Ep. 266: This Country Life - Deer Hunting with Dogs

stories to share. Deer hunting with Dogs. Deer hundred with Dogs has faded from the spotlight over the past thirty years. That at least it has around here. There's some great stories and lessons and cutting a pack of Houds loose and listening to them putting a white tail through his paces. We're going to talk about some of them, but first I'm going to tell you a story. This story comes from a fellow, y'all hear me talking about all the time,

my older brother Tim. I'll have him on here one day telling stories himself, but until then this will have to do so in Tim's words and my voice. Here we go. It was nineteen seventy and I was twelve and finally big enough to deer hunt by myself, sort of I'd always wanted to use a rifle, but rifle hunters at the time were looked upon like they were sort of nuts. I grew up deer hunting with a brown and a five that held a buckshot and slug combination that I lost many hours of sleep over trying

to get the right combination in the magazine. We used dogs back then, and if they ranted deer Bobby, I needed buck shot first for close range, then slugs in case I missed up close three double all bucks shot, followed by two slugs in case he was still amongst the living. Them rifles will shoot a mile son, you don't need one. They're dangerous. You could shoot a deer miss and kill someone over in the next county. That's what they told me. That's what my dad told me.

So there I was stuck with buckshot and slugs to deer hunt with until I was married, except for one time. It was December deer season and way before the Curse of Leaks Land, when you could hunt anywhere on Timber Company land that I wanted to go deer hunt. Dad said his friend Raymond was going to run his dogs and he would put me in a spot on the Upper Potlatch Road. We were at Uncle Jim's house talking about all of it, and Uncle Jim asked me if

I wanted to use his thirty thirty. Well, I thought to myself, I am a rifle man and I need that Winchester thirty thirty. I'll show these old folks I ain't gonna kill nobody. And I looked at Dad and he said, you need to toke that shotgun. I started whining, I come from a long line of winers. Dad caved in and Uncle Jim let me have that thirty thirty. A short while later, I was sitting on a pile of logs on the side of the road on a Timber company road close to Crane's Lake when Raymond's dogs

jumped a deer and they headed in my direction. Dad was parked about one hundred and fifty yards behind me, sitting in the truck, letting me quote unquote hunt by myself. And as the dogs got closer, I stood up with my thumb on the hammer of that lever action rifle. Soon enough, a humongous eight point buck jumped out in the road right in front of me, no more than thirty five yards away. I pulled that hammer back and

sent one to him. I missed two things that day, that buck and my opportunity for my first deer with a rifle. If I killed anything, it had to be someone in the next county. But if I did, we never heard about it. But I had to listen to my dad all the way home, son, if you just used that shotgun, you'd killed that big old buck, on and on and on. I come from a long line of folks that will say I told you so, and he did for the rest of his life. And according

to my brother Tim, that's just how that happened. Now I can testify myself to that last statement of Tims that I read. As our father got older, he soffered that into saying, how son, you'd do that anyway you want. But if it was me, that translated into, if you don't want to hear about this for the rest of your life, you'd better do it. The way out of deer hunting with dogs was at one time the way

people in my part of the world hunted deer almost exclusively. Camps, fed, and cared for packs of hounds all year for the opportunity to cut them loose. When firearm deer season opened, any number of dogs from groups of two to pens of twenty plus would be managed and conditioned throughout the year for the big hunt that happened at the beginning of each November. Second Saturday of November would see the

majority of the state's modern gun deer season opener. Now, but there was a time when it opened on Mondays and schools did not. Deer season was eagerly in anticipated this Christmas, and while I can't testify to the rest of the school districts in Arkansas, I can vouch for the Warren School district yours truly was serving a twelve year sentence a being force fed everything I wasn't interested in learning about, aside from football and girls, and those

two exceptions were not necessarily in that order. But getting out of school for deer season was something we could all get behind. It was a hunting culture and recognized by the community of folks who lived there as a social norm. Church was on Sunday and the men folk were hard to find around town on opening day and the week of deer season. You didn't have to be a hardcore hunter either to participate in the opening gun

deer hunt. There were a few who didn't participate. My maternal grandfather, find A Sly, who I've spoken about on here before. He was not a hunter. He was fully in support of anyone who did it. He just never got the hankering, But the rest of us we got his portion and took up the slack of anybody else. A lot of the big camps back in the day would have dog pins where they kept their dogs year round.

