nothin' is as thrilling as seeing your dog pick up a rabbit and chase the livin' bejesus out of it! it's thrilling as anything, the dogs love it, and as most rabbits get away (they can turn on a dime, the dogs need a bit more turnin room) it helps keep the rabbit population fit.

the PETAists, and the bleedin' heart fluffy bunny lobby over here have just outlawed hare courseing (jackrabbits) but being basically ignorant, did not include rabbits in the ban. they also stoped hunting live fox with dogs (where again alot get away) but did not outlaw shooting them first, then drag-hunting with the corpse (so now NONE get away).

hare-courseing has been an organised sport here for centuries, hares are given a head-start & the dogs are awarded points based on how many times they can turn the hare, & for style, NO points for catching it.

lure courseing (a plastic bag on a string is towed around a twisty course by a motor or a person pedalling) is also popular.

My doggies frequently come up on rabbits in the fields around where i live & it's amazing how beautiful it is watching them run after the rabbits.

BlueMillieSig.jpg

Here's my two greyhounds
Picture_013.jpg

Here's Blue, he's just seen a rabbit about a half mile away.


p.s.-for the PETA crowd, no wabbits were harmed during the production of this message. cain't vouch for any other times tho. ( p.p.s. rabbit does taste nice when prepared properly & the dogs get rabbit meat mixed in their kibble quite frequently )
 
Hey, thanks one and all for looking. And thanks Kronckew for pics of your sight hounds. I'm sorry that you have to live where all the wackos get to call the shots. It will be a sad day when your dogs can only chase a lure. My friend and I have been dreaming of breeding one of his lankier pits (or a catahoula) to a greyhound to make a good lurcher for 'yotes. It is amazing how fast a pit from game lines can run (not as fast as a greyhound, but faster than most dogs).

Semper, I'd like to hunt with scent hounds as well some day. Rabbits, coons, fox, 'yotes, it would all be good.

stevo
 
Don't think greyhounds are the best sighthounds to cross for an anti-coyote missle. they have very thin skins which tear easily and i'd think in a fight with a coyote they might get torn up more than other breeds might - a few hundred dollars in vets bills each hunt might dissuade you. they've been bred for so long for rabbits/hares that they a bit light for anything else. they also are mainly sprinters, nothing faster at a 1/4 mile or so, but i've heard of owners who had to carry their dogs home if they walk them over a mile! (blue might see one at half a mile, but he'll stalk it down to the last 100 feet or so before going full blast & will give up if if turns into cover)

same with saluki, which are another desert derived breed. afghans, with all that hair as armour might be a better bet. you'd need to do a bit of research.

proper greyhounds are racing machines, and when retired are required by their agencies to be neutered before delivery, so finding one to breed from will not get you any freinds there. no racing breeder would go along with a plan to produce a coyote hunter.

crossing something with a pit might produce interesting and unexpected results. maybe you've discovered a use for all those fox hounds over here that are underemployed now...
 
Kronck, I knew that in and of themselves they were too delicate for the job, hence the atomic lurcher cross. Perhaps a deerhound in the woodpile would help, or an airedale from hunting stock. Some of the guys here in the states use airedales for hunting hogs and other rough game. Most of them like them about 65-75 lbs, not monsters but definitely bigger than the show dogs. Also, there are folks here in the states that have longdogs called staghounds. They are various deerhound/greyhound/fastandtoughsumbitch mixes, but I don't know anyone personally that has one.

LOL Aardvark. I know, commiefornia is where I live.
 
If you hunt with a dog,you can stand quietly in the area where the dog jumped the rabbit and eventually the rabbit will return to the place where he was bedded down. I've hunted a lot of rabbits and have never seen this fail.They run essentially a circle and unless they sense you they will be back underfoot in a short time.

I don't know if this applies to deer maybe someone will comment.
 
There's some guys, mostly older men, around here....

who hunt coyotes with hounds.

But it's more like a video game, or a bunch of kids playing "walkie-talkie." It involves GPS's, four or five pickup trucks, CB or cell-phones, and (mostly) Walker coon-hound type breeding.

The land in this area is sectioned off quite a bit with wire fencing for grazing/tillage purposes, and the roads are still a carry-over from the days when the the horse-drawn wagons had to travel the path which had the least mud or less severe slope, so they wind and turn, and rarely go in a straight line.

As I understand, the dogs are loosed at a sighting, or a place where the coyotes have been seen, then the trucks disperse to various sites to hear or "watch" the hunt as it carries on through, over, and around various lands, waters, and buildings. The "hunters" report in electronically and rearrange themselves as the hunt evolves. Eventually, the coyote either gets away, or doesn't. The hunters rarely carry guns.

