I used to have a pack of beagles and when several of us would get together, each guy could tell his dogs from the others and could tell how well they were working from listening to them bay.

Running the dogs didn't really have much to do with catching a rabbit.

I feel that one of the most exciting and at the same time rewarding and ethical ways to hunt is blood trailing wounded animals with a trained dog. This is especially important for known reasons at bow hunting.

Maybe some of you have not heard about John Jennenney in NY State, the founder of "Dear Search" and probably one of the persons with the deepest knowledge on traning dogs as well as on tracking wounded game animals.

Go visit his website and buy his book. If you like to hunt with dogs this is excellent reading and information.

Born to track.

I have been on a number of hunts in Germany where dogs and handlers are on the ground moving game hopefully to shooters in high stands. Most often, DJT (Deutsche Jagdterrier) are used...I have seen Deutsch-Drahthaar, Wachtel, as well. Dogs that are too eager to latch on are really not the dogs of choice. They are either killed or end up costing a lot of money. I have put money in the hat more than once. I raise DD, and my brood bitch is fearless but not stupid. She has killed feral cats, fox, a coyote, several big raccoons (easily the toughest of all these), but she will bay up bear and has treed a couple of yearling males over her career. She will point any or all of these species and I have often called her off when I have known what we were dealing with....when I'm bird hunting, I'm not interested in stopping to stitch the dog up if I can avoid it.

IMO, big game dogs aren't stupid...but they are relentless in the pursuit. Areal problem is when there are more than 2 dogs down...then the pack mentality takes over.