Speaker 1: Welcome to this country Life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves.
Speaker 1: From coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living.
Speaker 1: I want you to stay a while as I share
Speaker 1: my experiences and life lessons. This country life is presented
Speaker 1: by Case Knives on Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you
Speaker 1: the best outdoor podcast.
Speaker 2: The airwaves have to offer.
Speaker 1: All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate.
Speaker 1: I've got some stories to share dog traders. Dog traders
Speaker 1: can get an undeserved bad reputation at times. Back in
Speaker 1: the day, some of them are as bad as snake
Speaker 1: oil salesmen, promising high, delivering low, and then it's goddadling
Speaker 1: out of town with all your money. Modern times have
Speaker 1: all but erased them, but there's still something to be found,
Speaker 1: and if you do get caught up on the short
Speaker 1: end of the retribution is a lot easier these days.
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you some things that can help
Speaker 1: you a little about what to look out for and
Speaker 1: what a.
Speaker 2: Dog trader is.
Speaker 1: But first I'm going to tell you a story. It
Speaker 1: was the day before the COVID catastrophe started in Arkansas.
Speaker 1: I had driven three hours through the backwoods to the
Speaker 1: foothills of the Washington Mouse to look at a coon.
Speaker 1: How that I'd only seen a video of barking at
Speaker 1: a coon in a cage on Facebook Marketplace at Chawa
Speaker 1: while will do the same thing a dog, even a
Speaker 1: dog made for barking at coons, actually barking at a
Speaker 1: cage coon only proves one thing that the dog can bark.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Had he not done that, it could have been a
Speaker 1: red flag. But because he did it certainly wasn't a
Speaker 1: testament to any inheritabilities other than to be able to
Speaker 1: produce sound. He did it with a lot of vigor
Speaker 1: that didn't go unnoticed by me. I've told the story
Speaker 1: of how his living conditions were not ideal and were
Speaker 1: borderlined criminal. The dirt floor was inches deep and sloppy
Speaker 1: mud due to the slope of the yard, and his
Speaker 1: only escape was on the top of a window unit
Speaker 1: air conditioning frame that doubled as his house. Looking at
Speaker 1: this six month old coonhound standing on top of the
Speaker 1: empty air.
Speaker 2: Conditioning case, and as I walked up to the.
Speaker 1: Porch, I didn't know if I was there to look
Speaker 1: at a dog or to rescue one.
Speaker 2: It struck a chord with me that the way he
Speaker 2: looked at me.
Speaker 1: Now, there are a lot of people who will roll
Speaker 1: their eyes when it comes to a person remarking that
Speaker 1: dogs have the power of reasoning or can project anything
Speaker 1: other than contentment, fear, or anger.
Speaker 2: But I didn't get any.
Speaker 1: Of those when I looked into that dog's eyes as
Speaker 1: he stood there looking back at me, through my own
Speaker 1: interpretation that could have easily been of my own manufacturer,
Speaker 1: I felt connected to him immediately. He was half grown
Speaker 1: at around thirty five pounds, and outside of being muddy
Speaker 1: from legs down, he was as handsome a tree.
Speaker 2: And walker coon hound as I'd ever seen.
Speaker 1: He appeared well fed and looked after the best of
Speaker 1: the ability of the folks who owned him.
Speaker 2: A young lady opened the door after I knocked.
Speaker 1: On it in a small mobile home that stood in
Speaker 1: line with half a dozen that looked just like it
Speaker 1: in that trailer park in western Arkansas. She was very young,
Speaker 1: She was very polite and holding a little baby, and
Speaker 1: looking past her through the doorway where she stood, I
Speaker 1: couldn't help but notice everything inside that seventies model house
Speaker 1: trailer looked like it was in its place and as
Speaker 1: neat and tidy as it could be. It didn't appear
Speaker 1: to be a lot of furnishings in there, but what
Speaker 1: I could see in that brief instant of looking past her,
Speaker 1: it appeared to hold value to the folks that lived there,
Speaker 1: and they took care of over the best they could.
