A beagle did win Best in Show at Westminster this year.
And my beagle was so excited he had to sleep another 6 hours today. He did celebrate by chasing the cat around the living room for at least 30 seconds.
I had a guy that worked for me in California that was from Arkansas and raised/sold beagles for years also rabbit hunting the hell out of them. I recall him telling me of the many families that came that he tried to talk out of "the cute little pup". They didn't listen and came back a couple of months later to return ornery the dog.
Had one in high school. Cute as could be for a puppy. Friendly, but the absolute [bleep] dog ever. Let him outside and gone for six hours and barking to boot. Went to college and called home the first weekend and my dad told me they gave him away. Couldn't blame him.
I got more darn stories about that dog. Ate a whole unopened bag of Doritos in about 20 seconds. The big bag plastic and all. Opening presents on Christmas Eve and my cousin tells me the dog is doing something under the tree. Ate through wrapping paper, bow, tinfoil and Saran Wrap to eat a nasty fruit loaf.
We ended up calling him the overweight lover because he got so fat and his lipstick was always out.
I used to have a 134 lb. rottweiler named Harley. SOB wasn't fat either. Solid muscle with a head as big as a bushel basket. Had a female beagle named Patsy at the same time that weighed all of 30 pounds soaking wet. If Harley did anything Patsy thought was out of line she'd tear into him like a PO'd wolverine and Harley would run and hide. She was the only dog he'd take any crap off of and I never could figure why. He damn near killed the neighbors German shepherd one time and I'm certain he would have if I didn't pull him off. The only thing that shepherd did to bring down Harley's wrath was growl at Patsy.
Always had a pretty good beagle around when I was a kid. When my brother and I were into coonhounds and coyote hounds in the '70's and '80's we also had some DAMN GOOD beagles. I miss running hounds....gotta be happy with retrievers now, I guess.
Yes they are! Mine hunt like crazy but hide when its time to load up and go home. They mind great till they get something they like up their noses. Sum bitches they are.
When i was a kid there were still some pretty big areas of timberland in East Texas. We would go camp in the Nueces River bottom a week in the Christmas holiday and hunt squirrel and hound deer.
Grandad had a big, long legged beagle that wouldnt push deer out of the country because of his speed. He could cover country but not like a walker or tick hound. Plus, he would only run one 30 minutes or so before comming back.
I will never forget one day at dinner (lunch) dad put a big pile of food down on a piece of plywood for the hound. It went across that platter without stopping his feet the pile table scraps were just gone in the blink of an eye.
My oldest male Willy is a stud. He whips the $hit out of 3 or 4 dogs around here. When him and mack (my other beagle) fight its so entertaining to watch, if you have ever watched UFC there's this move called the spinning back fist. Willy does the spinning back ass. He uses it to push the other dog away so he can get a different hold or bite them in a different place. Its hillarious, he never loses. If you get him worked up with a old towel he will latch on and you can pick him up off the ground. He will hang there till you put him down.
Years later Dad had another bigger sized one named Ranger which would not give up a deer or squirrel to anyone but him or me, and it was a scarey proposition for me to get it from him.
Ranger would regard me with a baleful glare of disgust but i would always give him a treat and rub heck out of his ears, crankling his ear canals into his skull. Most dogs love a good ear rubbing and i eventually obtained some manner of acceptance from him. When on a hunt and after a bit of success he would growl and threaten me but would always snap those teeth just short of my reach and if not rushed would eventually relinquish the game to me. You can rest assured i never rushed Ranger to give up his trophy.
Ranger would range well ahead in the woods and tree a squirrel or run a deer for a couple of minutes. Often a deer would bust out in the direction we were hunting from so we or Dads grandkids carried buckshot in the chamber until a squirrel was treed.
If a deer was shot Ranger would trail it down and bay until you found him laying on top of it.
If Dad was not there things were fixing to get interesting until the Mexican standoff was resolved.
Dad ran beagles, and his hounds were known for their ability to bring birds and bunnies to the guns. An invite to hunt with Dad on Thanksgiving day was something not to be taken lightly. His best was a beagle/blue tick cross named Belle. She looked like a 13" beagle on steroids. Classic beagle coloring, but very tall. That dog by far had the best nose of any dog I ever hunted over. Man the stories..... Dad told me, "whatever you do, DON'T MISS." I'm like, yeah, right. First rabbit rolls through with Bell hot on it's tail. The little Fox Model B barked twice and the rabbit kept running. Belle got to the spot of the infraction, looked at me, and the hackles went up on the back of her neck and she growled at me like she was going to rip my spine out and stuff it back down my throat. Lesson learned- Belle as the boss, and we'd best not let her down.
I used to have a 134 lb. rottweiler named Harley. SOB wasn't fat either. Solid muscle with a head as big as a bushel basket. Had a female beagle named Patsy at the same time that weighed all of 30 pounds soaking wet. If Harley did anything Patsy thought was out of line she'd tear into him like a PO'd wolverine and Harley would run and hide. She was the only dog he'd take any crap off of and I never could figure why. He damn near killed the neighbors German shepherd one time and I'm certain he would have if I didn't pull him off. The only thing that shepherd did to bring down Harley's wrath was growl at Patsy.
Back in the late 90s I pulled up on a residential job site where there was a bad azz German Shepherd just wearing out a Rottweiler. Seems that one of the guys on the job site brought his female dog that was in heat. The guys on the job had to spray a garden hose down the Shepherd's throat to get him to quit.
She was the only one calm enough to let me get a shot off. The others were too busy clowning around and bawling their fool heads off around your dad for me to shoot.
One afternoon I found a little Rez hound pup next to a barbwire gate.
Gravel road, someone dropped him off. I was dumb enough to scoop him up. He was the roaming'st dog I have ever seen. Hated it, always worried about his dumb ass.
Sure enough one night he ran off and didn't come back.
I found him on the highway about 2AM the next morning when I drove out to check heifers. Fresh road kill deer, he sniffed it out and got hit.
I don't have any photos on my new computer, but HERE is another great Beagle thread that has my little girl's photo. Her face has lightened up some since that photo was taken, but she's still a very smart little princess.
My beagle and first GSD were the same age. I picked Flint, the beagle, as a puppy and had Heikko shipped over when he was between two/three. Heikko, to the end, was dog aggressive.... loved to fight.
Flintfigured I was "his" and would [bleep] with Heikko to no end. To his credit, Heikko figured out that I liked Flint and, in reality, wasn't worth his time. Heikko would wait and flatten him with a paw...,Flint would just run back in.
Damn......I forget sometimes how much I miss those two. Hope they're fighting in whatever afterlife is waiting.