WEBVTT - Ep. 145: THIS COUNTRY LIFE - My Journey as a Coon Hunter (Part 2) 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:09.200 Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves 0:00:09.920 --> 0:00:13.720 from coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living. 0:00:14.080 --> 0:00:16.040 I want you to stay a while as I share 0:00:16.079 --> 0:00:18.479 my stories and the country skills that will help you 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:22.360 beat the system. This Country Life is proudly presented as 0:00:22.400 --> 0:00:25.880 part of Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best 0:00:25.920 --> 0:00:30.000 outdoor podcast the airways have to offer. All right, friends, 0:00:30.160 --> 0:00:33.080 pull you up a chair or drop that tailgate. I 0:00:33.120 --> 0:00:34.760 think I got a thing or two to teach you. 0:00:41.720 --> 0:00:46.160 My journey is a Coon Hunter Part two. We're back 0:00:46.200 --> 0:00:50.040 this week with more tales of coon hunting and coon dogs. 0:00:50.600 --> 0:00:53.800 The Bandidos we Chase are curiously smart creatures and their 0:00:53.840 --> 0:00:57.040 survival instincts of slipping away from hounds is about as 0:00:57.120 --> 0:01:01.800 legendary as it gets. To continue one struggle of my exploits, 0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:05.880 along with observations and lessons learned, are up next on 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:09.920 meat Eaters of This Country Life podcast. But first, I'm 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:21.800 going to tell you a story. About three years ago, 0:01:21.959 --> 0:01:24.760 someone sent me a want add for lack of a 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:28.119 better term, that they'd seen on Facebook in some hunting group. 0:01:28.200 --> 0:01:31.320 The post had had a number listed and it said 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:34.360 looking for someone to get coons off of Deer Lease 0:01:34.880 --> 0:01:39.840 in central Arkansas. Well like Doc Holliday in the movie Tombstone, 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:43.360 when drunk Johnny Ringo challenged the earth Still Duel and 0:01:43.440 --> 0:01:47.960 they ignored him, prompting him to shout, wretched slugs. Don't 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:50.040 any of you have the guts to play for blood? 0:01:51.360 --> 0:01:54.320 Doc Holliday calmly said, and they y'all say it with me. 0:01:55.320 --> 0:01:59.920 I'm a huckleberry. That's just my game. Well, that's just 0:02:00.000 --> 0:02:02.320 that's how I felt what I saw that ad I 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:04.639 broke a nail tapping the numbers out on my phone 0:02:04.640 --> 0:02:06.760 to talk to the man and offered the services of 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:11.240 me and my coonhound whaling. I talked to him, and 0:02:11.320 --> 0:02:14.600 in short order he'd sent me a waypoint on on X, 0:02:14.960 --> 0:02:18.360 And just like that, I had four hundred acres of 0:02:18.400 --> 0:02:21.320 private timber ground to hunt in the middle of agfects. 0:02:24.720 --> 0:02:27.720 It was too good to be true, all short growth 0:02:27.720 --> 0:02:32.600 hardwood timber, surrounded on four sides by rice, corn and soybeans. 0:02:33.320 --> 0:02:36.520 It had a drainage canals on one end and would 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:38.880 hold water on about sixty percent of it That was 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:44.160 about ankle deep, making it primo for crawfish, tadpoles, and frogs. 0:02:45.480 --> 0:02:49.800 Three house favorites of Ricky Raccoon and his kin good 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:52.120 night Nurse. If I was going to draw on a 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:55.320 piece of paper the perfect place to train it up 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:58.280 and come in Coonhoun, that would have been the place. 0:02:59.320 --> 0:03:01.680 The coons were thick in there. And when I dropped 0:03:01.720 --> 0:03:04.600 Whaling in there the first time he treated a coon 0:03:04.639 --> 0:03:08.000 before kackied lick is behind. He tread so quick I 0:03:08.000 --> 0:03:10.760 thought he'd messed up. Now I can count on two 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:14.720 hands and still have fingers left over the number of 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:18.440 times that old Whaling has slick treed. He just doesn't 0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:20.640 do it. And if y'all don't know what a slick 0:03:20.680 --> 0:03:23.800 tree is, it's like striking out in softball. It is 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:28.519 no bueno and a bit embarrassing. A slick tree is 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:30.800 when a dog sets in tree in which is the 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:33.360 way of saying, hey, boss, I found him. He's up 0:03:33.400 --> 0:03:36.320 here in this tree, and then you look and look 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:41.360 and finally decide, hm, no, he ain't. That tree is slick, 0:03:42.080 --> 0:03:45.320 meaning there ain't no coon in it. Nobody