Patrick,
When I decided to give up the hounds in favor of some other kind of dog, I gave it a lot of serious thought. I’m sure not the first guy to come up with the idea.
At the time, I was in contact with a young fellow in England. He moved, and I have since lost track of him. He used what is called a “Lurcher” over there. That’s a greyhound crossed with something else, often a shepherd. They run mostly by sight, and are very fast. This fellow hunted fox with a predator call and his dog. He hunted mostly at night, and would call the fox from cover and slip the dog on it. Usually the dog would catch the fox before it could reach cover again.
It didn’t take me long to figure out that a sight hound wouldn’t fill the bill for me where I live and hunt. For one thing, in this country anything my dog gets after can be out of sight in 2 or 3 jumps. I had to have a dog that can at least run a red hot track. I also needed a dog that barks treed; at least well enough that I can find him.
Aside from hunting, I needed a dog that could fill other requirements. Where I live, I can’t have a hound loose in the woods for half the year. I spend a good deal of the spring, summer, and fall camped somewhere in the mountains; much of the time horseback. I needed a dog that could be with me the year around. A camp dog, guardian/companion that was pretty much under control. I tried an Airedale and have never been sorry. One led to another, and that’s all I really wanted. I was perfectly happy with the pair, until a little female came by looking for a home and someone to belong to. And now there are 3.