Ep. 90: You Want to be a Hound Hunter?
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We've talked with him, you know, hound hunting and the perception and the politics, you know, even internally like our own hunters sometimes looking at hound hunting, you know, through a different lens. We've talked about all of that, but today we're going to just dive into building your own pack of hounds or being able to go out and hound hunt. What does it take?

the equipment, the dogs, the breeding, everything involved. I'm very, very interested. I love everything about working behind the dogs. I love what Bradley's built and is able to do. Unfortunately, I live in the great state of Washington for, I think, about the last 20 years. We haven't been able to hunt with hounds. So, joined here by Bradley Dammerman. It's just going to be a live show talking about building your own pack of hounds. So, welcome to the show, Brad.

Thank you. Thanks for having me on again. Yeah, yeah. It's always a pleasure. So we're kind of finishing up our – it was a very short – our schedules are nuts, and you had clients leading all the way up. So we were here on a short three-day hunt. Dirk will get to hunt tomorrow morning. I've got to head back. But it's been great. We've been on bears. Your dogs are resilient, tough, tough little –

Tough little critters. You know, some long chases. You know, bears that had some long legs and really could scoot sometimes into two units over. So great dogs. And it's just, I'm, you're probably tired of me asking dumb questions. You know, stuff that you hound guys know, but it's just things that interest me because I want to know everything about it. Like, what about this? And what about people you've read on the internet about this? And so,

We're going to just start diving into it. If you wanted to hunt with hounds, how do we do it? And so I think we could talk about equipment, but I think it makes sense to start with the dogs maybe or the know-how. So...

If you wanted to start being a hound hunter, where do you start? I guess I'll let you tell me where do you start with hounds. Not to interrupt you again, you were from the lineage of your grandpa hound hunted, your dad hound hunted, and it was just kind of a natural step. But let's say you don't know or you don't have that training or maybe dogs to be passed down. How do you start this? Yeah. Yeah. So if I had to start from scratch, I...

you know, that's, it's quite a journey. First of all, I mean, you're, you're going to have to, you're going to have to ask yourself, you know, am I going to have time for this? First of all, you know, and, um, you're going to have to kind of have a passion for the outdoors and, and, um, you're going to have to have some drive, you know, I mean, um, and, and if you got a job, you know, if you're working five days a week, um,

You know, you got to think you're going to need to hunt every weekend. I mean, I call it weekend warriors, you know, and I used to be one, you know, where I'd work on the weekdays and hunt on the weekends, you know, hunt every chance I could on the weekends. And I caught lots of game. You know, I have better dogs now because I hunt a lot more now.

But most your average guy that's getting into it's going to have a job because this stuff costs money, you know. And, you know, you might have a good job where you're working at a meal or a job you're only four days a week or something. And that definitely helps. But I think you'd want to start, you know, definitely do your research. You know, you got different tools than I had growing up. Now you got Instagram and these people posting. But, you know, you got to really do your homework and try to find a line of dogs or whatever.

Somebody that you see is catching a lot of game, whether that's on Instagram or you look them up on the internet. Maybe try to go hunt with the guy. Try to pick out, okay, do I want walkers? Do I want plots? What kind of dogs do I want? Black and tans, blue ticks. I mean, we can go on and on. But try to narrow that down. Talk to different people about their dogs and stuff.

what they do and then I think get your dog picked out

And then your bet. So real quick, you said get your dog picked out. How many, if you're a lion hunter or a bear hunter, like is there a number of dogs you would shoot for? Do you need to have a minimum of two or three? I mean, we've seen it. You've got dogs good enough that a single one can get them up a tree. Right. But bears, you know, more so the bear fights, dog fights. Like what's that number? Do you need to shoot for? I like to hunt with six dogs. A lot of that, you know, if I was hunting in a pickup more now, you know how I'm hunting now with ATVs and stuff. Yeah.

Um, that's about all I can handle is six dogs on the bike. You know, I might hunt seven or eight dogs if I was hunting out of the pickup more and had a nice big dog box or something, you know, but I like that five to six dogs, um, plenty of dogs, if they're all doing their job to catch a mean bear and, and put pressure on a bear, um,

Um, I think starting out, I would highly recommend probably only starting out with one or two dogs. Gotcha. And then find somebody to work them in with or just hunt that one dog. Yeah, I would, I would, I would try to find somebody, um,

and I I've kind of told you this already, Jason, you know, I've had guys reach out to me, you know, and, and, you know, sometimes I'll, I'll take them hunting. And a lot of times I'm thinking, ah, I don't really have the time, you know, but if you're, if, if you know a guy that's willing to put a little time into you and, and, uh,

allow you to hunt with them, hunt with already trained dogs. That's going to be your best way to start your pups with already trained dogs. You know, I mean, you can hunt with the guy on a weekend, a hound hunter that's willing to take you, hunt your dogs. That's going to be the fastest way and best way to get...

get your dog going. But I would start out, the reason I'm saying starting out with one or two, I've, I've had a lot of guys gun hole on hound hunting and buy all the equipment, buy a bunch of dogs and make her about a year or two and quit.

So in my mind, start out with one or two dogs, hunt with somebody, and see if it's even something you really love because I can tell you, you really got to love this. And I'm sure you're going to hit roadblocks being a brand new guy. Like it's not going to pan out exactly how you have it in your head. There's issues with dogs or maybe a dog that doesn't turn out. And so I imagine it's real tough to get started and think that you're having success right away. Yep. I'm glad you brought that up because what I've seen with guys

is we get attached to these dogs. I get attached with them. But if you got a dog that just ain't going to, and you could breed two really, really good dogs together and their pup, there might be a pup or two out of that cross that just ain't going to make it. It's just no good. I mean, I don't believe in killing the dog or

shooting it or any of that i don't do that but i if i had the past in the past if i had a dog like that i'd find a home for it yep what i've seen with these younger guys and guys that are just getting into it is they're so attached to them which is good i'm not saying that's bad but they need to get rid of them yeah and get something that will hunt they try to force that dog into being a hunter that's just never going to be right and you should have a pretty good idea at a year and a half two years old uh

I usually know by a year if I'm going to keep them or not. But, you know, where you're weekend hunting or something, it might be more like two years. And if that dog ain't doing what the guy you're hunting with, maybe the guy that you're hunting with has been hunting for 25 years or something or longer, if he tells you, you know, I just don't think it's going to, your wife might be attached to it, your kids might be attached to it, but you need to let it go or at least just keep it at home and get a different dog and

and try it. So don't waste too much time on a dog, if that makes sense, you know? So before we talk or jump into like training characteristics, what you're looking for, for good, you know, good characteristics on a, on a hound dog, um,

Let's jump into bloodlines or the breed a little bit and what you think matters. I was telling you a story earlier today. I was all gung-ho on this. Everybody around home that hunted cats or bears, everything was walker around home. Treeing walker, running walker, a mixed breed. You could probably tell me more. You're like, this idiot over here is talking running. They always heard them referred to as treeing walkers. You're talking about running walkers here. Yeah.

