Home Forums Birds & Dogs Hunting Dogs Blood Trailing Dogs

Following Wyoming legalizing blood trailing dogs early this year, I've been wanting to buy a hunting dog and train it for the purpose. Most type of curs seem like they'd be a good breed choice, but I usually hunt cow elk in November and December and would like a dog that is resilient to the cold. I'm afraid curs or coonounds with their slick, short coat would be prone to getting chilled. Anyone have any suggestions for a good trailing dog for cold weather? I've been thinking about an elkhound.

put a coat on them....

That's a good idea. Nice dog and coat, what type of each are they?

red heeler. a fleece dog coat under a browning orange vest

If you are in Montana contact Omega Shepherds. They sell trained dogs and pups. Their trained dogs usually go to military or LEOs and are expensive. The pup I got was the best and healthiest dog I have ever had and lived a little over 12yrs which is pretty good for a 110lb dog. One thing I really liked about Omega Shepherds is they were always available to help over the phone.

As you can tell by my handle, I'm a fan of the Deutsch Drahthaar (DD). These dogs are purposely breed to do many hunting tasks well, and one of those is to track and retrieve wounded game In an advanced German hunt test, there is a dedicated blood tracking portion. Even in an less advanced test there is a requirement for the dogs to track and retrieve a dead hare that has been dragged over 300 meters. These dogs also handle cold weather very well.

If you're interested in learning more about the DD breed, here's the link to the national breed club here: Verein Deutsch–Drahthaar - Group North America

There are several registered VDD-GNA DD kennels in WY: VDD-GNA DD Breeders List I'm sure they would be happy to answer your questions about the breed.

This link shows DDs at 'work in the forest' and there are a couple of pics of DDs with big game animals they tracked down: Drahthaar Forest Work

My red healer (ACD) was one heck of a good trailer.

At the first kill, I allowed her have to have at the gut pile.

All the other times she was always there first trying to do her own version of field dressing.

Worst part was she usually puked in the truck.

These are very cool dogs. I can see myself ending up with one. I'll definitely contact a breeder.
Thanks.

Drahthaars are a great breed. As MT DD Fan pointed out, WY has some good kennels and I got mine up there. They are multi purpose and do best when used a lot for various things. If you get one, just be sure to hunt the hell out of them.

Most people aren’t going to shoot and wound enough big game to justify a DD.

But if you want a dog that will blood track,upland and waterfowl hunt plus kill coons and coyotes it’s the obvious choice.

They just have to much hunt in them for a few blood tracks a year.

Amen to that. Love the goofy bastards.

I trained all my versatile breeds to blood track using the method outlined in NAVHDA's "Green Book". It worked well in all of them as well as two English Setters which had tremendous retrieve desires. Our pit bull mix is pretty good too, though I haven't done any formal training with it. I send him off after any pests I shot around the yard that did not drop right away. He is a coward and won't close in for the kill but he will bark up a storm when he finds the critter.

I think many dogs can work well for the purpose though some will excel and others will be barely adequate. It really boils down to the time spent training and the dog's instincts and desire to please. A dog that has mediocre ability but a high desire to please will do much better with some training than a gifted dog that is left to its own devices to figure out what needs to be done.

MN just legalized blood tracking this year too. In the past I generally got a phone call from one of the wardens I know to bring a dog to help find a cripple. Often it was to help a kid or other inexperienced Hunter find an animal. The hunter would contact the warden for help and then the warden would call me. I typically get 3 such tracks a year with a slight tilt towards bears. I get about double that in calls but I am not always around to help. The worst part is most wait until after dark to call and that makes for a short night.

I'll agree that most of the Versatile European breeds should have the chops to double as tracking dogs. A friend here in Idaho has trained his Drent as a fully qualified search and rescue dog, and the little guy is doing quite well.

Seems like having a dog that will hunt birds as well as retrieve and track would be the better choice, even if they aren't "the best" at any one of them.

I am from Germany.

DD, while great dogs in their own right, are, as a breed relying on air scent (nose up) and eyesight, a second choice for dedicated blood trailing over here.

Any breed with "Brackenerbe", hounds, that is, is picked.

Hannoverscher Schweisshund
Bayrischer Gebirgsschweisshund
Steyrian Coursehaired Hound

This last breed is the one I have - one of em goofing of down in the yard right now.

They are calm, but tenatious on the trails and just perfect for the task.

If you want more info, let me now.

Ready,


I would imagine the breeds you mention are exceptional blood trackers.

Interesting that you say that DD dogs are air scent dogs. I have had German Wirehaired Pointers for 30 years and I assure you they also do lots of ground scenting. I see it primarily with mearns quail. The dog will detect recent feeding activity and follow the scent trail (on the ground) of the covey for one hundred yards or more till they are found. It is amazing to watch them at work figuring out where those secretive and highly camoflaged quail go.

The few times I shot a coyote and one time a coati, one of my GWPs was taken into the area and followed the blood trail to the quarry. I never trained any of them to do it, just encouraged them to "get it".

Helped a buddy with training his Drahthaar for the tests.
When he told me the expectations, I though "Bullschidt".

Berta easily exceeded them.

She went down a training blood trail 12 hours overnight old.
After a good rain.
As fast as we could go holding her leash.
Respetfully she wasnt limited to what was airborne,
She was smelling the stamps of no old that had been put on
stuff by a 1"x1" sponge screwed to a walking stick and occasionally
dipped in blood.