Some would serve as a caretaker throughout the year by feeding and watering them and taking them on hunts during the off season to keep them in shape, or members would take turns with that responsibility. They weren't shooting deer during the off season, just keeping the dogs up to speed on what was expected of them and training new ones that they were acquired and brought into the pack. I was never a member of one of the big camps where members were from all over the community with

a big pen full of hounds out back. It was always a small family camp of in laws and brothers and nephews and cousins. Females were as welcomed as any of the rest of us. They just chose not to hang out at the camp outside of family night when everyone brought food, and we all gathered for any evening a fellowship in vitals. That was their choice. Now, we didn't continue to practice running deer dogs, more or less, dropping out of that practice in the mid nineteen eighties.

Now you back up over two hundred years and you'll find records of settlers and adventurers roaming through Arkansas. Was some kind of utilitarian k nine that assisted in hunting game. You regular listeners of this channel may have heard about a settler from Kentucky living in Arkansas around eighteen eighteen who had a dozen hunting dogs, one of which he gave to a German novelist who sailed to the New World to seek adventure, finding a lot of it right here in the natural state when it was in its

most natural state. The Kentucky and gifted Friedrich Gerstoker one of his hounds during his hunting adventures through the region. Now, the man claimed the dog was an excellent turkey dog, and it would chase turkeys until they flew into a tree. Then he treated the turkey by barking until the hunter arrived. And Old Gerstalker took that dog and cut him loose, and he jumped a deer, chasing him clean out of sight.

Frederic never saw him again. Now more than likely that dog went back to the last place he saw his original owner and trailed him back home if hunting in familiar territory. Many hunting dogs would return home if they separated from their hunters. And don't feel bad for old Gerstalker on losing that dog. He eventually ended up with a more faithful hound that stuck by him through some interesting times, and his name was Bear's Grease, So I'm

familiar now. In the late eighteen eighties, a native North Carolinian and current at the time Arkansas US Representative Poindexter Done hunted with a renowned Mississippi bear killer, Robert E. Bobo, and his famous past back of fourteen dogs, and they were hunting here in Arkansas. After a successful four day hunt, taling over a ton of bear and deer meat, it was apparent to everyone involved that Bobo's hounds were just

as advertised. The politician offered Bobo a section of land that's six hundred and forty acres for his fourteen dogs, and Bobo declined. Bobo's hunting partner, Jim Dunn, no relation to the representative traded six of his dogs to the legislator for half a section of land, or three hundred and twenty acres. The old Jim Bow later sold that ground for thirty five hundred dollars, which is north of

one hundred thousand today. Those were some good dogs. If you've listened very long, you've heard me expound on a few dogs of my own, currently my coonhound, old Whaling. But before Whaling, there was Anna, my black laugh. Her retrieving abilities were so to none. She was the solid of a hunting companion as you could have, and that pealed in comparison to her duties as a member of

the Reeves family. I know I've told this story before, but it's a story I like to hear myself, and it fits when I'm talking about the value of hunting dogs. And it was a gift to me from a very good friend who received her as payment on an overdue tree planting job that my friend, who wasn't a duck hunter, had done for a guy who happened to be a

professional dog trainer. I recapped that portion only to emphasize the value of this dog, as I fully trained to work in retriever her bloodline was impeccable, and her demeanor and personality was what anyone would want in a dual purpose hunting family pet. She wiped out that four thousand dollars over to my friend, and he in turn gave her to me, where he knew that she'd be put to good use anyway. I had her a couple of years at this point, and lots of people that hunted

with her at my brother and I's guide service. One guy, particularly from the start, right after his arrival with his group to our camp, wanted to buy her, and I repeatedly told him no over and over again, to the point that after two days of it, I began avoiding one on one conversations with him for having to hear his pleas for me to sell her. That always told me to never put a price on something that I

didn't want to sell, because someone would pay it. I found that out on the day they were leaving, when that cat came up to me and said, I am asking you again to name your price for Anna. Frustrated, I blurted out, six thousand dollars. That's what it'll take for her to leave here with you, And that joker never batted an eye. He said, will you take a personal check or do you prefer cashiers? He got me.