And then you get on the internet, you're like, oh, black and tans have great noses, but slow. Or you're like, oh, blue ticks and plots are resilient, maybe not quite as fast. And so you read through all of this. And then I show up with you, and you've got these orange hounds. I'm like, what the heck are these? And then you realize, oh, there was some semi-famous within the hound world, Mathis, that bred specific hounds.

you know, uh, lion dogs. And then you guys have tweaked them a little bit with some running Walker and, you know, and then you, your grandpa and dad, you always say like, man, they'd be ashamed right now. Cause I don't have a single black plot on the box, you know? So is there,

The way you guys hunt big country in Idaho, I know you've talked about you need dogs that are fast, dogs that have endurance, and dogs that are mean. But go through those breeds. What works for you here in Idaho? And then I know you mentioned earlier, I'm not going to give your answer, and this may upset some other houndsmen, like black and tans aren't maybe fast enough or typically aren't fast enough to do what we do or you're doing here in Idaho. So go through the breeds and, you know,

Maybe what makes a good dog or maybe, you know, the historic nature you've, you've mentioned multiple times, like, you know, the, the Walker that's on your, on your box, like your grandpa's rolling over in his grave, you know? So walk, walk through the breeds and whether you think it matters or sometimes characteristics do, and they just wouldn't work. Yeah. I will say this to start now it is, there is good dogs in all breeds. I haven't, and I haven't owned all breeds, but I've hunted with enough of them.

um i really like the the line of plots i had the bear path plots that i started out hunting grew up hunting with um and i like them dogs because they were cold-nosed and they were about a 40 to 50 pound dog you know these ones anyways and here in idaho and these mountains and stuff you get much over 50 i mean 55

is about my max. I don't want a dog any heavier than that. Um, they just, they age quicker, they break down, they can't run these real hard races. Um, but, um, so I really liked the line of plots I grew up in. They had cold nose. Um, they were really good strike dogs, really good tree dogs, really good. So forever I hunted them, you know? Um, and then I've been around some blue ticks. Um, the blue ticks I were, I was around, um,

They were good dogs. They were really good mountain lion dogs, you know, lion dogs. But they didn't have any speed either. They were real slow. They had extremely cold nose. Now, you could use a dog like that. You know, if you had... Say you had a couple...

young dogs or something and you had an old slow blue tick but he'd strike the bear and start the lion for you you know and you could get those young dogs going with a dog like that that would be great but i know for me here in idaho uh the ones i were around and i and i have i don't want to offend anybody but i have i have seen a few fast uh ones though but most of the ones i was around were a little slower than i like anyways and um

The black and tans, and I don't know a lot about black and tans just because I haven't ever owned one or been around them a lot, but I know they're cold-nosed dogs. But again, you might get one that...

That doesn't seem like it has a cold nose and it's litter mate does, you know, real quick for those of you that don't know when we're talking cold nose, that's a dog's ability to, to, you know, be on a truck or on the front of a box and, and catch a, you know, catch just a molecule or a couple of molecules of a bear scent and they'll strike.

which means they'll bark as you're just driving down the road at, what, 5, 10 miles an hour. They'll pick up just enough, let you know. And so when we say cold nose, it's their ability to work up or notify you of a track that, you know, or a scent that you may not know about. So I just wanted to clarify that because people that don't know, cold nose is the ability to, you know, smell older tracks. Older tracks, yeah, and take, say, a 12-hour old track, you know, on –

bear track on dry ground or a lion track on dry ground. You know, that's another way of thinking cold nose. And then you've got a lot of that...

um blue ticks one one blue tick that stands out to me a guy an old guy had that was really gutsy but some of these these blue ticks i were around were pretty they weren't that they didn't have much guts the ones i were around but i i know the one guy that had one that had plenty of guts so you know

there's just, there's just good, there's just good dogs and all breed. It's a matter of whether you get one, whether you, if you do decide a blue tick, whether you get the right bill blue tick for what you're doing or what, but, uh,

I don't want to completely pick it apart. Yeah, yeah. But, you know... Yeah, so... They're definitely not for me. I've been around them enough and it was nothing I was interested in. Yeah. So, I mean, a good... You know, me being a non-houndsman, you want to hunt the mountains in Idaho, like, it just quick...

like i'm gonna look at who's hunting around here what outfitters and then like what dogs are they using would probably be a really good check maybe to like stay within a blood you know a species or a bloodline and make sure you're not trying something new you know yeah um and then you guys run in we've mentioned earlier you guys are running mathis which you might scratch your head and there's not a lot of information on them um they're they were you know i think wyoming kind of their origination was out of wyoming yeah

um i think the where did that guy i can't remember off the top of my head where he where steve mathis actually lived uh um those dogs kind of fell into my lap um um i and i so i originally started hunting with a few of them with my guide travis which you've met most people probably don't know him um

a really really good hound guy i mean and he hunts a lot this ain't a weekend warrior this guy um works just enough to to hunt constantly you know yeah and he uh i was around his dogs you know and i and and this is when i still had plots you know and i i i was they were you know they were about a 40 anywhere from a 40 to 45 50 pounds tops dog that was the first thing i noticed about him

And they were built really like my plots, about the same build. They were just different, you know. Some of them were just all red dog, you know. And then the ones I got down here we call high tan looking dog. And so Travis had talked to Travis and I had hunted with them dogs enough, you know, guiding and just hunting with Travis. And I was really liking them. And anyways, I learned that, you know, that this guy in Wyoming ended up with the semen. Yeah.

from steve's old dogs you know before steve passed away and was smart enough to freeze the semen and and and he said i i think he's gonna have a litter here soon if you want one and i'm thinking i've i've never owned anything but a plot in my life and i'm just kind of like stopped and i was like but man i really like these dogs you know i've been hunting with them for a while now and so i uh i said i'll take one you know i'll buy one that was mallory yeah as a pup

And I'll tell you, she... Her whole litter, that whole litter was... I would have been proud to own any one of those dogs. And I mean...