likes a 0:03:45.400 --> 0:03:49.240 lion coon dog, especially the fellow he belongs to. Now, 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:51.440 some dogs do it because they just can't figure out 0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:53.880 which tree is in and they gamble or they're they're 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:56.360 just not good enough to decipher it and figure it out. 0:03:57.080 --> 0:03:59.960 The prey driving and the want of praise gets the 0:04:00.240 --> 0:04:03.360 gets the best of them. Old Whaling he ain't never 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:06.360 been bad about that. He ain't never been bad about 0:04:06.400 --> 0:04:08.880 that at all. And I've heard Michael Roseman say he's 0:04:08.920 --> 0:04:12.320 one of the most accurate dogs he's ever seen. And 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:14.720 Michael has seen a lot of dogs in his lifetime, 0:04:15.120 --> 0:04:18.039 and coon hunting and making lights for coon hunters is 0:04:18.080 --> 0:04:22.680 his business. So when he made that tree fifty yards 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:25.280 from where I cut him loose, instead of getting on 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:28.479 to him and making him go on, I checked the 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:32.000 tree and there he was, the mass bandido, looking right 0:04:32.040 --> 0:04:35.360 back at me. Less than a minute in and I'm 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:39.000 already looking at a coon. It was that way for 0:04:39.080 --> 0:04:42.760 quite a while. We were flat smashing the coons in there, 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:46.520 and Whalen was getting some good training and experience, and 0:04:46.600 --> 0:04:50.240 so were the coons. Night hunt there three or four 0:04:50.320 --> 0:04:53.599 nights a week, and never fail to tree coons. It 0:04:53.720 --> 0:04:56.960 was more or less automatic. I'd parked my truck on 0:04:57.000 --> 0:04:59.640 the north end of the property, walk into the edge 0:04:59.680 --> 0:05:02.240 of the world woods, cut Whaling loose and he'd be 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:06.359 struck and barking in pretty short order a few times, 0:05:06.400 --> 0:05:08.920 and y'all gonna think I'm crazy, But he'd strike a 0:05:08.960 --> 0:05:11.279 coon in the same place, or at least on the 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:14.680 same couple of acres, And I believe in my heart 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:17.200 that it was the same coon every time, because that 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:19.960 joker would make a couple of dips and dodges in 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:22.880 the woods before making a big loop and then a 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:25.760 bee line right out of the timber into a flooded 0:05:25.880 --> 0:05:29.760 rice field and soybean fields across the county road. Now, 0:05:29.800 --> 0:05:32.120 let me tell you it's hard for a dog to 0:05:32.160 --> 0:05:35.240 catch up to a coon in a flooded field. They'll 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:38.039 get in there and zig zagger around, and it's hard 0:05:38.040 --> 0:05:40.320 for the majority of dogs to gain ground on them 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.400 because the rice is thick or the soybeans are thick, 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:47.880 and they the coons, they'll just get away. Meanwhile, back 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:50.599 in the woods, old tricky Ricky will pull some fast 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:53.840 ones too, And in this scope of woods I got 0:05:53.880 --> 0:05:56.680 to witness seeing the coons that whaling was running on 0:05:56.800 --> 0:06:00.000 more than one occasion. I just happened to be staying 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:03.000 in the right place at the right time to see 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:06.480 the coons come ambling by with a hound in hot pursuit. 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:10.400 Some folks think that when the hound is trailing and 0:06:10.480 --> 0:06:13.520 barking at a coon, that's he's always looking at him 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:15.720 and running through the woods in front of him, And 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:20.360 that's nearly always not the case. Even when I cut 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:23.039 Wailing loose and he treed fifty yards in front of me, 0:06:23.600 --> 0:06:26.360 I seriously doubt that he ever saw that coon until 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:28.200 he fell out of the tree and on the ground 0:06:28.560 --> 0:06:30.440 after I poked a hole in his ear with my 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:35.000 twenty two. That coon was probably spooked up that tree 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:37.560 by us walking in before I had ever cut Waiting 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:41.120 off the chain. But Whaling could smell him because I 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:43.640 was casting him into the wind, which means I had 0:06:43.720 --> 0:06:46.279 him facing into the wind when I cut him loose, 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:49.160 and he just went straight to where he that coon 0:06:49.200 --> 0:06:51.880 had just climbed up in a tree and started treeing. 