Speaker 1: I suddenly got the same feeling that she valued this
Speaker 1: dog in the same way. And maybe my initial impression
Speaker 1: was biased towards what I had seen before I really
Speaker 1: saw the whole picture. Maybe she was just doing the
Speaker 1: best she could, but what she had I'd rehearsed my
Speaker 1: bargaining speech for the last ten minutes before I pulled
Speaker 1: up at her home, and after talking to her on
Speaker 1: the phone the night before and that morning, she seemed
Speaker 1: highly motivated to sell the dog and asked several times
Speaker 1: during my question of her about his abilities, if I
Speaker 1: was going to buy him that day, and if I
Speaker 1: was bringing the money when I came to look at it.
Speaker 2: What was her motivation?
Speaker 1: And my excitement bled through in our conversations was.
Speaker 2: Was he sick? Did he bite?
Speaker 1: Why was she so eager to sell him? I kept
Speaker 1: asking myself these things all the way over there. Ten
Speaker 1: minutes after I got there, I knew all I needed
Speaker 1: to know about this dog. Oh again, this young mother.
Speaker 1: She needed the money, that dog needed a better life,
Speaker 1: and I had the ability to crackt both of them.
Speaker 1: I gave her more than she asked for, and I
Speaker 1: watched her crying. As I backed out of the driveway.
Speaker 1: Driving away, I was thinking, dang, lady is just a dog.
Speaker 1: Thirty minutes away from home, my wife Alexis called me
Speaker 1: and said, Brent, can you pick up Bailey from school?
Speaker 1: Someone at work has reported they've been exposed to this
Speaker 1: COVID stuff and we're all on lockdown until they can
Speaker 1: figure out what we're supposed to do next. Yes, just
Speaker 1: tell the school. I'll be a little late. I'm just
Speaker 1: now get into the little rock. Oh yeah, I bought
Speaker 1: that dog. She didn't respond. It was just I'll let
Speaker 1: you know what's going on when I know. I love you,
Speaker 1: and she hung up. So to the school I went
Speaker 1: and I picked her up, and I explained to Bailey
Speaker 1: what was going on, and that mommy would be fine,
Speaker 1: he'd be home in a little bit and she'd be
Speaker 1: back at school the next day that I had a
Speaker 1: surprise for her. Turns out that lop eer display of
Speaker 1: clumsiness was a surprise for us all That day in
Speaker 1: March when I picked Bailey up from school would be
Speaker 1: the last day that she'd attend that year. Drastic and
Speaker 1: abnormal changes in ours and everyone's lives would be the
Speaker 1: new normal as we just adjusted to our new way
Speaker 1: of life. Spring mornings and evenings were spent outside in
Speaker 1: the backyard together Alexis, Bailey and Me and Whalen. He
Speaker 1: was what seemed to be an exercise in futility. He
Speaker 1: knocked over everything he came close to, including tables and Bailey.
Speaker 1: Cups of coffee and glasses of tea were targets for
Speaker 1: his big, old, sloppy tongue that could wreck your favorite
Speaker 1: drink and started you when he snuck up behind you
Speaker 1: to lick your hand when you least expected it. His
Speaker 1: personality is that of a mischievous child. No that means
Speaker 1: no harm by any of the calamities he's causing, and
Speaker 1: regardless of the scoldings he receives, his memory of being
Speaker 1: in trouble is over quicker than you can say.
Speaker 2: Bad dog whaling.
Speaker 1: We couldn't imagine where we'd be four and a half
Speaker 1: years later after that spring day when he and I
Speaker 1: brought Bailey home from school, or the impact that just
Speaker 1: a dog would have on our family. We wanted normalcy
Speaker 1: and to get back to the routine of how all
Speaker 1: our lives were the day before we got it. Going
Speaker 1: through all of that over the course of the next
Speaker 1: year was made a lot easier by him being there.
Speaker 1: The fact that I don't ever take for granted or
Speaker 1: failed to realize what that silly dog has done for
Speaker 1: all of us. We wanted to go back to school,
Speaker 1: we want go back to work, We wanted to gather
Speaker 1: with our friends. We wanted a lot of things that
Speaker 1: we couldn't get. But in the form of a barrel chested,
Speaker 1: big footed howl at every sirn within earshot hound dog,
Speaker 1: we've got what we needed.
