I’ll be the first to admit: I completely misunderstood hunting with hounds. I was skeptical of ever doing a hound hunt because it seemed unfair. It seemed as if the dogs did all the work, and then the hunter shows up, shoots his shot, and the game is over. Boy was I wrong.
Bear hunting with hounds is not only a time honored tradition, but also an important wildlife management tool in many regions of the country. It’s a craft that takes endless hours of dedication, as well as arduous training all year round. A houndsman must know every idiosyncrasy of each one of his dogs, and his dogs must trust him 100%. There’s a difference between a good bear hunting dog, and a GREAT bear hunting dog, and a lot of that has to do with the time, effort, and devotion that a houndsman puts into his dogs.
Many people view hunting with hounds as “unethical” or “inhumane”. I can assure you, as far as “hunting ethics” go, there is no difference in shooting a bear out of a tree, versus over bait, or by spot and stalk when speaking on humane ways to harvest an animal. When it comes to “fairness”, and dogs cold trailing a bear, trust me, the hunter doesn’t always win. I can tell you first hand, I witnessed 7 tracks, over the course of 5 days, that went nowhere, and the bear “won”.
I first decided to do a bear hunt over dogs because the 3 previous bait hunts I went on, yielded smaller bears, and I wanted to harvest a mature bear, that tipped the scales at over 300lbs. Other hunters told me to either head North to Canada, or try and run dogs. Due to scheduling, the Canadian trip would have to wait…so dogs it was.
I showed up to bear camp, and was overwhelmed by the number of hunters there. Not only that, but the number of repeat hunters, which told me I was in good hands. The first night at camp, we had a steak dinner by the camp fire, and everyone was talking about what they had brought for the hunt. I had harvested my past 3 bears with specialized .308 and .300 Black Out rounds out of semi auto rifles. This year, I seemed under gunned compared to everyone else. It seemed the go to round for most of these hunters was a mix of 45/70, .300 Win Mag and 12 Gauge slugs. I showed up with a puny .357 Magnum lever gun. When I mentioned what I was using, and the type of ammunition, I got a lot of sideways stares, and mumblings and grumblings under some of the older gentleman’s breath. Heading to bed that night, feeling less than confidant, I was nervous for what the week may bring.
Initially, to start the week, we were doubled up, 2 hunters to 1 guide. The other hunter and myself both discussed that we were there for big bears, and neither was afraid to eat tag soup. We flipped a coin on who would get first crack at a bear and he won, so he was first up to try and tree a bear. On Monday, we had chased 3 cold trails unsuccessfully. There were good bears on camera, but tracks that were too old for the dogs to take up positively. Day one ended with a big goose egg for our truck. Tuesday was my turn to go after a bear, and as luck would have it, it down poured all night and into the morning. Anyone that’s ever hunted bears before knows that rain and black bears don’t mix. We probably checked close to a dozen trail cams and all came up empty. We did however have a close encounter with a great bull moose with about a 48” spread, so the day wasn’t a total loss.
Wednesday morning was the other hunters turn, and we cold trailed a really good bear at the start of the morning, but as the dogs chased him up hill, and we followed about a mile behind, the track went cold and the dogs lost the scent. Discouraged, we went back to the truck. The other hunter then decided to pass on 2 other nice shooter bears because they didn’t fit the “350lb minimum” he was looking for. Another night we returned to camp empty handed. Frustrated was an understatement for the emotions I was feeling, because with only 2 days left, the other gentleman had passed on 2 bears I gladly would have harvested, but that’s the agreement we made.
On Thursday, Bob had told me that 3 out of the 6 hound hunters had tagged out, so we would be switching guides, and hunting one on one for the rest of the week. I got paired up with Jesse Duncan, an experienced hounds man, with a great group of dogs. Things started to look up, as we checked 3 baits that had all had great bears on them within a few hours of us being there. We chose a bait with the best looking bear and set the dogs free. They immediately took up the track, and it was off to the races. After about an hour, we had noticed the dogs had split up, and were now moving in different directions. Not sure of what had happened, we set up for what we thought would end up being a shot across a road as the dogs chased the bear over it. No such luck. The bear had taken the dogs through a stream, and they lost the track. I was starting to realize, this whole hound hunting thing definitely wasn’t as easy as I had originally thought, and definitely not as successful as some of the videos I had seen online. With one day left to get it done, we headed back to camp.
