Anyone had one go bad?

[DoubleCK]

Warning: This post is way too long and holds absolutely no credible advice or helpful information. I'll leave the dispersal of useful tips to others who have something worth sharing. I have no idea why this is posted. Just draw your own conclusions then maybe share your own "Dog Gone Wrong Story." I guess just for fun.

When I was a kid Dad traded for a well bred, Black & Tan weaner pup (Pistol) at a night hunt or water race somewhere. Pistol grew up running around the place getting whipped by everything from the made coonhounds and beagles to my sister's Siamese Cat, Ginger. Ginger, like the "nowheresville cat" was a legend around those parts. She had Pistol's extra long, silky ears bleeding most of the time.

Pistol barely survived it all and finally grew up to be big, beautiful and strong and became terrible about fighting other dogs (hmmm).

I remember as a kid, more than a few times, having a chain on Pistol and a chain on another dog both engaged in a full blown to the death dog fight. My Mom would end up on the end of one chain, me on the other and my sister (all of us yelling/screaming/crying) blasting them with the garden hose that was always strung out to fill the water buckets. Pretty traumatic as I recall. Of course in those days if any one or God forbid two of those hounds got out of the pens it was a "National Emergency"

as something was probably going to die. Alarms would sound and it was all hands on deck. These disasters usually occurred due to my carelessness when doing dog chores. Certainly not a way anyone would want to live with hounds.

Of course Dad was normally off working when these things happened, But I do remember many a similar scenario on the creek. Pistol would finally leave the lantern just to bale into what was supposed to be a good ole coon fight/kill and pick a dog fight with one of the dogs that had trailed and treed or bayed the prey. And he was serious and became very good at it. I think a coon or two even escaped due to the distraction of the mighty Pistol.

In retrospect perhaps the fundamental mistake in the whole Pistol deal was that as a little puppy Pistol was designated as my sister's dog. Of course that was a way to justify another promising prospect in the pack. In any case this made the culling that should have occurred more difficult.

In those days we had heard/read about electric training collars. Not sure if anyone we knew owned or had even seen one. But purchasing one was not even on the radar. I often think of the time when Dad, keenly interested in curing Pistol of his many ills, used an extension cord, parts from a livestock hotshot and miscellaneous items out of the bolt bin to build the cure. I won't go into the results, just use your imagination to conjure up; the worst and then double it.

However I suppose some may have had a strange feeling of satisfaction as Pistol, on the end of a chain laced with the extension cord crawled in at the com'ere command.

My sis and I never really knew where Pistol disappeared to. And to my recollection no one ever asked.

 

[NM Leon]

He went to that great cull pack in the sky!

 

[DoubleCK]

A stark contrast to the ceremonious burial of other old hounds under a memorable cottonwood on the Frenchman River, the Muddy or the Sinkin Water where a they had admirably treed one during their prime.

 

[Predburner]

That was fantastic...Ty....

 

[btech29]

That was a good read, I enjoyed it.

 

[Jesse lackey]

Ok, here goes. When I was around 10 we had a litter of treeing walker pups. The litter was out of our stud dog Sam, one of our females Daisy. Earlier that year, Sam was named AKC's World Champion Treeing Walker, so wehen these pups were about 5 weeks old we headed off to Walker Days with the Dam, Sire, and pups. All sold that week, and headed back home with us until they were weened. Within 2 days of being home, pups started dying of parvo. Two survived, one male, one female, (Zeek and Molly) me and my sister nursed these two through the parvo, so dad decided we would keep them. I kept Zeek, and he got hunted almost every day. Turned into a great coon hound, at about two years old I traded him for a mountain cur dog to my dad, and he traded him to a guy in new mexico and he turned into one of the best bear dogs the guy owned.

Molly on the other hand spent so much time in the house with my sister that until she was a year old the only thing she would tree was the fridge. At about a year old my dad finally broke down and told my sis that regardless of the fact that the dog almost died, she would hunt or go. Well, she was the most deer running dog I have ever seen. Eventually she started to fall off the deer she had jumped, and pick up a coon. All in all she was the worst hound on the place, and cost lots of $$$ over time, but couldn't be culled because she belonged to daddy's little princess.