Speaker 2: And that's just how that happened.
Speaker 1: Caveat Emptore. That ring bells with anyone, I'm sure it
Speaker 1: does with the majority of you, but for those that
Speaker 1: it doesn't. It's a Latin phrase that translates to buyer beware.
Speaker 2: And it was a bezo.
Speaker 1: Or stone that set this whole chain of events into
Speaker 1: motion many moons ago in Mary Old England. What's a
Speaker 1: bezoor stone? Well, I'm glad you asked, simply put it's
Speaker 1: anything that can be swallowed that gets caught up in
Speaker 1: a digestive system that can calcify over time and have
Speaker 1: the appearance of a round, smooth riverstone. Now, from what
Speaker 1: I found out, the ones recovered from animals were believed
Speaker 1: to hold some type of healing power. Now, I ain't
Speaker 1: much on eating guts myself, so I can only surmise
Speaker 1: that there was some chitlin folks pawing around through the
Speaker 1: gut pile and looking for the goodies when they came
Speaker 1: upon the calcified whatever it was and decided it had
Speaker 1: some medicinal value. The Latin phrase caveat emptor became part
Speaker 1: of a common law in England way back y under
Speaker 1: in sixteen o three. The phrase comes from a court
Speaker 1: case of Chandler versus Lopus, in which a goldsmith sold
Speaker 1: a buyer a beez or stone for one hundred pounds,
Speaker 1: but the buyer later sued the seller after realizing the
Speaker 1: stone wasn't making him feel any better. In fact, it
Speaker 1: was making him feel worse, being sick and thinking about
Speaker 1: all the money he lost, paying what would be twenty
Speaker 1: five thousand pounds in today's English currency for a remedy
Speaker 1: that didn't work. The court ruled that the seller hadn't
Speaker 1: made any warranties that that stone was healing, which established
Speaker 1: a term in the legal world. There's lots of cool
Speaker 1: sound in Latin phrases in our modern lexicon, but maybe
Speaker 1: none as important as caveat emptore. Whether you're buying a
Speaker 1: car or a cow, you have the responsibility to yourself
Speaker 1: to make sure you understand all the components of the deal.
Speaker 1: But let's say you ain't buying either one of those.
Speaker 1: You're buying a dog, and not just any dog hunt dogs.
Speaker 1: There's lots of options when it comes to hunting dogs.
Speaker 1: In the bird hunting world, you got retrievers, pointers, flushers,
Speaker 1: and a combination of all three, along with a box
Speaker 1: car load of different breeds. The same as true in
Speaker 1: tree dogs, squirrel, coon, bear, bobcat, and line dogs. There's
Speaker 1: bay and catchdogs for hogs, rabbit dogs, deer dogs, fox dogs,
Speaker 1: cow dogs, and even turkey dogs. That's a right, I said,
Speaker 1: turkey dogs friendly support of hobby. There's a dog that's
Speaker 1: been bred to do the job of helping the hunter
Speaker 1: get his game. I talk about that partnership a lot
Speaker 1: because it's an important one. In my family's legacy and
Speaker 1: relationship with nature. It's also symbiotic of the trust humans
Speaker 1: and dogs having each other, a relationship that we've been
Speaker 1: nurturing for a long long time. Scientists say around fifteen
Speaker 1: thousand years, but who really knows. At one time the
Speaker 1: leading scientists of the day thought the world was flat. Anyway,
Speaker 1: the best places to look for hunting dogs are through
Speaker 1: folks you know that are selldom one or having knowledge
Speaker 1: of being one for sale. A lot of you may
Speaker 1: have seen the Bear Grease road show film. Oh, Clay
Speaker 1: Bow and I did Call Squirrels and Coons in Arkansas.
Speaker 1: Portion of that film was dedicated to a coon hound
Speaker 1: that Clay was hunting on trial that belonged to my
Speaker 1: good friend Michael Roseman. That dog was two years old,
Speaker 1: and the plan was this, Clay and I were going
Speaker 1: to be making this film, and before we went into production,
Speaker 1: Clays faithful old female plot Fern, she passed away and
Speaker 1: he was coon dogless for the first time in a
Speaker 1: long time.