0:06:52.880 --> 0:06:55.080 What's really going on when the hound is chasing the 0:06:55.120 --> 0:06:58.080 coon is the dog is barking where the coon has been. 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:02.760 And here's a short less on how that works. We 0:07:02.920 --> 0:07:05.960 all leave scent wherever we are, regardless if we had 0:07:05.960 --> 0:07:08.800 the buried o bomb for dinner or not. We are 0:07:08.839 --> 0:07:14.680 constantly shedding skin cells from our epidermis called skirf spelled 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:19.760 s k e rf. Well, guess what soda coons and 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:21.960 all the other little creatures running around and making a 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:25.480 living in the woods. It's kind of like dropping bread crumbs, 0:07:25.720 --> 0:07:29.040 but instead of leaving a visual trail of gravity and 0:07:29.080 --> 0:07:33.200 fluence sign for the hound to follow, these bread crumbs 0:07:33.240 --> 0:07:36.720 of scurf are floating on the breeze in the microscopic 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:41.440 particles that are affected by wind, humidity, temperature, and age. 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:43.360 And by age, I don't mean the age of the animal, 0:07:43.640 --> 0:07:46.520 I'm talking about how long it's been since the animal 0:07:46.600 --> 0:07:50.640 passed through. There. The dog is following the scin with 0:07:50.720 --> 0:07:53.640 his head up for ways and down for ways, and 0:07:53.680 --> 0:07:55.840 while moving through the woods, and depending on how the 0:07:55.880 --> 0:07:59.000 scin is flowing, he could be several feet away from 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:02.680 where the coon actually walk, just catching scent enough every 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:05.080 few feet to make sure that he's going in the 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:09.240 right direction and staying on course. This is called drifting 0:08:09.320 --> 0:08:12.080 the track, and that's what whalan does as compared to 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:14.800 a ground and pound style of hunting, where the dog 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:18.559 has his nose literally on the ground smelling for every 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:20.679 bit of scent that as he moved through the woods 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:24.880 following the coon. My old Buddy Rex had a dog 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:28.840 named Shadow that was absolutely excellent at this and that 0:08:29.000 --> 0:08:31.120 was his style, and that's the way he hunted. He 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:33.920 could sniff out some coons that had been traveled through 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:38.080 a long time before. But the drifting style dogs are 0:08:38.200 --> 0:08:41.600 usually faster on the track than the ground and pound types. 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:44.600 But those dogs make fewer what we call loses on 0:08:44.640 --> 0:08:47.920 the trail by staying as close to the scurf plume 0:08:47.960 --> 0:08:52.720 as possible. Now, the first time this happened that I 0:08:52.760 --> 0:08:55.760 saw coon that the dogs were chasing, I was hunting 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.200 with a new friend of mine named Michael Crosby. Michael 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:01.160 was looking to get his first coon hound, and I 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:03.319 took him along one night to give him a dose 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:07.199 of what it was all about. We cut Old Whalen 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:09.320 loose and he was making a big loop down through 0:09:09.360 --> 0:09:11.680 that four hundred acre block of woods, and as he 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:14.920 started back towards where we were, he struck in barking. 0:09:15.679 --> 0:09:17.440 I looked at my garment and he was over three 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:20.800 hundred yards away, but pointed back towards where we were. 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:24.160 Michael and I stopped and would cut her lights off 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:27.719 and listened. I was explaining what was going on as 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:31.560 it unfolded. I was talking soft and giving him the 0:09:31.559 --> 0:09:33.800 play by play of what I assumed was going on 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:37.560 by how Whalen was barking while still listening to Whaling. 