I was a deputy sheriff at the time, working on a poorly equipped and overworked, underpaid department, and six thousand dollars was nearly a third of my yearly salary. And he was serious. But I wasn't. I crawfished on him and I told him no, escorted him to his vehicle to get him gone. Dogs are valuable. Good was even more so. So I get it. When represented done offered that section of land from mister Bobo's dogs, I doubt

that I'd have made that deal either. Dear dogs, at least in my part of Arkansas, were a big percentage of the running walker breed, the cousin of my hound, Whalen, who's a tree and walker. I remember introducing my wife Alexis to my dad when we were dating, and at his house, his cow dogs were across the road and the pen raising all kinds of ruckus. When we pulled up and Alexis asked my dad what kind of dogs he had, he said, running walkers. She said, running walkers.

They need to make up their minds what they're doing. But those dogs were just about the standard for all deer camps in our area, with the exception of being the folks who'd feed anything, they would chase and barket a deer, and the beagle folks, which is what our

little camp did for a few years. Tim's brother in law, who has looked upon as being a brother to us both, Joe Bryant, was the keeper of the beagles, and before we built the structure that is the current being our deer camp, we hunted out of an old army tent that I described in detail back in episode one one

aptly titled deer Camp Real original I know. Anyway, if you were running dogs, you were the designated as the captain of the hunt, and you decided when and where to cut them loose depending on where the folks sat in. The stands were located along the wind direction, and the most likely avenues of escape at the deer take from the barking hounds. This type of hunting is foreign too. You need just understand that deer being shot at ain't

necessarily the one being pursued. It's the deer on the edges of all the commotion that slip away to avoid the hounds. That usually wind up getting tagged. Also, they're not likely to catch the deer that they're chasing. They ain't a deer dog in the country that could run through the woods and thickets fast enough to catch the deer. And I bet on the deer being chased a hundred times out of a hundred to live to see another day. It defeats the purpose anyhow. We don't want the dog

to capture. We want someone sitting on a deer stand and have an opportunity if we're shot at him. Here's how it worked. The night before, we'd gather at the fire after suffer to decide if we were running dogs the next day. If we were, we all picked stands and Joe would decide where he was going to cut him loose based on our locations. After breakfast the next morning,

we'd all head off to our selected spots. They would go back to his house and load the dogs, usually about an hour or so after daylight, and at a pointed time, he'd cut them loose and follow them through the woods, hooping and hollering them on their way to jump a deer. They was so much fun setting on a stand watching the woods for deer, watching the clock for the time to start listening for the dogs to jump.

We liked beagles because the land we hunted was relatively smalk compared to the other camps, and beagles didn't push deer as fast as the big hounds do. Also, the race lasted longer, take a bigle a long time to cover the same amount of ground as a big hound and man, and it really sounded good. I remember one particular morning that we had gotten a good frost. The air was cold and crisping. Seven point thirty Joe was

scheduled to cut the dogs loose. I was north of the camp, less than a quarter of a mile on a stand we called the salt lit. We poured out some rock salt from an old stump a few years before, and it had leached into the ground, and deer craves salted the fall live because of a sodium deficiency. They create that deficiency about even plants hide in water and protasting him throughout the summer. And they dug a hole out around that stump about a foot deep and a

couple feet wide. So I was in a pretty good spot, regardless that the dogs pushed them above by me or not, and Joe had both dogs, Isy and Nooget on leeds, and he left the camp heading east. He got to the corner of our property and the neighbors which lay east and south of our own. He pointed the dogs north, cut them loose, pooping them up and getting them out

in front of him through a small thicket. Both of them opened at once, and you could hear their voices ringing out through the woods as they told us all to get ready. They were trailing a deer. We were all holding out for a big buck. But you never really knew what the dogs were actually running. It was a fifty to fifty chance if they were on the trail of a buck or dough, and really the percentage