Speaker 2: It was his idea to add.
Speaker 1: The element to the story of the film and started
Speaker 1: looking for Fern's replacement. We started beating the bushes looking
Speaker 1: for dogs, and my first call was to Michael. Ninety
Speaker 1: percent of my coon hunting is done with Michael and
Speaker 1: has been for several years. He's a good friend and
Speaker 1: a trusted source for anything, but especially when dealing with
Speaker 1: coonhounds and coon hunting. His whole livelihood depends on it.
Speaker 1: Michael and his family manufacture son spot hunting lights, the
Speaker 1: coon hunting lights that I and everyone else that meet
Speaker 1: either wears. Selling a good dog to me is like
Speaker 1: selling a pocket knife for a shotgun. Why would you
Speaker 1: do that? Why would you get rid of something that's good?
Speaker 1: Never in my life have I ever sold a firearm,
Speaker 1: a pocket knife, or a dog. But tonight I'll be
Speaker 1: sitting on the couch with my phone in my hand,
Speaker 1: watching an online auction and bidding on pocket knives that
Speaker 1: I'll never sell or may never even poke into my pocket.
Speaker 1: I might give one away. But my thoughts on selling
Speaker 1: a case knife is the same Atticus Finch took about
Speaker 1: killing the maukingbird.
Speaker 2: That is a sin.
Speaker 1: Alexis looks at the knives I've sequestered all over the house,
Speaker 1: and cause of the sickness whatever, I don't buy them
Speaker 1: to sell, And the same appliance to dogs, However, if
Speaker 1: someone else wasn't inclined to do so, I'd have neither
Speaker 1: dog nor not pretty well, know what you're getting. When
Speaker 1: you buy a knife, even if it's dull, you can
Speaker 1: sharpen it.
Speaker 2: The same doesn't always apply to dogs.
Speaker 1: So back to the story of Clay Michael's two year
Speaker 1: old dog, it was a trial basis front dog. Something
Speaker 1: that may be new to some of you, that you
Speaker 1: could take a dog out and try it out before
Speaker 1: you bought him. I remember my mama taking clothes home
Speaker 1: from Martin's Department store and Warren when I was just
Speaker 1: a boy, and she wanted to try them on. The
Speaker 1: ones she liked, she'd come back and pay for, and
Speaker 1: the ones she didn't, she'd just bring back. It was
Speaker 1: called taking them out on approval. There was a lot
Speaker 1: of trust between the two, my mama and the store,
Speaker 1: but Warren was a small town and everyone knew everyone,
Speaker 1: and the thought of not bringing them back or taking
Speaker 1: advantage of the store it anyway, wasn't even a consideration.
Speaker 1: It's just how folks did that type of business back then. Anyway,
Speaker 1: It's not uncommon for dog owners that are selling them
Speaker 1: to take potential buyers hunting to show off the dog's abilities.
Speaker 1: For the buyer, it's a chance to see the dog
Speaker 1: in a familiar environment to the dog. Were there no
Speaker 1: distractions during that film project? We hunted three nights in
Speaker 1: a row. In the first two nights, every time Michael
Speaker 1: un snapped the lead off of that hound, he treated
Speaker 1: a comb before a cat kili gets behind. He was
Speaker 1: on fire, and in every tree there sat a big,
Speaker 1: fat bandido looking back at us. Michael kept saying, Clay,
Speaker 1: this dog ain't this good. He was tree and three
Speaker 1: and four coons to Whaling's won. It was a heck
Speaker 1: of a time for a dog to show out in
Speaker 1: front of the camera and equally his opportunity for one to.
Speaker 2: Look bad like Whaling did.
