Hunting Whitetails with dogs in the South?

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Hello, I've seen videos with guys hunting deer with dogs in the south. Has anyone done this and how was it? Also are there any guides for this type of hunt? I've looked into it and haven't found any.
 
Been outlawed in Texas for years. In most of east Texas it's even illegal to trail a wounded deer with a dog. Mississippi had a dog season years ago and it was a circus, people lined up on the sides of the county roads waiting for the deer to cross and then it was a free for all. Personally I'm glad those days are over, but that's just me.

Now running and baying hogs with dogs..............sign me up!
 
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Does a complete injustice to hunt deer that way in my opinion.
 
Some of you need to read a little Archibald Ruteledge. I have hunted whitetail with hounds in both Southeast Louisiana and the pan-handle of Florida. It was the traditional way to hunt deer in the Virginia and Carolina Low Country from well before the revolution. And before condemning it out of hand one might take a little hike in the “bays” below Charleston or a cypress swamp anywhere along the South’s coast to get a sense how difficult stand hunting can be in that environment.

That said, it is a dying tradition. Urban sprawl and deer leases are killing it. Dogs are being replaced by feeders and piles of corn. Properties large enough to run a pack of hounds are becoming very rare (neither the dogs nor the deer can read a map or a posted sign). Also, a gratifyingly larger number of hunters are more interested in quality than quantity - depending upon generous doe tags across much of the South to keep the freezer full.
 
I'm not opposed in principle to hunting deer with dogs; it's no different than running rabbits. However land size does not allow that on almost all properties nowadays and people just turn the dogs loose anyway. It's a giant mess.

If you try that stunt in a lot of places, you are going to have a couple less dogs wander their way home.
 
Agree that land size, packs of dogs and public mixed with private land can cause issues. And I imagine conflict can happen with land owners, hunters, etc. Also, I have never hunted deer with dogs. But I did live in Florida for about six years back in the 90’s and there were some areas that this type of hunting was tradition and common. But before we start taking sides on this one, I would remind all that some may not consider shooting game in Africa off a padded seat in the back of a truck with a rifle very sporting or just either. Same goes with fenced properties. Stay united my friends... our sports long term viability depends on this.
 
............... It was the traditional way to hunt deer in the Virginia and Carolina Low Country from well before the revolution. And before condemning it out of hand one might take a little hike in the “bays” below Charleston or a cypress swamp anywhere along the South’s coast to get a sense how difficult stand hunting can be in that environment.
....................


I happened upon a deer hunt with dogs in Virginia some time ago, while competing in a dog trial. It was interesting to experience the chase from a high vantage point. The deer was observed at 200 yards from me, flying by at the speed of an F-16, so far ahead of the dogs I thought it was just out for some exercise. Eventually the pack came along the deer's scent trail baying happily. I never saw a handler or hunter following.
I have no clue where any of the hunters were and never saw the results. I can only imagine the huge size of the land required to pull that hunt off, never mind the logistics.

You would not catch me in one of those swamps hunting a deer. I'm not tough enough. Being civilized and waiting on a hill for the deer to be presented does sound like a traditional hunt though.


I hope someone can help the OP.
 
I moved to north Louisiana when I was in high school in the mid 70s. My dad and I got in a hunting club that used dogs. It was interesting and fun for a few years, but also a lot of work and at times was sort of a Keystone Cops affair. It's almost more a social event than the quiet solitude most people seek by going into the woods and away from the rat race of work. I think dog hunting has been banned in the national forest lands in Louisiana, but the state still has a deer season, with or without dogs.

Here's an article on the subject:
https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_r...cle_c30d0eea-bd81-11e6-be11-0f85947c0c95.html
 
I grew up hunting deer with dogs and still love to hear a race. Some places are so thick it's hard to see deer without stirring them up some and most of the deer I've killed during dog season were not the ones the dogs were after.
 
This is a type of hunting that I have done my entire life. Ever since I was a little boy I have been “dog hunting” with my grandad, then on my on, and now with my own two kids. It is a traditional southern hunting style that couldn’t or wouldn’t work other places like it does here. It is also a type of hunting that just isn’t what people think. Most folks think that you release the dogs, and they just run bewildered deer everywhere to the slaughter. That is just not the case at all. Deer are not like foxes or hogs, the dogs can’t catch them, and believe me, hitting one running is far more sporting than using corn to bait one in at 100yds.