was higher that they were chasing the dough. That was still during the time when shooting the door wasn't actually considered a sin, but it was frowned upon to the point that the older hunters wondered if you'd ever make it past Saint Peter because you had killed one. Unfortunately, we've all learned that having a more balanced ratio of bucks and doze makes it a better and healthier population of deer. Anyway, from over half a mile away, the cold air allowed me to hear Joe's faint hollering and

a beagle strike. Game on bigles travel about as fast as a man can walk through the thickets, over logs, and crossing creeks, and whatever's going to happen ain't necessarily going to happen fast. There's gonna be plenty of time for the anticipation of trying to figure out if the dogs are coming towards you or away from you. Are they running or pushing a buck by you? It's someone

else going to shoe first. All of these things are going through your head at one hundred miles an ire while you're watching for movement, straining to hear a limb breaker or leaves crunching from an approaching deer. This morning was no different, except five minutes into the race, I

heard the dogs turn toward me. A short while later, I heard the unmistakable sound of deer moving toward me through the dense second and third growth hardwood and pine saplings that limited my view in some places to less than twenty yards. The limbs and bushes shook as the deer brushed up against them, and I knew it was only a matter of seconds. Before whatever kind of deer it was, stepped into the opening in front of that

salt licked stamp. My rifle, let my shoulder, and every bit of my senses tuned to what I was hearing and almost seeing. The expectation of a big buck stepping into the opening right in front of me had my heart pounding in my ears. I could hear Joe a lot better now as he and the beagles made their way to my stand. All the while, the deer that was so close and still unseen, stood within easy range but still in the cover of the thicket. My imagination started to run away with me. Had I not heard

what I knew to be a deer getting close. It wasn't like I had never heard that sound before. No, I was positive I'd heard a deer walking. But did it go back the way it came I would have been towards Joe and the dogs. I started to doubt everything I'd observed up to this point, when all of a sudden, a dough in a year and broke out of cover and stood looking at me from fifteen yards away. I let out a sigh disappointment, and saw my breath

in the cold air drift right straight to them. It was clear to me then that they'd smelled me as they'd gotten closer and stopped just short of breaking out of cover to weigh the odds are whether to continue go back toward the racket that had pushed them there in the first place, lowered my rifle, and they shot across in front of me, headed west in a bigger hurry than they'd been in just a few minutes before.

The beagles were getting closer now, and I could hear them clearly as they followed the scent trail of two deer that they just ran out in front of them. It was funny listening to them and hearing them is just as plain as day, and then hearing their barks and balling muffled as if they were suddenly one hundred yards further than they actually were. When I saw them coming down through the woods, I saw the reason why

they're barking sounded different. The timber had been cutting there the previous spring, and that it had been a particularly wet year. The loggers had put those big flotation tires on all their skidders, and some of the rusts that they left were really, really deep, and they caused those little beagles to drop out of sight when they reached them. It sounded like that falling in a well, only to pop up on the other side, unfazed and determined as ever to gain some ground on the animal that they

couldn't have caught if they'd been riding a motorcycle. It was hilarious and in a lot of ways, much better than killing a deer. I caught the beagles and was still laughing when Joe got there. We laughed about that together for a long time afterward too. He's gone on ahead of the rest of us, but we're gonna laugh about that again one day when I seen him, and I really look forward to that time. That's a little

bit about deer hunting with dogs. It may not be the preferred way of hunting these days, as we opt for the most covert ways to get within range of one, but it definitely has a place, especially in our legacies as hunters and sportsmen and women. The stories we tell about those days are important. They are important to hear be remembered, more so for the folks that involved than

any of the deer ever taken. We got some extra video content dropping Monday, November fourth, on the Meat Eater podcast network YouTube channel of me and my pal and colleague Austin Chili clever ad. Like I always say, don't be cool, be chilly. I think you'll enjoy it. Now. Something even more important is A Meat Eater's partnership with on x and donating twenty thousand dollars to hurricane relief for our brothers and sisters who are still reeling from

the effects of the hurricanes. If you'd like to help through our site, you can donate through the link that Reeve's going to include in the show description. Man, it's important and we really need your help. Thank you all so much for listening to this Country Life and Clay Bow's Bear, Grease and Render shows. We truly appreciate it very much. Until next week, this is Brent Reeves sign and out. Y'all be careful.