0:09:37.600 --> 0:09:39.680 He was more or less coming straight to us, and 0:09:39.760 --> 0:09:42.240 I told Michael, you know, if we're quiet and still, 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:44.320 he's liable to run that coon right over the top 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:47.360 of us. I was joking, but I was also thinking 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:50.880 how cool that would be if he did. All of 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:54.439 a sudden, the conversation kind of died out as Whaling's 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:56.640 barking picked up and got closer, and I could hear 0:09:56.720 --> 0:10:01.480 something coming toward us from about thirty or forty yards away. Wait. Now, 0:10:01.480 --> 0:10:04.120 I ain't scared of the dark, not in the least, 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:06.640 not in one little bit. But standing in the middle 0:10:06.640 --> 0:10:09.600 of the pitch black woods at ankle deep water, hearing 0:10:09.640 --> 0:10:14.400 something weighing towards you will heighten your situational awareness. I 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:16.760 switched on the red lens of my son's spot light, 0:10:16.800 --> 0:10:19.200 and I looked toward where that racket was coming from, 0:10:19.320 --> 0:10:23.280 and sure enough, here comes the coon. We didn't move 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:25.760 an inch. That joker looked like he was out for 0:10:25.800 --> 0:10:29.040 a Sunday stroll, not even trotting to amount to munch. 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:31.520 Every now and then he'd we'd we'd see him break 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:33.760 into a short lope for a few yards and then 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:38.200 go back to actually just walking with a purpose. He 0:10:38.240 --> 0:10:40.160 got to a little log that was laying in front 0:10:40.200 --> 0:10:42.720 of us and hopped up on top of it and 0:10:42.840 --> 0:10:44.880 walked the length from one end to the other before 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:47.680 jumping off the ground at a forty five degree angle 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:51.040 and heading due east. And we watched him go slap 0:10:51.120 --> 0:10:54.240 out of sight like he wasn't late for work, but 0:10:54.360 --> 0:10:57.040 if he wasn't careful, he might be cutting it close. 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:02.400 Two minutes later, here comes whaling, barking his brains out 0:11:02.440 --> 0:11:05.120 about ten yards further away from where that coon had 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:08.400 just come through. He was down wind and drifting that 0:11:08.440 --> 0:11:11.320 coon scent as it settled according to all the environmental 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:15.560 factors that affects it, like I just talked about, you know, 0:11:15.679 --> 0:11:19.360 wind and humidity, all that Whaling stayed on that coon's 0:11:19.400 --> 0:11:21.880 track until losing it one hundred yards or so from 0:11:21.880 --> 0:11:26.280 where it came. By us no idea what happened. Sometimes 0:11:26.320 --> 0:11:29.360 it's just like the world opens up and swallows them whole. 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:34.600 They just disappear, but we lost it. Other times it's 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:36.640 like when Rex Whiting and I were hunting in that 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:39.200 same spot one night, and Rex was training a tree 0:11:39.200 --> 0:11:42.040 and walk up pup named June that he was running 0:11:42.080 --> 0:11:46.160 with Whaling. Now, basically the same scenario played out, just 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:49.200 like it had when Michael Crosby and I were in 0:11:49.240 --> 0:11:52.800 there a few nights before Whaling and June struck a 0:11:52.840 --> 0:11:55.520 track and it looped back toward where we were standing. 0:11:56.760 --> 0:11:58.840 The only difference is this time the barking was a 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:02.280 whole lot more excited, which usually indicates that the hounds 0:12:02.440 --> 0:12:05.840 know they're close to the coon. They're either actually seeing 0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:08.400 or hearing it running, or the scent it's so fresh 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:12.199 and hot that it's easy to follow, which actually can 0:12:12.280 --> 0:12:16.800 sometimes work to the coon's advantage. But it appeared that 0:12:16.880 --> 0:12:19.800 it was like the same song second verse from the 0:12:19.840 --> 0:12:22.319 other night, and I'd already told Rex about it. I 0:12:22.360 --> 0:12:25.520 remember saying, we fixed a look at this coon, and 0:12:25.600 --> 0:12:28.040 he immediately turned on his red light and out it too, 0:12:28.040 --> 0:12:30.320 And I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:34.040 I started videoing. Sure, as I'm sitting here right now 0:12:34.080 --> 0:12:37.080 telling you this, we saw that coon coming and could 0:12:37.120 --> 0:12:39.760 hear not only the barking and Whaling and jumble with 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:45.240 their feet splashing coming close behind. They weren't far away 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:47.880 when that coon ran past a big tree, stopped right 0:12:47.920 --> 0:12:50.480 in front of us less than ten yards away, ran 0:12:50.559 --> 0:12:53.720 back a few feet and laid down as flat as 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:56.720 a flitter. He looked like wiley coyote after a steam 0:12:56.800 --> 0:12:59.320 roller had run over him. And both of those dogs 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:01.959 ran within the feud of embarking and raising sand like 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:04.959 they was about to catch him, and they kept going. 