Speaker 1: Now, not that Michael's dog needed any help, but his
Speaker 1: two night bandido beat down of old Whaling was bordering
Speaker 1: on cruel and unusual punishment. A dog could absolutely do
Speaker 1: no wrong. Now here's where the seller is an event like
Speaker 1: this or a time like this, has the advantage over
Speaker 1: the buyer. He could have said, there's the proof right there,
Speaker 1: and there would have been no valid argument made against
Speaker 1: the dog's abilities. It was the perfect storm to sell
Speaker 1: a dog. But honesty and integrity stepped in. In cases
Speaker 1: like this, it usually doesn't. Michael was adamant to Clay,
Speaker 1: this dog is good, but he ain't this good? But
Speaker 1: how could he say it? He was doing just what
Speaker 1: he was advertised to do. Cut him loose and watch
Speaker 1: him treacoon time after time. The truth was he was
Speaker 1: hitting pitches like Babe Ruth at a T ball game.
Speaker 2: He was in the zone.
Speaker 1: In every decision or gamble that dog made was the
Speaker 1: correct one. And even though for his first two nights
Speaker 1: in February that dog looked like a machine, the third
Speaker 1: night proved that he wasn't. He didn't treacoon every fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes like he had the previous two nights. He only
Speaker 1: wound up with two or three that night, and even
Speaker 1: let Old Whaler slip in and get one himself, which
Speaker 1: was still a well above average out and during that
Speaker 1: time of year here in Arkansas, for the most seasoned
Speaker 1: of hounds. Now, for those of you that watched that film,
Speaker 1: you know that Clay didn't wind up buying that dog.
Speaker 1: Folks like what they like, and even though that dog
Speaker 1: would have been a bargain at any price, as far
Speaker 1: as qual he goes, he just didn't feel what Clay
Speaker 1: Bow was looking for. There's more to hunting dog than
Speaker 1: just the dog, and that's the way it is to
Speaker 1: a lot of folks. Michael's a lot like me when
Speaker 1: it comes to good dogs. Why would you sell one?
Speaker 1: But sometimes you have more than you can handle, which
Speaker 1: is the reason he'd offer that dog to play in
Speaker 1: the first place. Michael had more good dogs than he
Speaker 1: could hunt. And a good dog sitting in a pen
Speaker 1: not being hunted, it's way up there on the no
Speaker 1: No list. We were talking about this just the other
Speaker 1: day and he got to tell me about the old
Speaker 1: dog traders from the past that he knew growing up
Speaker 1: that helped lay the foundation of how he handles selling
Speaker 1: a dog on the rare occasion that he does. And
Speaker 1: by laying the foundation, I mean doing the exact opposite
Speaker 1: of what he saw most of them doing. These old
Speaker 1: guys were in the trading business and gathered twice a
Speaker 1: day at the local Coon Hunters Club where he grew
Speaker 1: up to swap lies dogs and lies about dogs. He
Speaker 1: said they'd be a gathering six days a week at
Speaker 1: the clubhouse of a dozen or more men that Delton
Speaker 1: coon house like blackjack dealers pass out cards at the casino.
Speaker 1: He told me they'd trade a good dog for a
Speaker 1: bad one just to make a trade. It was a
Speaker 1: game and the only rule was there were no rules.
Speaker 1: They were all on an even playing service and they
Speaker 1: knew it. Michael said he couldn't count the times when
Speaker 1: a trade was made and the registration papers, some of
Speaker 1: the ink barely dry on them, were handed over to
Speaker 1: the new owner. And the question that was always asked,
Speaker 1: do these papers belong to this dog? And the response
Speaker 1: was always I give you my word they are. I
Speaker 1: gave them to that dog this morning. During the evening
Speaker 1: gathered at the coon Club, they'd all leave together once
Speaker 1: it got dark and cut all the hounds loose a
Speaker 1: lot of times in one pack and just wait for
Speaker 1: one to get treated. They'd all marched to where the
Speaker 1: dog or dogs were treed to shine the coon. And
Speaker 1: he said he was with them one night as a kid,
Speaker 1: and he heard a dog come treae weed down.
Speaker 2: In the bottoms. So the way they all went, he said.
Speaker 1: After a mile of mud and briars and swamps, they
Speaker 1: found that hound tree barking at a crawfish that was
Speaker 1: backed up against a dead law. Both pinchers out like
Speaker 1: he was holding a pistol in each hand and daring
Speaker 1: anybody to come closer. Now, in dealing with a dog trader,
Speaker 1: how do you know what kind you've got?