I love that dog so much. I mean, she's just one of a kind. And I mean, she has everything. I mean, she strikes well, old tracks, she cold trails, she bays the bear. I mean, as hard as you ever see a dog bay a bear and no quit in her and just a warrior, you know, it's been scarred to pieces. She's been, she's a little too gutsy. If there's anything wrong with her, she might have a little too much guts on the bears. But yeah,

I kind of went off on a rabbit trail here, but she's just, she's a nice little dog, but it was definitely hard for me to, you know, some of the plot guys that I grew up with,

they were all plot. They're not hunting nothing else. They were stubborn old guys and, and they had some good plots. I mean, they caught lots of games, so it was hard for me, but I was glad I, I got the, I got Mallory, I know. And, and that was kind of right when I was starting my business. Well, I'd had my business for a while, but really starting to run some hound hunts with clients and stuff. And she really, she really helped my business out. She caught a lot of game for me and her and other dogs, you know, but she was my main lick for,

quite a few years and um and so i really got attached to that blood now you see most of that that stuff's down there yep and then um so i kind of got to know this guy in wyoming and and uh um he's a taxidermist a really good taxidermist too by the way lions and bears and everything he's just good um but he uh he he uh we've been kind of breeding dogs back and forth travis and and and

and me and and Travis's dad and this John guy and and they've bred some like running walker into that Mathis which would be like that page dog you were hunting with and you see she's real fast and kind of fine-tuned it a little bit and messed with it and and really that's what it's all about you know finding a dog you kind of like like I did and then

kind of tweaking it, you know, well, they could be a little faster. So let's, let's bring, breed some running dog into it, or they could be a little colder nose and maybe try to breed something, you know, known for their cold nose, which the masses Mathis's are, are known for their cold noses, but, uh, you know, and just tweak it. But,

um for a young guy just getting into it he's just gonna have to pick one and hopefully he gets a good line of dogs and and starts out and um yeah because you'll know you'll know within a year if you're hunting enough yeah those math is dogs we're we we all kind of found his old book you had mentioned it and we found brave which steve wrote in his own quirky way and it's it's a great read but

correct me if i'm wrong he originally developed those dogs for for dry ground um like mexico arizona new mexico and then he ended up getting a lot of work in california it looked like and wyoming so he kind of um these dogs were were bred for that um but have found some great utility you know being able to hunt alongside you here in idaho they work out really well in the mountains as well so they're pretty pretty dang universal breed um

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But we'll diverge a little bit from the breeds and then go maybe a little more into the training and the characteristics. So you had just mentioned you'll know by a year, have a pretty good idea, and you should really be able to tell by about two. So what boxes are you trying to check? And I'll let you lay those out, like cold nose, voice, or whatever you're looking for. How are you starting to judge these dogs? Yeah, so I mean...

You know, so you're going to, if you're hunting by yourself, you're going to need something to strike a bear for you. So that's a must. And unless you're putting baits out and guys do that, you can put, you know, you have to check and make sure it's legal. Yeah, and then start on a bait. Yeah, and, you know, it might be something that if you can't find somebody to hunt with, you might just, you know, get a trail camera, get a bait set up, get a bear coming in.

and and take your pups in there try to buy it you know and try to run them off then you know there's a bear just been there been a been a bear there and and start that way you know try to get them to run it but you know it's it's a long process without having an already trained dog or try to find a hound guy that'll sell you an already started dog or already trained dog or an old dog you know um

I have a hard time getting rid of my old dogs that I've hunted with so much, you know, but there's guys that'll sell them. If you can, if you can get us even an old dog that's slow and just get those pups kind of going off the bait and running with an old guy, an old dog like that, that'll be another good way to go. But you're going to, you're going to need a dog that'll strike if you're, if you're not using baits. Um, and all my dogs, some are better at

One thing, another, you know, they're different. They're different personalities. So Mallory's a really good strike dog, as you guys can see. And then I got Paige, which she won't hardly – she looks good up on the rig box, but she won't strike, but she'll cold trail really good. She won't bark on the cold trail, but, like, sometimes she'll out-trail Mallory, you know. So she's a really good cold trailer. She's, like, my second best cold trailer, you know. And so I can still use her.

Tom, you know, he's kind of like a pack dog. Like if I got a mean bear, I can send him a long ways away to the sound of the dogs, you know? And some dogs don't make good pack dogs. So there's a lot of little things that I'm looking for. And it might take five dogs to get everything, you know? Because they're not the whole package, every one of them. Yeah.

Real quick, we've been talking about Paige. I think she led once Mallory would get him started, aside from Tika leading the long chase yesterday for a little bit. But Paige led the majority of the races. And we were talking a little bit yesterday while we were listening. You're like, dang it. One thing she doesn't do very good is she won't bark unless she sees the bear or is very hot. But then we also talked about how that could be seen as a bad thing, but also a good thing. Because then you know when you see here on your GPS, we'll just talk about equipment a little bit, like

Well, the bear is right there right now because we hear Paige and we can tell which barks her. So it's like it's a good trait and a bad trait because then you also know when she's on the bear. You mentioned Mallory. We talked on the cat hunt. She's got this uncanny ability to cut corners.

and shorten the trail so she can put more pressure, you know, and some dogs don't have that, which I think you probably learned through watching a lot of your GPS, like, oh, she's cutting and then she's on. What else are, you know, resilience, you know, toughness you're looking for. But it's weird. You see all these little, you know, differences in these dogs, you know,

Jackson, who, you know, you told a cool story. He actually got lost for three months and survived. But like that dog, to me, he's probably on your bigger end of dogs that you'll ever have. But that dog struck a little bit. He was always kind of up front with Paige. He was just, you know, that dog maybe not be the best at anything, but he's kind of the full package. So there's, you know, and he obviously was either tough or dumb.

um on that first bait up barracks he ended up being the most banged up but super tough was ready to go again you know day two and three but yeah um is there anything else you're looking for like to check the boxes like are there are there telltale signs um one thing we didn't talk like during training is trash like when i grew up the few years i got to hunt you know you get a dang pup or something gets on a coyote track they're willing to chase anything oh yeah um

is the best way to work trash out is just run them with dogs that won't look or go that way? Or how do you break them from those bad habits? Or like me being a dummy, I go out there and I couldn't tell you like, oh, that pup's running a trail by itself. Like it's doing something crazy. Like how do you keep them off of a garbage? Yeah. So we'll go back to the toughness of dogs, you know, Paige, you know, or her barking, you know, like Paige, she, she doesn't bark and that does drive me nuts. But what I think it does for her,

is

is I think she actually gets ahead of the dogs because she's not barking. She's not using that extra energy. She's running, you know. And her mom was like that. Travis owned her mom, and her mom was really quick. So it's kind of bred into them too a little bit. But I like it because, yeah, you hear her barking. You know stuff's about to happen, you know. She's on it and either looking at it or right behind it. So it's good to kind of know that in the middle of a race, like you said. Yeah.

Another good thing that you want to look for on a good hound is whether they have tough feet or not. And that can be bred into them too. I've seen where dogs...