0:13:05.920 --> 0:13:08.520 That coon got up like he'd been taking a nap 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.920 on the couch and just loped away. Whaling and June 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:14.240 had gone twenty five or thirty yards past where that 0:13:14.320 --> 0:13:17.080 coon had stopped, and then they came roaring back to 0:13:17.120 --> 0:13:20.520 pick up the scent. Whaling opened up and took off 0:13:20.559 --> 0:13:23.720 with June ride behind him. That coon turned east, just 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:26.400 like the one had done a few nights ago, and 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:29.760 after a hundred yards or so, the dogs lost him again. 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:34.360 Now I can't swear that it was the same coon 0:13:34.679 --> 0:13:38.000 from the hunt before, but he ran that whole circuit 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:41.040 just like the other one did. They struck him and 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:44.760 trailed him almost identically, and he looped around and came 0:13:44.840 --> 0:13:47.760 back to that same two acres where the one before 0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:52.440 it does. Then that coon turned due east and disappeared 0:13:52.640 --> 0:13:56.319 just like the other one. Now I can't swear it 0:13:56.360 --> 0:13:59.839 was the same coon, but I saw him both and 0:14:00.120 --> 0:14:04.720 it looked just like him, and that's just how that happened. 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:16.920 My journey is a coon Hunter, Part two. For a 0:14:16.960 --> 0:14:18.880 fellow that's been a coon hunting for the better part 0:14:18.880 --> 0:14:21.400 of forty two years, one would surmise he's had a 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:25.560 bunch of dogs during that time, and normally they'd be right, 0:14:25.920 --> 0:14:29.720 but in this case, in my case, I've only had 0:14:29.760 --> 0:14:33.800 three For the past thirty two years. My career has 0:14:33.960 --> 0:14:36.280 limited the amount of time that I could dedicate to 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:39.400 training and being able to properly care for a dog 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:42.960 the way a hound should be cared for. They need space, 0:14:43.040 --> 0:14:46.280 and they need hunting. Being on call and involved in 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:50.400 cases and such was a limiting factor over a large 0:14:50.440 --> 0:14:53.120 portion of that thirty two years, and only in the 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:55.240 past five years or so have I been at a 0:14:55.240 --> 0:14:58.360 stage in my job that I could dedicate the proper 0:14:58.480 --> 0:15:03.880 amount of time to do it. So in twenty nineteen, 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:06.160 I decided it was time for me to start looking 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:08.640 for a hound to my own. I wasn't going to 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:11.800 be real particular about the bloodline or the breed for 0:15:11.840 --> 0:15:15.640 that matter, although I've always leaned toward tree and walkers. 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:18.760 That was my first coon houn in my teens, and 0:15:19.200 --> 0:15:21.320 even though my second one was a blue tick in 0:15:21.320 --> 0:15:25.040 my late twenties, I never lost the preference for walkers. 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:28.320 My dad was a walkerman, but his dogs were used 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:32.920 for running codies. I remember taking my city mouse girlfriend 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:36.200 at the time, Alexis, down to dad's house to meet him, 0:15:36.440 --> 0:15:39.080 and when we got there you could hear his hounds 0:15:39.080 --> 0:15:42.880 over in the pen barking and raising cane. I introduced 0:15:42.920 --> 0:15:44.840 her to my dad as we walked in the door, 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:48.680 and she asked him, what is all that barking. He said, 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:52.240 that's my cold dog's barking. She asked him, well, what 0:15:52.320 --> 0:15:54.840 kind of dogs are they? He said, they're running walkers. 