Thoughts on Dogs for Blood Trail Work!

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I was recently on a Forum  where someone suggested a Jack Russell would make a perfect blood trail dog. I have quite a bit of experience tracking crippled deer with a dog so I decided to offer some of my insight and what I have learned on this subject.

A Jack Russell is a great little dog and might make a good blood trail dog but there are better choices.

Everyone will have a different opinion on this and there are always exceptions but the Jack is a little on the hyper side as a rule. A great blood trail dog is steady and deliberate, and has a track to track trail style. Some gods can switch from winding to track without issue but a dog that has a tendency to hunt with his nose in the wind is not preferred. The size of the Jack is a good quality but only in fairly open woods. Remember, by law you have to keep the dog on a lead. A shorter dog is more difficult to handle in thick gallberry and palmettos, etc. A crippled deer is headed to the thickest place he can find. Water is another issue where the short dog comes up, short.


One of the best short legged dogs for blood trailing is a wire haired dachshund but in the South has some of the same limitations as the Jack.

Another top blood trail dog is the Lab but you need to find one that is out of hunting stock such as a duck hunter. The problem with Labs is that they have been bred to death by the pet people without concern to hunting qualities.
I personally, really like a bluetick but also has some draw backs, He is a big dog with fierce drive and will pull your arm off while dragging you to death. However, sometimes that drive is a plus as well as the height and stamina. One of the best things I like about this breed is that most all will bay unlike beagles, walkers, etc.
Another great blood trail dog is a german wire haired pointer. They are incredibly versatile and you can hunt a bird with him in the morning and blood trail a deer in the afternoon.

If you have plenty of spare cash and can find one, a Bavarian mt. blood hound is as good a blood trail dog as you can get. They don't like being yelled at but are incredible trail dogs and about perfect size.

Then there is the choice of male or female. Personally, I prefer a female but try to get one that will not be in heat during hunting season. Females seem to be a little more no-nonsense, learn quicker, etc.
With all that said, most any of the hunting breeds have the potential and equipment to get the job done but some are much better suited than others.
One of the biggest mistakes people make with a blood trail dog is not building a bond with the dog where he has a desire to please you. If you don't spend a lot of time with him and teach him everything you can, don't expect him to be the brightest crayon in the box. Keeping him in a pen 24/7 and just taking him out when you need him won't cut it either. A dog kept like that just wants to go nuts when you let it out and has no control.

Remember, you are going to have a lot of time invested in this dog. Select your dog very carefully. Consider where you hunt and your needs. Then spend every minute you can with him. Take him every where you go. Put him on [U]every[/U] track, not just the ones you can't find. Teach him everything you can. Do this and you will have a dog whose abilities are nothing short of incredible.
Here's a few pic's of my Bluetick Lacy and some of her finds:

Larry Stephens

Florida Bow Hunting Report #9- 2011 The Last Hunt!

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Florida Bow Hunting Report #9- 2011
The Last Day!
Saturday, Oct. 16, 2011

For the last morning of bow season I decided to put my money on the Kill Zone stand again. There has just been to many bucks using here and I want to put my hands on one of them.

I was in the stand early and eagerly awaiting daylight. However, no deer made an appearance and it was pretty slow going this morning.

Then came the last hunt of the last day of the 2011 Florida Bow season. Do I really need to tell you where I hunted? Yes, I went back to the Kill Zone. I know what everybody’s thinking…..I’m over huntin’ that spot. Well, some stands can take more pressure than others and this is one of them. Besides that, this particular spot is just a natural area that bucks like to pass thru. I get a lot of bucks I’ve never seen before on the trail cam here. I think it is partially due to the lay of the land but also due to the way 4-5 different edges conditions all come together right at the stand. There is a fire break, planted pine plantation, old cut over bay, mature volunteer timber stand and a mowed area all converging at one spot. I have killed at least a couple bucks here every year.

I climbed to my hide up in the little pine about 6:00 PM for my last opportunity to take a buck here with my bow.

Time ticked by slowly and it was getting pretty late. I was really getting worried that a buck was not going to show. Actually, I think I had already surcomed to the reality that I was not going to take a buck this year. To tell you the truth I was just thankful that I had at least finally taken a deer at this point.

The sticker 7 Buck Makes A Fatal Mistake!

I was standing there with bow in hand listening for any sound of an approaching deer. There was maybe 15 minutes left in the 2011 season when I heard a noise that got my attention back in the palmetto flat behind me. I went ahead and eased into position just in case. Then I heard it again……That’s a deer!