You know, you can see my dogs, you know, I, even I thought they wouldn't hunt this morning, you know, but that I can hunt them dogs day in, day out. They're, they're tough. And that's so important if you're bear hunting a lot and, and you want good feet, you don't want a dog that's just, you take them out and he hasn't been ran for two weeks and you take them out and hunt them. And he, he blows his pad so bad. You can't hunt him for two weeks, you know? Um, and a lot of that,

mine are hunted a lot so i never have that issue but a weekend warrior might have that a little bit but you can for sure you don't want that if you have any of the slightest clue that they might have bad feet you know hunting with the old guy that you're hunting with or are talking to people about the the dogs you're looking at i just stay clear to that that's one thing i'd stay clear about um but uh

Real quick, you keep talking about you hunt your dogs a lot. Just for the audience, how many days do you drive out of this driveway to go hunt with your dogs, either on the four-wheeler or in the box? Well, I'll just say this. I've been since May 1st of this year. What is today, the 12th? 12th of June. June. I think I've missed three days of hound hunting. And I'll do that clear until...

um the end of july um i'll hunt um a lot so that that to me that's a lot you know we're uh and i'm fortunate enough to be you know i'm i'm i'm blessed to be able to do that because that was the reason i bought a hound or i've been a hound guy my whole life and when i was working um logging i used to log and worked under a high lead and stuff and and i got a lot of hunting in but

It drove me completely bonkers that I wasn't out with my hounds every day, you know. It just did, you know. And I thought, how could I hunt with my dogs more? And that was the big reason why I bought an outfitter out. Yeah. Is so I could hunt with my dogs and just be able to hunt, you know. I like to elk hunt and everything else too. So a job is everything when you're building a pack of dogs because you just ain't going to have that good of dogs if you can't hunt them much.

I've just been around guys that, that, that, uh, you can, they might be decent dogs and they might be really, really good dogs. If a guy, a different guy owned them that, that hunted more. So time, I think is going to be the biggest killer time and maybe a wife. Everyone kill, kill a good hound guy. But, um,

but yeah so that answered your question on hunting a lot so anything else you're looking for as you're as you're you know checking the boxes for these dogs so i cat hunt a lot um i'm um and i used to struggle with it probably more in that line of plots i had although i had some good ones if you're cat hunting and i like to run bobcats mountain lions um i love to do that too but you want a good locate dog

So bear, most of the time on a bear hunt, bear race, the dog sees the bear climbing the tree. You know, they catch it and they watch it tree most of the time. You know, your lead dogs anyways. And once one dog's tree and your lead two or three of your lead dogs tree and, you know, the other ones that may be behind, if they're behind, you know, they'll know when they get there, the other dogs are bringing, and they'll tree. But a locating dog, just in case anybody doesn't know, that's,

The dog that's going to bark up the right tree, the tree that the cat's in and that the cat, they know that cat's in. They're not false tree in either. You know, and you got to be careful with that in line of dogs too. I don't like a real tree happy dog. I mean, I like dogs that'll tree, but I don't want a real tree happy dog. I kind of want...

because i've noticed with those really tree happy dogs um they they'll false tree a lot you know and um so i'm really looking for locating dogs for cats and and page and mallory and all them dogs are really good locators and especially on bobcat can be hard to locate for dogs um

um, super important, um, thing. So if you're doing your research on, on a guy's dogs, make sure they're good locators. If you plan on cat hunting, because you could spend a lot of time, you know, you'd run these cats and, and, and,

The dogs might treat them, but the dogs don't know what tree to bark at. Yeah. You know, so you never find the dang thing in the tree, you know, and I've owned dogs like that, you know. Yeah. This is all – I've been there, done that, you know, so. Yeah, the old – that's where the old saying, barking up the wrong tree probably comes from. That's right. A dog that wasn't going to locate me. Yeah, exactly. Okay, yeah, so back to that, you know, one thing that got me is like, man, that'd be –

hard to train like and i call it trash i don't know what you guys refer to it but game animals you don't want to pursue whether it's you know maybe it's raccoons or coyotes or rabbits how do you is there a way or is it just lots of time with the dogs that know what they should be hunting or but if you're a new guy like how do you keep them off of that and how do you know

Yeah, so I've done this for a long time, so usually I can almost tell right away if I'm running trash just because I'm like, something seems fishy. Maybe it's my old Mallory dog or one of my old dogs comes back and stands in the road and looks at me, and I'm like, okay. So that's how I can tell. But my biggest pet pee, probably the biggest thing I struggled with, especially in my youngest years,

younger years and actually knowing what the heck they were running had been a stinking coyote for me. I ran them, you know, and thinking I was running a bear, you know, but running a coyote. And you want to know because the more times they run it, the more times they're going to think it's okay and the harder they're going to be to break.

But where I hunt with good broke dogs and, and I'm not sure that I've ever trusted 100% because about the time you trusted a dog, a hundred percent, it, it'll trash on you or something, run a coyote. But yeah,

Most of my old dogs are as broke as a dog could be anyways. But if you hunt, we're hunting with these pups, and especially it's a lot easier now, obviously. The gear we got now is just incredible. I mean, what a time for a young guy to get in, really. I mean, I got this GPS, and you're watching it, and you see your three old dogs, and you might see your pup veer off, and it's running something crazy.

and, or say I, you know, that's one example. Well, nowadays you can just shock it. You know, I've got these colors. That's the best way. Shock it. It'll either come back to you or it'll go back to the, and you only have to shock these dogs a couple of times and then just, you know, so it's not cruel. You shock them a couple of times and then it's just a tone. And I mean, it freaks them out just bad, just a tone. But, um, the gear we got now to break dogs is just incredible. Um,

I'll be watching on my screen and, and a cold trail and a bobcat or a lion, and I'll see my pup veer off and I'll hear her barking and I'll know it's trash. You know, I just know. So I'll,

toner and yeah and she'll and she'll come right back to the old dogs and hunting with the old dogs again is always going to be the easiest way and they almost they're constantly going to bear trees and they smell that scent and i don't have a lot of trash problems like i used to but a guy that's getting in into it and just starting from scratch and he's he's trying to start them on coons or whatever get them going or whatever he can get get you know to try to get the pup started or

you know i've even heard of guys using rabbits and everything well that dog there he he's gonna he's gonna be more likely to trash because he's been on all and then you're trying to throw him on a bear now he's been on a on a coon and uh who knows what else and and now you're trying to run him on bear and so he thinks he just run anything he just wants to run anything and um you're going to want to figure that out fast you're going to want to know i mean obviously snow never lies if you're hunting in the snow you can check them

their track and um you just you just shock them a couple times it don't take long um if you have to do that i mean if uh again try to find somebody to hunt with try to find an old guy that's willing to put a little time into you and point you in the right direction and hunt your pups with his old trained dogs it's going to be your best bet yeah yep

So we'll assume we've got dogs, whether it's one or two like you recommend or maybe you're gaining three. What equipment? I mean, you've got some specialty equipment where you've got the garments and the GPSs. I remember I would go with the guys, and they'd have this antenna out their door, which you guys told a joke last night at dinner about one of the guys that was dead set on using his old telemetry antenna. He's like, man, once he learned how it worked, he's like, if I could have all of my life back,