0:15:55.440 --> 0:15:58.560 She scrunched up her nose and said, running walkers. They 0:15:58.640 --> 0:16:01.800 need to make up their minds went they're doing. He 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:05.240 laughed and loved her from that very moment. I had 0:16:05.280 --> 0:16:07.840 never even thought about the paradox of that name until 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:11.640 she said that. Anyway, I was looking for a walker dog, 0:16:11.680 --> 0:16:14.920 and for six months I made phone calls, I sent 0:16:15.080 --> 0:16:19.200 texts and emails, and I scoured over the internet looking 0:16:19.200 --> 0:16:21.040 for a dog that would suit me and what I 0:16:21.120 --> 0:16:24.000 was after. And what I was after was simple. I 0:16:24.040 --> 0:16:27.680 wanted a dog that would mind and tree coons. I 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:30.200 wasn't after a particular style of hound like. I didn't 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:32.240 care if he was a dog that drifted a track 0:16:32.640 --> 0:16:35.119 or if he was a ground pounder or a combination 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:38.240 of both. I wanted to be able to turn him loose, 0:16:38.560 --> 0:16:41.040 have him treat me a coon and come to me 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.360 when I called. I had no interest in competition hunting. 0:16:44.520 --> 0:16:47.160 I got nothing against it, and I loosely follow it 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:49.000 due to so many of my friends that I know 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:52.080 and hunt with that do enjoy it. Now, there's a 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:55.640 strategy and skill in competition hunting, and the handler that 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:59.440 knows the rules best will win a competition even when 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:02.000 his dog may not be the best dog in the cast. 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:06.040 And that's cool. It involves the human element and the 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:10.040 bond that's created between a handler and a hound. The 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:12.760 handler has to know the tendencies and habits of that 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:15.080 dog inside and out to be able to listen to 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:17.720 him and tell what's going on just by the different 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:21.320 barks or tones of different barks, and make his call 0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:24.560 to the judge based on his observations. There's a lot 0:17:24.600 --> 0:17:27.760 of skill in that. Me. I ain't that good at it. 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:30.800 And me went in a competition hunt with whaling rests 0:17:30.800 --> 0:17:36.240 squarely on his shoulders, not my brain. Michael Roseman, Rex 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:38.439 Whiting and I would hunt together and we'd use all 0:17:38.520 --> 0:17:41.159 the rules of a competition hunt, and they'd keep a 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.639 running tally in their head of the time left in 0:17:43.680 --> 0:17:46.920 the hunt and what everyone's score was. Heck, I couldn't 0:17:46.960 --> 0:17:49.680 even keep up with my own, much less everyone else's. 0:17:49.800 --> 0:17:53.440 It was fun, but it just wasn't my thing. If 0:17:53.440 --> 0:17:56.800 it's your thing, you should see what Alan Gingrich and 0:17:56.840 --> 0:17:59.800 Trevor Wade and all those folks over at United kennlel 0:17:59.800 --> 0:18:06.360 cl Over doing. You'll find them online at Wwwukcdogs dot com. 0:18:07.000 --> 0:18:09.399 Then just search up to coonhout events. They've got a 0:18:09.440 --> 0:18:12.560 lot going on and there's always room for more participation, 0:18:12.880 --> 0:18:15.240 and these folks will bend over backwards to help you. 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:19.240 So to get back to my journey, After six months 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:22.879 of looking, I found a dog that interested me. I 0:18:23.000 --> 0:18:25.959 was scrolling through Facebook Marketplace and there was a picture 0:18:26.000 --> 0:18:28.520 of a six month old tree in Walker puppy for 0:18:28.600 --> 0:18:31.560 sale with an address that was forty five minutes from 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:36.199 my house for two hundred and fifty dollars. Something struck 0:18:36.240 --> 0:18:38.920 me about the picture. I can't tell you what it 0:18:39.040 --> 0:18:42.080 is to this day, but there was something about that 0:18:42.119 --> 0:18:45.520 dog that called to me. Up to this point, I 0:18:45.560 --> 0:18:48.479 had looked at well over one hundred pictures of dogs 0:18:48.520 --> 0:18:51.439 on the Internet, and talked to a multitude of people 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:54.879 on the phone or through texting about a jillion dogs 0:18:54.880 --> 0:18:57.800 that I never laid eyes on. But I had never 0:18:57.880 --> 0:19:00.520 been drawn to going and looking at one till now. 0:19:01.640 --> 0:19:04.399 I called the number, I talked to the lady and 0:19:04.480 --> 0:19:07.040 made an appointment to go see the dog. The next day, 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:10.639 she informed me that the address on the Facebook ad 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:13.880 was wrong and that they had moved nearly three hours 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:16.119 away from me instead of the forty five minutes I 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:20.600 originally thought. Okay, I was still going to look. I 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:23.280 couldn't shake the image of that hound out of my head. 