Speaker 2: Are they like the old men that Michael told me about?
Speaker 1: Are they more like Michael, who's not a dog trader
Speaker 1: by any means? There's a lot of folks just like
Speaker 1: Michael who sell dogs for the same reason and believes
Speaker 1: or not, there are a bunch of good folks who
Speaker 1: simply make a living selling good quality, hone dogs. Here's
Speaker 1: how you weed your way through the sea which kind
Speaker 1: you're dealing with. You ask questions, You do research, You
Speaker 1: seek out references. You take everything with a grain of salt.
Speaker 1: Unless you're buying a robot, be prepared to be frustrated, surprised,
Speaker 1: and maybe even disappointed. Sometimes even the best of intentions
Speaker 1: and qualities end in failure. It's a gamble every time.
Speaker 1: And one other thing, Remember the phrase, mmmm, that dog
Speaker 1: ain't never done that before?
Speaker 2: When and if you hear.
Speaker 1: That one when you're describing something out of a character
Speaker 1: and off the wall, that the dog that you just
Speaker 1: spent your hard earned money on did to the person
Speaker 1: you bought it from. If you hear that one, don't
Speaker 1: be surprised if he eventually trees a crawfish.
Speaker 2: It's been on to happen, you know.
Speaker 1: It's easy to see the common denominator and what those
Speaker 1: old folks Michael told me about we're doing if you
Speaker 1: look past the subpar dogs, falsified registration papers, and the
Speaker 1: fruitless hunts that they were all sharing. Within that group,
Speaker 1: they were spending time together and join each other's company
Speaker 1: and competing on who could come out ahead this week,
Speaker 1: only to start it all over the next with the
Speaker 1: majority of the same dogs. Now, I'm sure there were
Speaker 1: one or two whose motives were less than honorable, but
Speaker 1: those folks usually weed themselves out of a group like that.
Speaker 1: I saw that with the men who hunted and dealt
Speaker 1: dogs with my dad. New faces would come.
Speaker 2: And go, but there was always a core group.
Speaker 1: Of men that were seemingly always there until they weren't.
Speaker 1: Time is a thief, and it steals us one by
Speaker 1: one from our circles. There's only a few of those
Speaker 1: men left the hunting with my dad and the old men,
Speaker 1: along with Michael's old coon club from his youth, they're
Speaker 1: both gone too. What once was a regular twice daily
Speaker 1: meeting of houndsmen and dog traders has now left to
Speaker 1: stories and memories that, unless told, they'll all be gone
Speaker 1: as well. Now dogs are so more on the Internet
Speaker 1: than anyplace else. You can watch videos of the dog
Speaker 1: you're interested in, and see live feeds from the woods
Speaker 1: in real time, what the dog's capabilities or limitations are,
Speaker 1: and never leave the couch. With DNA and micro chipping,
Speaker 1: is harder for a crooked dog trader to get.
Speaker 2: Over on someone. That's a good thing.
Speaker 1: It's hard to dodge an irate person you just circled
Speaker 1: out all his money with the speed of social media.
Speaker 1: In the same vein, the person who makes the first
Speaker 1: post on any deal gets to tell the story, and
Speaker 1: sometimes the guilty dogs bark first. Such are the times
Speaker 1: in which we find ourselves. The absence of the gathering
Speaker 1: of the old dog traders is a sad thing to me, and,
Speaker 1: regardless of the inevitable tick of the clock, I hate
Speaker 1: to see things like that go away. I realize that
Speaker 1: with progress comes changed, but change doesn't come without a cost.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that what we got in trade for
Speaker 1: those old men gathering at the Coon Club twice a
Speaker 1: day was a very good deal. Thank y'all so much
Speaker 1: for listening. Remember and pray with me for everyone affected
Speaker 1: by the hurricanes, and give, if you can, whatever you
Speaker 1: can to a legitimate organization until next week. This is
Speaker 1: Brent Reeves, sign it off.
Speaker 2: Y'all be careful.