You know, like how much life he lost searching for dogs or trying to keep track of them. But go through all the equipment because, I mean, you've got side-by-sides, you've got collars, you've got, you know, the leash. I mean, not to get too nuanced in leashes, you know. What do you need to do this and do it right in today's day and age and to be as effective as you can? Right. Yeah, definitely the time now with the GPS versus the old way of...

a track and the dogs are just in, we'd still be on that two days ago. Yeah. Barry ran clear out of the country, you know, we'd still probably be looking for dogs on that. Yeah. But yeah, geez. Um, yeah. And that's what I meant by what a time for young guys to get into it with these GPSs and stuff. They're just, it's just easier to train dogs too. Um,

So the equipment you're going to need, you know, um, first of all, I guess, and this does depend on where you live. You know, I live where I live. Um, you have to have an ATV. I mean, I see guys hunting just out of pickups and I have no idea how, but you're, so you're going to need a good ATV, um, which is expensive, you know, and then you're going to have to build some racks and stuff for it and get it set up to haul dogs. And, um,

If you're hunting with a guy, you know, if you're hunting with some old guy, like I was saying, that would be your best bet. You know, you're going to need some kind of radio to communicate with him. You're going to need the GPSs that are anywhere from, you know, 500, 800 bucks. And you're going to need collars that are 350 bucks a piece for however many dogs you got. I run two collars on my dogs and I highly recommend them.

I highly recommend if you can afford it to put two collars on your dogs. I know they're expensive, but trust me, these collars are great. They've saved me so much gas, so much time. I get home earlier and everything, you know, because of them. I love them, but they do go bad. Yep. I mean, if I have a collar that makes it a year, it's rare. I mean, without going bad. So,

Keep that in mind. You're definitely going to want two colors. When you're going to need a good Toyota pickup with the dog box. Now you've got your four-wheeler set up. Now you've got your dog box. Now you're going to need a trailer to pull your

your atv um again you know there might be places some of these guys can hunt out of pickups i know i can't so yeah um yeah if we uh just an observation i've made if we could if we had to be in a pickup we can only pick dogs up from non-four-wheeler roads and and main gravel roads we would want like you said we'd still be picking up dogs right or long long hikes big walks yeah yeah so it's uh

Yeah. And let's see. I know I'm forgetting stuff. I mean, we have a dog leashes, you know, you got to have a bunch of dog leashes and, um, I build my own dog leashes. I just get some cable and, and that's pretty easy and cheap, you know, just order all that stuff on Amazon or you can get, there's people that sell it nightlight and, you know, definitely, I mean, several places that you can buy dog leashes, but, um, what else do we need for gear? Um,

I'd probably get you started anyways. I don't know. What am I up to? 20 grand now? With as many colors and dogs as you're running, it's not cheap. O'Reilly Auto Parts are in the business of keeping your car on the road. I love O'Reilly. In fact, the other day, I'm not kidding you. The other day, I went into an O'Reilly Auto Parts looking for a part. I needed a different thing that wasn't really in there, you know, only like tangentially related to what they carry.

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You have two receiver units so that, you know, when we're hunting together, like there'll be times where you're maybe trying to listen to the race, but hey, I have a dog that we need to go pick up. So, you know, you've got two receivers and, you know, there's a lot of equipment out there. You know, you mentioned the two-way radio, so we can kind of, hey, I'm going to go out here and...

Yeah, a lot of equipment. That's not counting the stuff at home. When you get to your place here, you've got kennels. You've got dog houses. Yours are all under lean, too. I mean, I've seen some old houndsmen at home. They'd have a stake in the yard in a dog house, and that was good enough. Yours are treated a little better. You've got dog houses. They're kennels. They're kind of out of the weather. Yeah.

yeah you know that sort of stuff and then you also got the the food bill you know you're feeding what 12 mouths here yeah um you know so you've got that's not really equipment but all the stuff that goes along with owning these right these dogs yeah um i remember an old guy uh um a kid was uh wanting to get into hound hunting kind of like we're talking about and this old guy was standing there and and he says let me see your wallet and the kid's like

What? He's like, let me see your wallet. You got any money in there? He's like, yeah. And he handed him his wallet and the old guy pulled all of his money out and threw it. He said, that's hound hunting for you. Yeah.

So, yeah, it's kind of already, you know, like the old saying, you know, the boat, you know, it's just a money pit, you know, or however they said that. But it's a lot of money, but it can be rewarding too. And there's ways to cut corners, I'm sure. You know, you can get used stuff.

You know, you can get online. You don't have to buy a brand new GPS to start out with. Buy a used one. Find somebody that wants to upgrade or something, you know. There's deals out there, you know. Like I said, build your own leashes, you know. You don't have to have a brand new pickup. You don't have to, of course, in fact, you don't want a brand new pickup. Yeah, yeah.

I don't think I could sell you any of my pickups, could I, Jason? No. We had a conversation today as we came down that one trail that was pretty steep and bumpy and brushy. And we got to the bottom. I think we all looked at each other and like, this is why you would don't buy it. Not to ruin your sales value here in the future, but don't ever buy anything from a houndstooth.

Right. Except for Good Hound. Yeah, except for Good Hound. If it's for sale. Yeah, yeah. And I was joking with you earlier. I'm like, yeah, but is a Good Hound ever really for – like a real good one ever for sale? Not to –

I'm glad you brought that up, Jason, because... And I mentioned it just a little bit ago, you know, buy an old dog. But be dang careful with that. There's dog... We call them dog jockeys out there. There's guys out there. And I'm not even sure they're really that big of hound guys, really. They hunt a little bit. But they're salesmen. They're just a dog breeder at that point, right? Yeah, they're a dog breeder. Or they'll buy... I've had them buy dogs from me, you know, where I'm like, I'm going to sell these dogs, say...

for a thousand bucks. That's what I think it's worth. Uh, I'm not saying that I'd sell a dog for a thousand right now, but I'm just using it as an example. And then I have a dog jockey that knows I'm hunting a lot, buy it from me and then turn around and sell it for 5,000. Well, the dog wasn't worth 5,000. It was worth a thousand, you know? So you gotta be careful of that. I would highly recommend if you were going to buy a dog to hunt with it and

And if it's a good dog, like they're telling you it's a good dog, there's no reason they shouldn't invite you over. I know some of the dogs, and I don't sell a lot of dogs, but I have sold a few throughout the years. And I'll tell the guy that's, I'll tell him, come on over and hunt with me for a day or two. We can just hunt with the dogs and make sure it's a dog you like. And there's,

