Deer Hunting With Dogs

Have you ever enjoyed hunting deer with dogs? Did you enjoy the hunting sport? But some time it is not possible to always spot the deer especially in the Southern states. You will come across different terrains to locate the deer. Sometime to hunt one animal we use other animals like dogs for hunting the deer. I have no experience of using them for hunting but have seen them in action. But more than the dog hunter the foxhunters are considered a good sport.

Another poacher of my acquaintance had a deer dog that was deer proof. So much so that the owner offered a suspicious warden one hundred dollars if he (the warden) could persuade the dog to chase a deer. The warden was satisfied and the dog's owner was perfectly safe in making the offer, but that dog was about the best aid that a poacher could wish. Healthy deer were perfectly safe from him. I saw a deer run within a hundred feet of the dog and he never even looked at the deer. It was different when his master used his gun. The dog would be off at the sound of the shot and, if the deer had been wounded and not killed, he would chase, catch and hold the animal until the man could approach and make the kill.

Most of the legal deer hunting in which dogs are used is done in some of the Southern States—in areas where there are large private estates. It seems to be more a "gentleman's sport" than one the common people can enjoy—more a holdover of the English nobility or southern aristocracy idea than a sport of American democracy.

The excuse is that the deer are in such inaccessible places that the use of dogs is necessary in order to have any success at all. I know that there are many places in the South which I would not want to enter and where it would be almost impossible to see a deer, let alone to shoot one, but we have a few places here in Maine that are nearly as bad. I know of one tract of several thousand acres where deer are plentiful, but hunters shun it. There is no visibility and I often have been forced to crawl on hands and knees in order to make any progress. Such places are better left as sanctuaries where deer will have a chance to live and increase.

The overflow from these areas would soon provide good hunting in neighboring sections. I believe that it is better to do this than it is to use dogs to drive the last deer out of the refuge, to be shot by a favored few. The shooting of deer from trains, airplanes and automobiles is illegal in most places, and rightly so. Aside from the sporting angle, the use of a loaded gun in a confined space can be dangerous to anyone who may be with the shooter.

Accidents can happen and it is senseless to expose any one to any unnecessary risks. From a sporting standpoint, riding along a road with a gun stuck out of the window of an automobile and shooting any deer that might be seen, is about as sporting as shooting fish in a barrel. Deer have not acquired a fear of automobiles and will often feed in full view of a highway, to the delight of nature lovers. To take advantage of the deer's lack of fear is, definitely, not sporting.

Even though it is great fun to hunt the deer, I believe that the more you take care in hunting the better you care safe from any unlawful or accidents. Unfearful nature of deer can sometime be a delight to the nature's lovers and they are dangerous as well when you travel on the highways. There are some good dogs that could be of good help when going for hunting deer. And there some dogs again that does not like to hunt for deer. They are called deer proof. Deer hunting could earn you a good amount of money as well if you know how to trade it.