I like dogs. I like hunting. This doesn't make a lot of sense to me. But, I'm probably missing the point. There is no shortage of coyotes around here. They have established themselves fairly well, and some nights I can go outside and hear them calling each other, either to signal some food, or to identify their locations. I really like the sounds.

They don't bother the dairy cattle, and the few sheep farmers I know have fences that would stop Arnold Schwartzenager.

As for rabbits, Young Bert, the not-right dog, has caught two, but out of sight. The land is too hilly for me to watch.

I'd think coursing would have to be done on more level terrain with fewer wire fences, but it would be neat to see.

I think it is Afgan hounds and (perhaps) Salukis have a different hip/leg orientation which makes it easier for them to turn. Don't remember, but Kronkew seems right on the money.

(I've NEVER had a rabbit turn back to be shot at. My bad karma. :grumpy: )


(Edit: FUR hunters never use dogs around here.)
 
I'm a little uncertain if rabbit after it's been run is as good eating as just taking a bunny standing motionless.




munk
 
I hunt coyotes and do it the usual way, make a stand, call them in, and take them out with a well place rifle shot when they are in range. I have a few different DVD's and video tapes on the subject and in one of them there is a guy that uses his dogs as decoy dogs to draw the 'yotes in close enough to shoot. He has trained the dogs so that they actually seek out the coyotes and when the coyotes see a strange dog on their turf they come over with the intent to at least check them out if not run them off. When the coyote gives chase the darn decoy dog leads him right back to the hunter who then dispatches him. As you can imagine the last thing the coyote has on his mind is the hunter because all of his attention is focused on the dog. Apparently, from what I have read, coyotes are sight hounds as well. Something to think about anyhow.
 
munk said:
I'm a little uncertain if rabbit after it's been run is as good eating as just taking a bunny standing motionless.
munk
Click to expand...
Next time Blue gets one, i'll ask him, not often we get one standing still, but having said that, our last dog, Benji, a small lurcher, i've seen go circle around a field of 5-6 rabbits, charge them, 2-3 would freeze motionless, he'd grab them on the way by & shake them, drop 'em & on to the next, then after the moving ones. total that day was 6 all in less than a minute.

our local farmer on who's land we walk the dogs had a stroke a couple of years ago & got all mortal & animal freindly & got real mad if he saw us chasing rabbits. consequently the population exploded and his crops suffered, i note his sons were out shooting all the rabbits last fall & they killed & cleaned at least 20 by the barn we go walkies by. they used .22 air rifles to avoid upsetting the locals, so we had to go elsewhere to find rabbits. (farmers find it easier to get a firearms certificate, i can't get one, being a furrener & not belonging to a acceptable club with a steel gun safe, etc. etc..)

finally saw another rabbit in his fields this morning, blue, millie and sam (our neighbor's lurcher) never even noticed, they were too busy following its scent to have a look, some sight hounds them, can see a rabbit at a mile, but not one 50 ft. away & daddy shouting 'RABBIT!!!!' at them. it wandered off & they never even noticed.....

p.s. - i'd think the meat would be better without all the stress hormones in it, but as i don't eat it it's a moot point. most of the ones that get caught get caught quick, so probably don't build up the adrenalin, the more fit & intelligent ones get away after a good twisty run, usually by ducking into a briar patch

(once one ducked into a green pea field with blue in hot persuit, blue got all tangled up in the pea vines & i had to go get him & cut him loose, when he' jumped the rabbit about 100ft from me they ran away from me about 200ft, did a 180 and the rabbit took off up the road towards me, saw me, turned back the other way past blue who had been in hot persuit about 2 ft. behind, zigged right into the field and disappeared with blue right behind. i think it was playing with us)
 
Kismet, that is ok if that's the way they want to do it, but it doesn't appeal to me. I'd like a couple of dogs that run AND catch the coyote; I could just sit and call them if I wanted to shoot them.

On one of my friends ranches we leave the coyotes alone because they have a real problem with ground squirrels; on my other friends place, though, they are eating every rabbit, quail, etc that moves. See tons of yotes, and no game now. Not sure what brought about the change in numbers because it wasn't like that before.
 
Nice looking hounds, Kronckew.

I've never gone hunting with dogs - don't have any, can't have any, don't know anyone who has any. (Wiener dogs and pit bulls excluded, but neither would be my first choice for a hunt.) I'd love to sit in on one sometime though. It sounds like a good time for the observer and a better time for the hunters. (The ones with four feet.)
 
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