And if they're saying that it's a good dog, there's no reason why they shouldn't say, yeah, let's go hunting. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And let's see what it's got. Right. Prove it to you. And you know, if the, and say you got an old dog, I wouldn't judge a dog that's out of shape. So maybe the guy kind of is getting out of hound hunting. Um, that might be your best bet to get a, a good dog, a guy that hunted quite a bit, but he's kind of, I don't know, uh,

maybe had some kids and got busy with basketball and football games and kind of, I've got to kind of get out of it. That might be a good opportunity to buy a dog, but you go hunting with it and it didn't really show you much. Well, it's just out of shape. So you gotta, there's a lot of things to be looking for, you know, is the dog do bad today just because it's 20 pounds overweight or what? But just be, be careful buying a,

a good dog from somebody, you know, a high dollar dog, definitely check it out and do your research on that. So I'm kind of almost reverting back to the training and picking dogs. So you just made, you know,

an old dog what is what is the prime like we've we've talked about this and you said some of these are debatable you're gonna kind of know by a year or two that they're good um i'm assuming what nine or ten's about the end of hunting as far as like a dog getting pretty up there i mean mallory's nine but she's like you said she's a once-in-a-lifetime dog that still has the grit like

So what's that prime? Like two to nine, two to 10 is like when you're going to hunt them. Yeah. I'd say their prime, especially for me is about, um, I would say three to six, three to six, um, four years. And that's dogs that have been on two, 300 bears by the time they're,

three years old so it makes a difference on how much i've heard a lot of guys and read a lot of stuff on you know you don't really have a good finished dog till five or six and i i always kind of shrugged my shoulders at that because i'm thinking their life's half over at that point you know what do you mean five or six but i think in their prime they they really start running really start running hard if they're going to make a good dog say page or dotty down there mallory or any of them

that I ended up keeping, you know, and I knew that, you know, I already knew at about a year, year and a half old that, okay, I'm not getting rid of these dogs. I've seen enough. I seen all I want to see. I like them, but you really see a difference right around that two and a half, three years old when they're getting hunted a lot, they really start flying. They can really run hard. They can run those, um, races like the other day out of the County, you know, and, um, and then get up and hunt the next day. Yep.

And then you start getting up to eight where like Tom is. He still does pretty good, but you see him falling back. Yeah. On a long race. On a long race. He hangs in there for a long time. But, you know, a good hard cup, say an hour and a half, really hard running, you know, steep ground and stuff. He makes it to the tree if they tree it, but he's, you know, three, 400 yards behind the young four or five-year-olds.

So I'd say that definitely, you know, three to six, somewhere in there. But then I'm jumping all over the place. We're talking about prime, but then also what you just mentioned, like making a good, a pack of dogs. Everybody has, you know, every dog has their good things and bad things where, you know, you put Jackson and Tom in, they're a little bit bigger dogs. Maybe, you know, I know two years ago when we were here on that bait up dog, Tom got beat a little bit more, which I don't know if it was an indication that he's,

He's two, but he put me on putting too much pressure on. You got some bigger dogs. You got your fast dogs to kind of push. And it's almost like, you know, you're looking at it or at least me looking at what you're doing. Like, man, all these things kind of have good things that all kind of round out what you've got going on down there, you know, over the hill. Absolutely. You know, you got, and I've been giving Bradley a crap about this all week. Dottie, who he just mentioned, who he very rarely talks about. I do want to say,

is his only Walker in the group. Um, but she's her and page are typically led most of the, the chases. They're, they're fast, um, pretty good noses. Um,

And so you got this weird, I don't want to say weird, you got a very good mix of dogs that do certain things good. And then on the bait up bear, I think all of your dogs, when you, not to spoil it, when you came up over the bait up bear, like all your entire pack was there and on them. So they're aggressive, they're putting pressure. They all made it to that point.

They're working as a pack. And like you said, on a mean bear, you probably need that many dogs to stay and put pressure so that you don't hurt a dog or try to get it up a tree or to kind of keep the pressure off of the one or two dogs that may be up front. Right. Yep. So the one thing a dog has to do, every dog that I have down there has to do, or I'm not keeping them, is they have to bathe a bear. And...

I've been around a lot of dogs that won't bathe a bear. I mean, they got caught by a bear, spooked them real bad or whatever. I'm not keeping them if they won't bathe a bear. They're going to have another home. So all my dogs have to bathe a bear. But that's all I ask. And they got to run pretty fairly fast. But they have to bathe a bear. And like Mallory, so I kind of, I always kind of look at

Well, you're a coach. You know, it's, there's nothing, it's the same thing. I look at a pack of dog as a, as a football coach or a basketball coach. It's like, okay, I need Mallory to strike the bear. I need Mallory to get it started. I need Dottie and Paige to catch it.

And then when they catch it, I need them to hold it there long enough for Jackson and Tom to show up. Yeah, yeah. And then we'll really hear. And then they all put the pressure on, and a lot of times they can get it to tree, you know. So it's really true, like, working out as a team. And it's kind of fun, you know. And you see, and you're proud of them, you know. Like, good job, you know. But it's no different. It's really just kind of like having a good football team, you know. Yeah, yeah.

No, it's awesome watching the dogs work. You know, just how... And you got to see... I mean, a lot of times people don't... For those of you who don't know, a bait-up animal, we're going to... Some of you, maybe a lot of you guys know, but bait-up means that bears either...

And we've talked about this. Does it come from bad dogs putting pressure on? Not enough pressure early enough to get it up a tree and that bear realizes it can fight the dogs for a little bit. And so next time it encounters the dogs. But me and you kind of jetted down there to catch up to this bay bear. And when you got to see him peek over, you're probably proud. Houndsman at that point, like, man, all my dogs were a foot from its face, like on it putting pressure on.

So you get to see that teamwork, all those dogs were there. But one thing I do want to touch on, which not to bring, we're going to pull some of the old podcasts that hound hunting is easy. Yeah. Or it's the lazy man's way to do it. And besides this morning,

The first two days chases, we all kind of looked at each other and like, this is going to suck. Yep. I mean, and we're, we're all diehard elk hunters. Like we don't mind spiking out. We don't mind going wherever we need to kill an elk. And I'm like, this is going to like, is that a three hour hike at this point? Like they ran these bears in the no man's land with no roads. Yep. No way to get to them. And I'm like,

So to bring this up, you want to be a hound hunter or a houndsman, you better... Lace your boots up. Be in somewhat decent shape or be tougher than nails yourself because your dogs aren't going to come back on their own if they're good dogs. Not if they're good ones, yeah. And so like...

yeah, to me, it was just kind of eyeopening. You know, the first time we came in bear hunted with you two years ago, we didn't get on any crazy long chases or the road systems just worked out. But, um, you know, yesterday and the day before the first two days, we're looking at each other like, yeah, right. This is going to be fun. We're going to have to walk. And then that's when we, we did get the chance. He kind of,

For those of you who don't know, a typical day of hound hunting, once you find a bear, let's say you strike one, is watching your garment and trying to figure out, I think we need to go to this road. I think we need to go that road. Well, when there's no roads where they're heading, you're like, oh boy. And that was what we were in. So number one, be in decent shape or resilient. And then you better have some get up and go because when you took off running off of that road, I mean, I've...