If you hunt it, they will hunt with you.

For pure blood tracking, and only tracking...hounds.

And their is even a hound with Blood in its name.

I had good luck using Great Pyrenees, started as pups, as that was what I had at the time. They had really good noses. I found lots of deer for people that would have been lost otherwise. By law, we had to keep them on a leash. They could also drag you through a pretty bad thicket. I used to joke with people that sometimes I was bleeding worse than the deer. miles

Meant to add that most times any dog is better than no dog. miles

The guide who helped my daughter shoot and recover her first deer used a boxer mutt. No idea what the other half was, some variety of "fence jumper.". That boxer mutt got out of the truck, the guide said, "Get it" and the mutt was off like a shot, circling about, then took off in one direction and found the deer piled up PDQ.

Granted the blood trail was less than an hour old, but I was surprised that such an un-specialized dog (that I thought was just a sweet companion dog of the guide's) made a terrific blood trail dog.

After seeing that, I suppose most folks would be fine with whatever dog they already have and if they have or desire one of the multi-purpose breeds (GSP, etc.) they would be good-to-go. And any scent hound, of course.



Heh.

We got a Boykin spaniel for just this. He is 1 year old and been on 22 tracks this year. Found 20 of the deer. Trailed one to a neighbors property, where we could not get permission to go. Last week, trailed one for over 2 miles, when it started to rain. Based on blood and a couple of quick glimpses of the deer, it was decided that one would heal fine and we gave it up. He is owned by the ranch manager and spends most days in the truck with him and all over the ranch. Wonderful, happy dog who loves to trail. Only issue is, he does not bark when he finds the deer.

My English lab. Smoke, does a good job of finding wounded or dead deer, but I have to watch her, as she won't bark just stands there wagging her tail, if I don't get there quick enough she will come get me and take back to the deer, we kill over 350 deer a year and end up tracking about 10 per year. Rio7

Put our lapdog Keeshond on a deer trial once when we encounter a hunter looking for his wounded quarry. Nose to the ground she took off like a shot going straight line for about 400+ yds. When we finally caught up, she had a porcupine treed.

My English Setter understands find the bird. This year, Minnesota said we can put 'em on a leash and track deer. I told her "find the deer" twice and we went to the deer without any detours both times. Both deer bled a lot and it would have been hard to lose them. If I took away his shoes, Stevie Wonder could have found the first one, it only went 30 some yards. The second one had a almost a continuous stream of blood, but went 300 yards+. Very simple trails with all the blood I could ask for. Ideal training trails.

I stared training my English Shepherd at 12 weeks on blood trails of squirrels I'd shoot for her (dragged them on a string from a pole and let her find them). She tracked her first deer at 9 months and has since tracked moose, deer, bear, caribou, coyotes and other stuff I can't even remember. I let her find anything I shoot. If I let her track off lead she'll run ahead but comes back and finds me until we get there...kind of like hunting with Lassie.

I think any dog with some level of prey drive and biddability can be trained to blood trail. But too much prey drive might even be a detriment in some ways as the dog might be harder to handle and live with when you're not hunting. My dog is always ready to hunt when I am, but isn't totally crazy about it when we're not hunting and will leave stuff alone when I tell her ("No, we're not squirrel hunting right now").

I put a deposit on a Redline Airedale pup a month ago, with the idea of training it for this purpose.
In Az, we can use dogs, on a leash "until it is determined the animal is still alive", at which point the dog must be taken off the trail.

It is quite common to see people on FB post looking for blood trailing dogs. Figure it might be a decent way to make a little side cash, and get more time in the woods.

Catahoulas don’t fit the cold weather requirement, but they are superb trackers of wounded game.

A guy here in MI uses his Border Collies to VG effect in finding wounded/dead dear. I understand there is some training involved. Also have heard that various "weiner dog" breeds are VG at this job too.

I'm in the middle of training my nine month old GWP female pup to scent track. Right now it's beef liver drug on a string once a week. Later it will be a pheasant wing.
And in my wildest dreams, Sheds.

Yes...I agree with the poster who mentioned a Blood Hound or one of the other hounds. That's the first thing I thought of, just coat them up if they are cold. I mean, you're cold right? And you are coated and mittened up. The dog will usually be on a long leash if you are trailing, so you don't have to worry about them getting stuck from briars and stuff.

But, as mentioned above...versatile dogs like the ones tested in Navdha...have a dead track requirement. They have lots of different dogs in styles and size.

The only thing wrong with versatile dogs from my experience (I'm an SM owner) is the drama of various breed clubs and some people worried more about paper than their dogs. For the most part, the owners and breeders are very nice and stable...but there are some out there that really need to add another hobby, or go outside or take some lithium

Be thankful for the fact she comes back to get you, its a good response and you didn't have to train it. Barking on site usually also takes some training ( we do it for SAR dogs on live finds) but yours sounds like a natural and an ace at the job.

I have found training a dog to track wounded game is like training a fish to swim...most have a natural propensity to do it, because they evolved that way.

Someone mentioned Border collies...they are great at it and I used my Border Collie X Aussie for a lot of years...she was great..but wouldn't bark on a find either....

Years ago I had 2 Border Collies that were from the same litter, they were the best tracking dogs i have ever seen, when they found a critter they sounded like a pack of Coyotes, raising hell, will never forget them Mike and Tyke. Rio7