Friday morning, the last day of the hunt, was the last chance for me to keep my record, of successfully harvesting a Maine Black Bear. We set out earlier than we had any other morning, and as “Copperhead Road” by Steve Earle pumped through the speakers of the truck, Jesse and I looked at each other knowing we only had a few hours to fill my tag. He didn’t want to let me down as much as I didn’t want to let him down, and we both knew it. We discussed strategy, shot placement, and the fact that I was to leave my Go-Pro cameras in the truck, as Jesse was sure his superstition of them causing bears to “disappear” was correct.
The first bait we checked had a REALLY nice bear on it that had been there recently. Jesse wanted to do his due diligence and we checked 3 more baits. 2 of the sites had good bears, but we ran with the first site as it would have had the freshest tracks. We leashed up his 2 best dogs and took them into the woods. They immediately hit the track, we popped the leashes and off they went. We ran back to the truck, and to pull out all the stops, let 3 more dogs go. The chase was on, the adrenaline was pumping, and the track was set.
We drove logging roads and back roads and chased the dogs, chasing the bear for about 3 hours. Finally, Jesse let me know the bear was treed. I grabbed my rifle and our packs and we head out. The good news, the bear was staying treed. The bad news, he was 3.5 miles away, up a mountain that we had no other access to except literally, over a river and through the woods. About an hour or so later, we were about 100 yards away from the dogs. Jesse told me something I hadn’t seen before in any of the hound hunting videos online: once we got about 20 yards out, we’d rush the tree, he’d pull the dogs back, I’d secure the bottom of the tree, and on his command, I’d make the shot. Not something I had anticipated, or mentally prepared for, but I didn’t come this far to go home empty handed. As we rushed the tree, and Jesse pulled the dogs back, I heard him say “that bear’s WAY BIGGER than the one I saw on camera.” At this point, I hadn’t even looked up to see the bear, but standing at the bottom of the tree, with the bear only about 20 feet above my head, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and hoped the bear didn’t decide to slide down the tree on top of me. With the dogs secured, Jesse told me to step back from the tree and take my shot. The bear was moving from one side of the tree to the other, not exactly presenting an easy shot. I stepped back, waited for him to settle, and put my sights on his chest. I took a slow breath, squeezed the trigger, and heard the shot slap his chest. He fell backwards, and hit the ground with a LOUD thud. We gave it a minute, then we moved in…and Jesse announced “dead bear”. A wave of relief came over me, as we began to uncover the bear from the knee high fern bed he fell in. As we attempted to move him and clear the vegetation, he seemed to grow the more we pulled the fern leaves back. Jesse looked up at me, we both smiled, and gave me a big embrace. This was NOT the bear we thought we were chasing on camera, but he was a stud nonetheless. He was an old warrior, with a big block head, worn down teeth, scarred face and back, and a good 6 plus inch fat layer on him. Definitely an experience I’ll never forget, and one that has led me to be hooked on hunting with hounds.
If you decide to hunt with hounds, I can promise you this. First off, it’s one of the most fun and exciting ways to hunt. If you don’t have a blast doing it, you may not have a pulse. Second, it is NOT for the faint of heart. Thinking this is an “easy” hunt is completely wrong. Those dogs work hard, and you’ll work just as hard chasing them. Last, it’s a dying tradition that is in danger of going extinct. There’s been all types of bills and proposed legislature to limit and ban hunting with dogs. Most don’t understand the hunt unless they’ve been on one. I was one of those people. Now I’m 1000% in favor of hunting with dogs. If you don’t understand it, don’t condemn it. Do some research and learn about how important this type of conservation is. If you’re on the fence…get on a hunt…it’ll totally change your perception.
For those that will ask, I used a Henry Repeating Arms Big Boy Carbine in .357 Magnum, with a 120grain Xtreme Hunter bullet manufactured by Lehigh Defense and loaded by Underwood Ammunition
Black Dirt Diaries 