I get around okay for a big guy, but it was like, it was everything I could do to keep up. Cause it was, you needed to get to that bear. It was trying to go away from us again and going into that no man's land. And we had to kind of seize that little slim opportunity we had to catch up to the dogs or who knows when we were going to get another chance. Right. Um, I felt like it was, if we didn't take care of it, then it was going to go into the night, you know? Yep. Um,

When I hear somebody, and I've heard it a lot, you know, when I hear somebody say that hound hunting is easy or the lazy man's way or just whatever they think up in their head. Because they probably haven't did it or can't afford to do it or don't have the equipment to do it. But go ahead. Yeah. No, I mean, that automatically goes into my mind. I know right then they've never went. Yeah.

And maybe they don't care to go and that's fine. But I can tell you that it is far from just being easy. Now there's days that I have easy hunts, smooth hunts, go out there and tree a bear, walk 400 yards, grab the dogs, come out, no big deal. But there's days that I about wore myself completely to death. I mean, just wore myself into the ground, you know, and worse than any elk hunt I'd ever been on, you know?

And by the way, you do get around really well. Oh, no, that's not what I was getting at. I was getting at how fast you should. I'm like, how fast are we going to get there? And then Bradley took off. I'm like, all right, we're dropping about 15 feet elevation every step. It was one of those where you're taking off just trying to get the brush out of your face. And every running step, you're like, all right, we're 15 feet lower. And then we're 15 feet lower. Right.

And then we get to the rocks, and I thought we were going to get ledged out there, and we almost did, really. Which we would have got around, but it would have took us a little longer to get to the dogs and stuff. And at that point, I mean, I don't know as much as you, but it was every second mattered at that point. Because last time I remember I was next to you looking at the GPS like, oh, they're going back away from us. And I seen you find another gear, and we were getting up and trying to get in front of them at the worst there. Yeah, no...

We talked like the second day, the long race, the dogs, we started well within the unit we could hunt and they ended up well within a unit we couldn't hunt. Yeah. You had mentioned earlier, the one requirement you have is that a dog will be resilient in bay and bay and fight. Mm-hmm.

We talked about this a little bit today. You can't necessarily call your... You don't want to train this into the dogs. You don't want to be able to say, hey, get over here and get your six dogs to leave. Oh, yeah. So you're in this predicament like as a houndsman, like...

One thing that I've just found on my cougar hunt, now this bear hunt, is you better be comfortable with being really intimate with alpha predators because I'm not as familiar as you are. You're comfortable doing these things or pulling dogs off of bears if you need to. Yesterday, not saying it was a good thing that we lost the race or lost the bear. Dogs were beat. But what do you do in that situation? How tough are you going to have to be as a houndsman to like, you have to go get your dogs off that bear.

Right. Because you can't kill the thing. Right. Unless you're going to be an outlaw, which we would never recommend. You're not going to do that, obviously. No way. But aside from shooting this bear that you can't shoot because you're in a pursuit unit,

how are you going to get the dogs unless you've trained them or shocked the heck out of them and maybe they'll come to your voice. But like, that's the things that like get me like, what do you do in that situation? And you talked about, you're lucky to maybe grab one dog off leash it. Yeah. And then you're back to the race with it. And then you're trying to grab one more. Like what is that? What it turns into? Like, is there, there's no fail proof system to get your dogs back at this point. Right? Yeah. No, it, it, it can, I've had, I've had quite a few times where I've,

i dang it we got a mean bear you know um and the season's closed i don't you know can't kill it so it's pursuit season so we're gonna have to start catching these dogs and it can get interesting uh with a good pack of dogs like what we were you know like they were baying the bear the other day you know and i'm baying it hard they don't and they're psyched up and they're not going to come to you or care that you're yelling at them they're focused on the bear um

What I've done in the past, and it's hard, but you can usually catch one or two dogs at a time if you're lucky. You try to head them off, and if they got the bare corner, run in there. And sometimes you can yell at a dog if you get in there 40, 50 yards from it, and it might run up to you real quick. Most of mine won't, but I've had dogs...

that might at times it would run up and like say hi to you and then run back down there and start baying and then i'd you know grab it or if i can run right down and i've been you know four or five feet from the bait up bear and i've had them charge me and everything bluff charge me and and i just grab grab a dog hook a leash to it and i've had dogs tied up for a mile literally you know chasing the bear and dogs and tying a dog up at a time till i'm down to one or two dogs and then

Most of my dogs will bay a bear a really long time by themselves, but they really psych each other up. If there's five or six of them, they're really into it. Or one dog is a lot easier to catch off of.

off of a mean bear or if you got a road and you can try to head them off and grab one then you know i'll do that grab one put them on your box you know he's gonna go nuts because he wants to turn back loose but yeah it's a process and it's hard i do not look forward to mean i like a good mean bear like the other day you know when it's when you have a tag and it's good for a young dog if he's gonna bathe a bear to get a bear shot to him and i don't shoot a ton of bear i'm not a big killer

you know i killed the one the other day just because i i felt like i needed to kill and it wasn't in a tree and it was a boar and um mean and everything so i did that but most of the time i you know let them go like we did the one today and stuff but um um when it's pursuit season you have no choice but to just start catching them you know and they they'll eventually be tired and wore out and quit some time but you know that could go into the night and everything and you don't want to be out there at night you know

that looks bad first of all. And, um, and just, it's never good. And then wolves and everything else, you don't want to be out there at night, but, um, yeah, that's how I've done it. I've headed them off on roads and, and went on foot and got right into, right into the fight with them and grab the first dog I can get my hands on, tie them to a tree and chase them another 400 yards and grab another dog and slowly start getting them gathered up. And it's,

it's there's nothing fun about that yeah and i can promise you it ain't easy yeah yeah um so is there anything we missed like we've talked about dogs we've talked about equipment you know a little bit of kennels like is there anything else that you could recommend if somebody's starting out and wanting to maybe start to hunt is there anything else we missed or you know i feel like there probably is and i hope i did a good enough job explaining but i um

I think that's the gist of it. Find a good hound guy, young guy, old guy, whoever, that's been doing it for a while, that's catching game, and talk him into taking you. And make sure it's something you want to do. So when you go to this hound guy, say, I know I might be a pain in your butt,

I hate to even bother you, but I really want to get into the hound hunting. Can I, can I get a pup from you or can I buy a pup and can I start hunting with you and start out with one or two pups and, and go into it easy. And that's going to be your very, that's going to be your fastest and best way to get started. And you might, and I've seen this a lot. You might think you're going to be a hound guy the rest of your life and you might be two years in and, and all of a sudden just say, no, it's too much. I'm done. Yeah.