The next thing I saw was a deer step from the palmettos and I could see it was a racked buck. He moved slow and cautious down the mow. When he came into the shooting lane I bleated at him softly but he didn’t hear it. I bleated a little louder and it got his attention, stopping with his head behind some bay saplings. I put the pin at the back edge of the shoulder and launched. The shot was 39yds and the shaft caught him just a few inches behind the near shoulder, passed thru the center of the heart and out the opposite shoulder. He charged off into the chest high palmettos like he was on fire. There was a constant clattering, crashing sound of bushes until he reached the back of the old chop where the timber started. There was a slight pause then a final crash and thrashing. I have seen this play out many times in the past and it has always meant a dead deer.

I could hardly believe I had just killed the 7pt with the sticker off the bottom tip of his beam. He was the first racked buck to show up on the trail camera there and I had actually seen him once but he did not get close enough for a shot. As much as he was showing up on the camera I was confident I would eventually get a shot at him.

In 2 days I had completely turned around a season that was looking like a total wash. Funny how things work out. Just goes to show you need to stick with it right to the last minute.

This deer was shot with a Muzzy 4 blade, 100 gr. Broadhead and left as good a blood trail as you will ever see. Have a look at some of the pictures I took of the trail.

There's my broadhead and 4" of shaft near the center of the picture!

Now that's a heart shot!

Here are some trail camera pictures of him.

Looks I finally got things going my way.

Larry S.

Florida Bow Hunting Report #6 - Oct. 7, 2011

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Florida Bow Hunting Report #6
Monday, Oct. 7, 2011

I needed to change things up a little after hunting the kill zone stand and walking in on some deer in the dark. After climbing into the stand the wind switched and a deer ran off blowing evey breath for as far as I could hear. I thought to myself, the cat is out of the bag now. I know I had been putting a little to much pressure on this stand.

I decided to make my next hunt at the pond stand. I was in the tree before shooting light and ready for action. There was some large cloud formations to the east that held daylight off just a bit but it finally got light enough to shoot.

The morning was going pretty slow but from the stand I could see the deer had been on the corn and a good bit of it was gone.

I was just about ready to put my gear together and climb down when I caught a little movement in the edge of the chop off to my left. I put the glasses on it and surprise! A deer. Slowly a young doe and two yearlings emerged from the gallberry and palmettos.

The doe, like most with yearlings, approached the corn very cautiously. I decided I would take a shot at the doe when she got right.

I was videoing the hunt and trying to keep the camera on the deer while preparing for the shot.

As the doe reached the 5th row that adjoined the corn she suddenly got real nervous and stopped and stomped her foot. She turned and started walking away. At 33 yds she turned broadside, I put the 30yd pin on her and launched a shaft. I did not have time to make sure the camera was on her, I may have missed the footage, I don’t know yet.

Well. The shot felt pretty good but it all went bad in an instant. The impact was low and back. The doe bolted off to the north and I sank into the seat…..How did that just happen? I just managed the dreaded paunch shot.

I really had my work cut out for me now. The bad part was the 60% rain chance that was forecasted for the day. I needed time to let the deer layup before taking up the trail. Really, 8 hours minimum but I was not going to get it.

I looked at the arrow sticking in the ground and there was no sign of blood, only stomach content. That pretty much ruled out any liver involvement.

I went to the house and picked up Lacy so we would be ready to hit the trail if the weather threatened. About the time we got to town it started to rain. It appeared to be isolated and there was no way the doe would be dead at this point so we had to bide out time.

At 1:30 I felt we could not hold off any longer and we headed to take up the trail. Lacy was ready to go. I leashed her up and away we went. Without a word spoken and with it already having rained once, Lacy pulled me straight to the arrow sticking in the ground. Incredible! She was on it. We pushed thru some palmettos to the edge of the chop and turned east. From there we moved along the edge of the timber to an old atv trail. The dog turned North and tracked down the road maybe a hundred yards, made a loose, turned back and found where the deer had gone in the bushes to the east. I feel the doe would have gone down the road like this but you have to believe the dog. That is the biggest mistake most inexperienced dog handlers make.

Lacy pulled me into some pretty thick cover and eventually up under some mature palmettos to a spot where a deer had bedded. I did not see any blood or stomach content on the ground. Lacy smelled around it and found where the deer had left there and in short distance she opened on the lead which is not a good sign. That indicates the deer is up and moving.