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:26.800 When I pulled up and saw him, I knew he 0:19:26.960 --> 0:19:29.879 was the one that I'd be taking home. When I 0:19:29.920 --> 0:19:33.080 found out his name was Whaling, it solidified it for me. 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:37.240 For half a year, I had fretted and worried about 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:40.240 finding a dog and having one reason or another not 0:19:40.280 --> 0:19:43.880 to even commit to going and look anyone. Now, after 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:46.440 learning at the last minute that I'd be driving two 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:51.040 hours further away, I hadn't been deterred. Pulling up to 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:53.840 the address and seeing the dog in the subpar of 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.800 living conditions he was being housed in. I didn't really 0:19:56.840 --> 0:19:59.040 know if I was going to be buying him or 0:19:59.119 --> 0:20:01.920 rescuing him, but I knew I was leaving with him. 0:20:02.680 --> 0:20:16.800 Come to find out, he was rescuing me. It was 0:20:16.840 --> 0:20:21.120 Thursday in March twelfth of twenty twenty. I had made 0:20:21.119 --> 0:20:23.080 it back to the outskirts a little rock when I 0:20:23.119 --> 0:20:26.520 got a call from Alexis saying through her job, she'd 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:30.240 learned of a possible exposure to the COVID virus earlier 0:20:30.280 --> 0:20:35.199 in the week. This was when all that started. They 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:37.760 were instructing her to go home and we had to 0:20:37.760 --> 0:20:42.199 report our family's possible exposure to my employer in Bailey School. 0:20:43.080 --> 0:20:46.679 Now Bailey was in the first grade. Alexis had called 0:20:46.680 --> 0:20:48.720 the school and they said that we'd have to come 0:20:48.760 --> 0:20:51.800 get Bailey and do that whole quarantine thing that was 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:54.800 just starting to get so popular. Then it was all 0:20:54.840 --> 0:20:57.800 the rage and everyone was doing it. I would have 0:20:57.920 --> 0:21:00.639 never thought that Bailey wouldn't get back to her class 0:21:00.680 --> 0:21:04.639 that year. I also would never have thought a dog 0:21:04.720 --> 0:21:07.080 could have meant so much to us in such a 0:21:07.160 --> 0:21:12.320 short amount of time. Bailey was doing her classes online now, 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:14.679 so she was free to roam around with me and 0:21:14.720 --> 0:21:19.480 our new hunting hound. So while elementary school was basically 0:21:19.520 --> 0:21:22.879 out for Bailey, coon hunting school was in for her 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:26.639 and Whalen. The rest of that spring and summer was 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:29.199 spent taking that dog to the woods and turning him 0:21:29.240 --> 0:21:32.560 loose and just seeing what he'd do. Bailey went with 0:21:32.600 --> 0:21:35.240 me on a bunch of those trips. She like riding 0:21:35.240 --> 0:21:38.199 the four wheeler and watching and learning what Whalen was 0:21:38.240 --> 0:21:40.720 doing and asking a million questions. And I are while 0:21:40.800 --> 0:21:43.800 unknowingly tried to burn the retinas out of my eyeballs 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:46.640 by shining her coon light in my face every time 0:21:46.680 --> 0:21:50.440 she looked at me. I bought a metal diamond played 0:21:50.440 --> 0:21:53.800 a dog crate for my truck that attracted the attention 0:21:53.960 --> 0:21:56.320 of a guy that happened to be driving by one 0:21:56.359 --> 0:21:59.280 time who stopped and introduced himself, And that was Rex, 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:03.600 who is now like a member of our family. He 0:22:03.640 --> 0:22:06.359 introduced me to Michael Roseman, who is now like family 0:22:06.359 --> 0:22:09.679 and who I'm going hunting with tonight, all because of 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.320 a dog. I've been to the ears of those boys 0:22:13.359 --> 0:22:15.600 and several others in the training of old Whalen, and 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:18.920 they helped me beyond measure in the development of this 0:22:19.040 --> 0:22:22.600 dog from coonhound to coon dog. And there's a difference, 0:22:22.640 --> 0:22:27.040 a big difference. He was born a registered purebred coonhoun, 0:22:27.520 --> 0:22:31.640 but he earned the title of coon dog by being one. 0:22:31.800 --> 0:22:35.080 I took him religiously every opportunity that I had that 0:22:35.119 --> 0:22:39.720