After WWII, the mechanization of farming made a ton more land available for farming, and subsequently made the deer habitat largely nonexistent. My granddad, his brothers, and others used dog out of necessity. They would go weeks without seeing a buck, does were off limits. As time past, less and less farming was done, and the deer habitat and population exploded.

Today, is a totally different atmosphere than even I as a teen remember. In 1994, our club killed 94 bucks and 6 does, and I only remember 3 pieces of property ~400 acres, that we could not hunt, for 60,000 acres. Today that this definitely not the case. Our land totals are 20%, our total hunt days are half, and kill numbers are more like 45 bucks to 55 does.

Today was the first day of our season that I went dog hunting with my boys, and I specifically told them to enjoy this now, because it will be gone most definitely sooner rather than later. We can hold on for 5-10-15 more years, but once it is gone, it won’t be back. The way of a lot of lost southern traditions.
 
@lil 2 sleepy so is this sort of hunting more of a club activity rather than a guided one?
 
It is a club activity. I have never heard of a guided dog hunt. You couldn’t guarantee a client an expectation of size. You can definitely choose what you want to shoot, but you can’t control when, where, or how with any degree.

I’ll go 10 trips and not have a chance at anything, and go another and have 20 come by.
 
Ok thank you very much for the info
 
In the mid 70s I worked for a while in Mississippi on the Grand Gulf Nuclear Plant. Some of the guys that worked for me hunted deer with hounds at their "Club." On the day of the hunt you were assigned a stand and expected to remain on it. If the deer happened to come your way perhaps you had a shot at it. BTW because of the close proximity of hunters it was shotguns only. Not my cup of tea, but while hunting there with my rifle I never saw a deer. Might I also add that there are Cotton Mouths and Timber Rattlers in the areas frequented by the deer. That fact was also mentioned by the guys that hunted with dogs.
 
It is a traditional way of hunting and hunters should support it even if they do not do it. Leave your judgements and condemnations somewhere else if you want to preserve the tradition of hunting. Otherwise, do not act as if your actions or club memberships to organizations trting to protect all legal hunting mean anything.

On a rather embarrasing side note: I relived this tradition last year when a walker lion hound puppy I had just aquired took of on a mule deer track when I waz a few miles in hiking to find a lion track...she needed a little electricity therapy. And when she came back, my older dogs looked at her like, "yeah, you'll only do that once in this pack."
 
Grew up doing this in GA and FL but we did it in a “controlled” manner, one large “head” of trees/thicket/swamp at a time. Lot of fun but takes discipline and I wouldn’t do it with newbies or people drinking, that’s for sure. More like pheasant hunting than feeder deer hunting.
 
Ruark’s “The Old Man and the Boy” has a chapter on hound hunting white tails and the boy making his first deer kill. It’s an old southern tradition that is still in practice in coastal Georgia. Down this way there is very limited public hunting and private lands are leased to hunting clubs which may or may not be hound hunting.

It isn’t my style of hunting but my main issue is hound hunters releasing their dogs on others’ properties to run the deer onto dog club properties. I also don’t care to eat venison that’s been run a few miles before being shot.
 
It is a traditional way of hunting and hunters should support it even if they do not do it. Leave your judgements and condemnations somewhere else if you want to preserve the tradition of hunting. Otherwise, do not act as if your actions or club memberships to organizations trting to protect all legal hunting mean anything.

I'm all for preserving traditional ways of hunting. When the time comes when a hunting method causes significantly more harm than good though, then putting an end to it is on the table imo. Ruining 250,000 hunters day to make 500 people happy is no bueno.

If a state wants to set aside a weekend in mid-january when all other deer hunting is over, then that's a consideration I suppose.
 
I'm all for preserving traditional ways of hunting. When the time comes when a hunting method causes significantly more harm than good though, then putting an end to it is on the table imo. Ruining 250,000 hunters day to make 500 people happy is no bueno.

If a state wants to set aside a weekend in mid-january when all other deer hunting is over, then that's a consideration I suppose.
I have no idea what you are talking about and clearly you have never been around a drive hunt. Exactly what quarter of a million hunters were adversely affected by a hound hunt? Where - precisely - did that take place?

The hunts only occur on properties large enough to support them. In all states that I am aware of where it is still practiced, it is absolutely illegal to run deer on property other than where you have permission - typically through ownership or lease. The sport is gradually dying because those sorts of properties or gradually vanishing. The big plantations are being broken up and timber and paper companies are finding it more profitable to lease more numerous smaller plots which can only be hunted effectively by stands.
 

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