We kept going but all of the sudden the bottom dropped out of the clouds and the rain started to pour. The trail was starting to break down and we had to give it up. We tried to make a new start but it was useless. We headed for the truck with our heads hung low.

I am still torn as to whether we were on the right deer. We could have been on one of the yearlings, I guess we’ll never know. I convinced that the bed Lacy took me two was what she tracked away from the stand site. She never indicated she had lost the track.

Once this weather breaks I will try to see if the buzzards have found her. I would like to know what happened.

I wish I had better news but for a bow hunter, it is just a matter of time before you run into this same situation. It generally does not go well. I will try to shake this off and get back in the saddle but I have to say my confidence has been shaken after two clean misses and a cripple. I sure need to make a couple good clean kills before heading for the big Illinois bow hunt the first of November.

If there is some video to see on this I will post it when I can.

Larry

Lacy My Blood Trail Dog, tracks #4 & #5, 2010

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Lacy Tracks #4 & #5 for 2010 Bow Season!


I hunted at the Cabbage creek club with my buddy Steve Bailey this weekend for the last weekend of bow season. The weather couldn’t have been better if you had ordered it. However, the wind was a quite a problem and blew from all points of the compass on every sit.

Steve had a great closing to the 2010 bow season except for loosing one of the two bucks he shot this weekend.


Track #1, Thurs. Oct. 13, 2010

Well, Steve was just about to dial my number when I pulled in to camp this evening. He had shot a 6-7” spike type buck and needed some help looking for it. We packed up and headed back down to the deer pen to put Lacy on the track.

Steve had recovered the arrow. It had considerable blood on it but I did not like the chunks of meat stuck to the shaft. That is typical of a mussel shot and not really a good sign. He also related that the impact had a pretty good crack to it so I assumed we were looking at a leg bone hit. I think this assessment was correct but was probably very low. Possibly even below the chest cavity. All the blood we found was very low in the bushes and there was not very much of it.

We hiked back into Steve’s stand in the dark with Lacy leading the way. I could tell she was back tracking Steve to the stand. It is so important not to pre-track the deer if you are going to put a dog on it. That really messes them up. Especially if the dog has an issue with wanting to use you as a crutch.

Even though the track was several hours old Lacy took right to it and was pulling extremely hard and after about 100yds started opening on it. That’s very unusual for her and typically means the deer is alive and we are not far behind it. I have never actually seen her open like that while tracking. There was probably other deer involved in this but unassociated with the buck. We found some minor amounts of blood out to about 100 yds and none beyond. With Lacy opening on the track and pulling so hard I could not believe that this was the right deer so we restarted her 3 times and spent an hour and a half in the dark with flashlights looking for blood. We did eventually find a little blood on the trail she was opening on so obviously, she was telling the truth. With so little blood Steve finally pulled the plug about 10:30 and we decided the deer was not recoverable. If it had been legal and we put a tracking collar on Lacy and let her go, she could probably have run the deer down and kept the wound bleeding but that was not an option. I believe this is either the deer that I let go the first morning or maybe the one that got by me last Sunday morning.



Track #2, Oct. 16, 2010:

Steve ended up back at the same stand that he had lost the buck from on Thursday. When I got back to camp Steve was about to wet his pants he was so excited. “Stephens, I just shot a m o n s t e r buck! We need to go put the dog on it.” Once again, we loaded up in the dark and drove all the way back to the deer pen. On the way down I would tell Lacy….he’s dead girl! We got to go find him! Lacy would answer back with a whine, so high pitched I could hardly hear it.

Well, Steve had made pretty much a perfect shot and the deer had only gone about 50yds. I let Steve work the dog so I could film but when we got to the head of the track Lacy took off pulling poor Steve so fast they were there before I could catch up to video it. The track was about an hour and a half old and took Lacy maybe a minute to get to the deer. He was a rank buck, I could smell him 15yds before I got to him. Steve will probably need a couple days for his shoulder to recover. I probably should have worked the dog so I could have tried to keep her from pulling so bad. This is a bad habit for a tracking dog.

The deer was not all that big in body but had a perfect 8pt set of horns, very symmetrical. This is a buck I have been hunting real hard in the next block over. I have a bunch of trail camera pictures of him but It looks like I took his last photograph tonight with Steve holding him by the horns! That was one happy hunter!