and get out of it. So that's why I say, don't go, you don't need to go buy six dogs, seven dogs and, and do that. Just go into it slow. And, uh, um, don't be scared to, to ask questions, you know, just ask any question you can think of, um, talk to your hound guy that you're, you're dealing, ask him all the questions he'll tell you, he'll know. And, and that's how you're going to start out. And, um, you know, you can always, uh,

message me on instagram too if you have a question yeah idaho white tail guides yep um and be careful not i've talked to bradley i was very interested 20 25 years ago like and i would you know the internet was kind of pretty new back then but you could read all kinds of information and there's good information that you've confirmed and there's also a lot of bad information so i would highly recommend like he just said talk to whether it's bradley or somebody out there like talk to somebody that's

catching game which is proof in the pudding um that they know what they're doing you know talk to somebody in the area and just you know really spend a little bit of time researching and you know like you said don't go to the the dog breeders or the dog flippers right um make sure you're getting quality quality dogs um you know getting the getting the right training um and uh i i can't say enough about your operation um i i know you know even way back

when at home when we could you know watch people hunt bobcats i just love getting out here watching the dogs work to be honest um you put a ton of work in the training that you do but as a hunter behind the dogs like i'll be honest i don't do a whole lot of work but until the time comes to walk down to the tree um

But it's just awesome watching them work, being involved, watching you and your connection to the dogs. Like, I just love coming out there. It's awesome to watch them work. And like I say, if I wasn't in the awesome state of Washington and could hunt, you know, hounds, I think it would be something I'd love to do. Now, whether you mentioned earlier my wife would love me to do it would be another question. But I just love everything about it.

And just like today, we were able to, you know, shooting this bear across a clear cut or spotting it. You might not know it's a 80, 100 pound. You might not know it's a boar or a sow where I love that the hound's like, all right, yeah, he's not very big, maybe 80, 100 max. And I doubt, I think he's going to shrink when he hits the ground. It's a boar, you know, so we knew that information. And, you know, a hound's been, like Bradley said, he's not killing very many bears. His clients kill some bears. I'm not so mad at the bears that we need to kill all of them. Like it's, it's a,

It's a way to manage it, right? Yeah, you put a 300-pound boar up there, let's kill that one. You put an 80-pound sow up there, let's let it go. We're just trying to use it as a management tool, and it does way better, I feel, than spot and stalk. Sometimes. Some people are good at judging, but a lot of times that's when these one-year-old, two-year-old bears get killed is people shooting them in clear cuts across because they are very hard to judge at times and maybe only have a quick shot. So I love hound hunting from the management. It's cool to watch the dogs work.

And it's just, it's an awesome, awesome thing, you know, that people have been doing for a long, long time to help control some of these alpha predators. Yep. Beautiful tool. Yeah. And thank you again for shining some light on the hounds. Yeah. I appreciate that. They're important, you know, we got to keep that. We got to keep our hound season here in Idaho. It's always in the back of my mind that, you know, they're going to try to take it away again. And it scares me to death. I want my kids to enjoy it. I want young guys that,

that are wanting to get into it to have the opportunity to get into it. And we, and we need them. They're important. And, and, and, and just the hounds love it too. I don't know how many times I've had guys say, do you make your dogs do that? You know, that's kind of cruel. No, they, you can see when, how mad they are when you leave them at home. Yeah. I mean the real quick painting of the picture here, like we're in a little cabin on your place and the kennels down there and you can hear the

as you drive up you can hear the dogs that are pissed because they didn't get loaded up in the box that morning you know they got left at home so the dogs love to do it you can see the look on their face they're they they love it whether they're tired or not they still want to keep going they want to work

I love everything about it. I wish I could do it more, but it's cool to watch the dogs work. And like I say, I'm going to add one little, we've talked about this before. I'm going to add it in because I think it's important when we talk about hounds. I think sometimes within the hunting or I don't want to say industry, but within hunting itself, we can be sometimes our biggest, we can be our biggest enemy at times. Like hunters,

We need to protect hound hunting. It's a great tool. It helps if you're not a hound hunter, maybe you're not a bear hunter, but you like deer and elk. Like you should give these hound hunters all your support. Don't be jealous of people out there killing bears or cougars, whatever it may be like these things are making it. So you have deer and elk to kill. So if I could leave everybody with that as like,

If you haven't hound hunted, I urge you to go find somebody, maybe, you know, book a hunt or go along or just learn more about it. Because I have a hard time believing that if you're a fan of deer and elk or, you know, game management as a whole, you know, I don't want to get into the North American model of wildlife, but if you believe in that and believe that that's what's

you know, going to help your deer and elk opportunities, then you should support this as a tool and probably the most effective tool that we've got to manage these, these predators. And, uh, yeah, so I'm gonna leave you with that. Um, yes, support your local houndsman. Um, don't be there. Don't be an enemy, be an advocate. And, uh,

I'm going to close on that. I really appreciate having you, Bradley. Once again, I know you've been on the podcast a couple times. Let people know how they can find you. I don't want to bombard Bradley with questions, but if you have good questions, feel free to hit him up. How can people get a hold of you? I have a website, IdahoWhitetailGuides.com. You can check out. I'm on, like I've said on this before, I'm on Instagram. I do have Facebook, but I personally put stuff on Instagram because that's

just what I started out with. My wife kind of had Facebook for a while, but most of my stuff I put on Instagram. I got little videos I make. You can check out the dogs and stuff and you can message me on that on Instagram. And that's just Idaho white toe guides. Yep. And, and you know, he,

Idaho whitetail guides, and sometimes people might think you're a whitetail outfitter, but you do bobcat, lion, bears behind the hounds. And then you've got... I'm not even bringing up turkey. You said he's the guy that did one turkey hunter in a long time and he hasn't came back. Not that he didn't do a good job, but you're focusing your spring on... But then in the fall, you're also...

elk and whitetail yep elk whitetail and mule deer mule deer yep yep do you got do you have any like moose clients ever or will you could you have the ability to book those if they um yeah so if if you if you're looking for a hunt and you want a guided moose hunt you can look me up and i'll i'll i'll give you the information you need to put in for a moose tag yep and then if you draw it then i can take you hunting and those

I'm not sure that's on my website or not, but it's what an elk hunt costs. Yeah. You know, that's what I'll charge. Yeah. Once again, really appreciate you. I appreciate the hospitality. You and Amy are awesome. We're in a great operation here and your family, your bloodline has been hunting hounds for a long, long time and you guys definitely got it figured out. So appreciate everything. Yep. Thank you, Jason. I appreciate you. Yeah. Take care. Yeah.

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