We forgot to get Lacy in the photo. Sorry Lay.

Another interesting development in Lacy's learning curve showed up this weekend. All of the deer Lacy has tracked have been bow shot and I always let her investigate the bloody arrow. Now when she sees my bow she immediately goes to the quiver to smell the arrows.

Sunday evening it was after dark when I got to camp. When I let Lacy out of the pen, she took off for the truck. I had the passenger side truck door open and she jumped in. I took off running as I thought she was headed for parts unknown the way she took off. When I got to the truck she was leaned over the seat checking my quiver!

When I get home at night Lacy meets me at the gate. First she checks my hands, then she runs to the back of the truck and checks the tailgate! That's pretty smart for a hound.
Larry S.

Lacy the Blood Trail Dog, 2 for 2, 2010

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Lacy’s 2 nd tracking job for 2010!

Well, I put a shaft thru to boiler room of a nice forked horn buck this morning and it was time to give Lacy a little track job.

As usual, without a word she back tracked me right to the stand and we were off on the deer track. She learned real quick as a pup that daddy’s back track leads to a dead deer. That is something you need to remember if your going to train your own blood trail dog. By the time I got Lacy out there the track was aged a little over 4 hours.

It was a pretty easy track except for the three deer that had crossed the blood trail about 15-20 minutes after the buck had run off. Lacy faded a step or two off on their trail but got back on the right deer without me correcting her. That was pretty awesome. I don’t know for sure if she just got lucky on that or if she really got it right and knew what was going on with the distraction of the other 3 deer. It looked like she knew which track was which.

It was a short 50yd or so track and she went right to him and we made successful, recovery #2 for the 2010 bow season.

I need to go back and see what her record is to date. I can only think of 3 deer and a hog she did not recover and I feel one of the deer was not hit at all. One was apparently shot in the lower foreleg and not recoverable. The third deer is a mystery! There were a pile of other deer and hogs in the area and I think this really confused her on which was the one she was supposed to be following. She was just a year and a half old at that point. The hog was the same situation. There was a half a dozen of them and they had been all over the area like rats. We just never got it straightened out from the other hogs. She has probably found 20-24 deer successfully. I will research that and confirm the exact number. I will try to get those tracks posted as soon as I can.

Larry S.

Lacy, My 12 Week Old Bluetick Pup Finds First Deer!

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Sept. 22, 2007

This was so incredible I had to share it with everybody.

Lacy, my new blood trail prospect just found her first deer! Absolutely incredible!

I shot a 90# doe on the afternoon of the opening day of bow season in s stand of flooded pine trees. The deer splashed off thru the flood water and out of sight. I had been waiting for this moment, although I had not planned for such a difficult track for her first live exercise. Lacy and I have been training just about every day on short blood tracks I have laid for her.

Well, she just turned 12 weeks plus three days and sucessfully recovered the deer on her first real track in belly deep water! Pretty remarkable for such a young pup under those extreme conditions. I could hardly believe it!

There was another deer involved in the deal and Lacy made one loose and got off on the wrong deer. I recognizing her mistake and I took her back to the last blood and she straightened it out from there and went right to the deer.

The doe was literally floating in an old flooded pull trail, 2/3 submerged and Lacy was all but swimming by the time she found the deer! A 100 yd track in flooded conditions the whole way! Had I not seen it with my own two eyes I would not have believed it.

I gave Lacy some well deserved praise and began rafting the deer out to the hill. When we got back to the truck and started getting ready to take some pictures I turned around and Lacy was eating my our deer! I don't mean just licking it, she was tearing into the thing like she was half starved to death. It was a sight to see. She LOVES these things!

Here's some pictures of her first find

She sure looks like she is going to make one fine blood trail dog.

Best of Hunts,
Larry S.
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Lacy & Her Pet, Rosie!

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Here's a few pictures of Lacy i thought everyone would enjoy.

I have been working her on short tracks almost every day and I pack her everywhere I go. What a pain that is becoming! However this is very important and builds a bond between you and your dog that will return big rewards in the future. Additionally, the dog will learn so much more than a dog that is kept in a pen 24/7. That is not the way to go if you really want to develope a serious tracking dog.

Oh! the little brown dog in the picture is Rosie, Lacy's pet. Technically, I guess that is Rosie's bed but The "monster" as my girls refer to Lacy, has claimed posession of it at this point. Really pisses Rosie off!

Larry