Start tracking wounded deer at the hit site

By John Jeanneney

After a stretch of calls where we could not catch up to the deer, our luck has changed. Tommy and I have had three challenging finds in a row. Our find this morning confirms an important principle. Start at the hit site.

The 10 point buck was gut shot, and Dan, the hunter, had done an amazing job of tracking it a good quarter mile on very sparse blood. Finally he ran out any blood and backed off.  Dan didn't want Tommy and me to come and track at night in that god-awful swamp of bush and briars, so we scheduled the search for the following day. When we started, the scent line was 26 hours old.

Now the easy and attractive option would have been to avoid a quarter mile of brush and brambles by beginning at the point of loss. We could have driven right to it. But my 40 years of experience told me to begin at the hit site.  Then Tommy would gain a clear recognition of the buck's individual scent, while we had a few drops of blood to confirm that we were on the right line.

It took us about 40 minutes to work over the line tracked by Dan. It had taken Dan several hours. It was slow going in the thick stuff. When we finally came to the well-marked point of loss, there seemed to be no scent left. Tommy worked for 15 minutes through the deadfalls before he became positive on a scent line. He never would have been able to recognize and pick up this line, after that long check, if he hadn't memorized the scent over that first quarter mile.

We moved on wondering whether Tommy really had it. Then Dan found a drop of blood, and a few moments later Tommy found the buck, dead. Trust your dog! And start at the hit site.

John Jeanneney, a passionate tracker, recovers another wounded deer with his dachshund Tommy

John turned 80 years old in April, and I did not anticipate that he would be tracking this season. I should have known better! It seems that I tend to underestimate his drive and passion for tracking wounded game as this is what he lives for. The story was written by him and describes the track that ended with his 4th deer recovered this year. It was also his 302nd recovery through lifetime.

Brambles and grapevines are a great mix to keep an old man agile and active. The necessary dodging, ducking and crouching does more good than any workout at the gym. Each call I take is tougher than the last, but my legs get stronger to meet the challenge.

The call I took on Tuesday, November 11, taught me a few things. It was a big bow-shot buck, hit “too far back" at 8 AM. The hunter and his buddies had tracked it about a half mile. Then the blood sign ran out, and I was called in at 2:30 PM. There was plenty of scent, and it was no problem for Tommy to start and follow. After only a hundred yards we jumped the buck, and he made a tight circle in a thick swamp with a deep creek flowing through it. When you get wet, you stay cool.

And I was happy to see that the buck was staying close in thick stuff. He won't go far, I thought. Ha! After that tight loop, he lined out through the briars for over a mile. The creek meandered back and forth so that we could cool off several times. The steep clay slopes had me on my hands and knees coming out. I envied Tommy's four legs and claws.

We crossed a harvested corn field. ...no blood, but I could see the big splayed hoof prints on into a stretch of open hardwoods. Much easier going. Then we found a bed with a few smears of blood. But the buck was gone, and we tracked after him as fast as we could go, which wasn't very fast.

Now it was getting dark. The hunter and I agreed that we wouldn't catch up any time soon, and we had no lights with us. I marked the scent line as it came out of another creek, and we slopped our way out to a road where we were picked up.

Our plan was to pick up the line the next morning and track to the buck that should be dead or very weak. That was the plan, but what are plans in the passion of the hunt?

The next morning, as I was getting ready to leave for the track, the hunter called. He hadn’t been able to sleep, and he had worried about the coyotes. At 1:30 AM he had gone back to my marker and searched ahead for a 100 yards. There was the 10 point buck, dead.

Because I tracked it 1 1/2 miles without blood, I'm claiming it as a find for Tommy. But Tommy never got a chew.

This was John's 4th recovery this year and 302nd lifetime.

The other two pictures show deer recovered by John and Tommy in October.

Tommy works out a back track and recovers a great 10 pointer

by John Jeanneney

The hunter's phone call on this ten pointer was not too promising. He reported it as an 8 pointer that stopped bleeding pretty quickly from a pass-through. I couldn't be sure, one way or the other, that it was a "gettable" deer. So I took it. The line was 22 hours old.

The buck had back-tracked after it had stopped bleeding, but Tommy figured it out and took us a 100 yards though  thick stuff to the deer. When I saw that pale white antler sticking up, I thought it was a shed. But no, there was a big buck attached!

John Jeanneney and Tommy recover this really nice bow-shot buck in Slingerlands, NY

A nice 9 pointer recovered by John Jeanneney and his tracking dachshund Tommy

Yesterday John and Tommy found this nice 9 pointer in Rensselaerville, NY.  The line was only about 7 hours old, but there was no blood to verify. The hunter started John and Tommy in the wrong direction and it took them a while to pick up the right scent line.
 

John and his dachshund Tommy recover a nice bow-shot buck in East Berne, NY

Yesterday we had a good day in the woods. A friend of ours from East Berne, Jim Hens, shot a very nice buck a day before around 5 PM, a little too far back. Jim and his father followed some blood but when it started to be sparse, they backed out and called John. 

We started to track next day at 9:30 AM. Tommy, now 6.5 years old, is in his prime and a total pro. It was such a pleasure to watch him work. At one point when he was working on  a difficult check and we did not see any blood for a while I started to have some doubts. Well, five seconds later we saw a drop of blood. The total track was 600 yards and it took 30 minutes. There was no pulling, and a lot of tracking was done on a relaxed lead. The hunter got a lot of kisses from Tommy at the end of tracking. He was very happy as he would not have been able to find the buck without Tommy. John was very happy too.

For our area of New York State this is a very nice buck.

Jim Hens with his back recovered by Tommy.

Taking a good picture of Tommy was not easy as he insisted on kissing the hunter.

Tough track for John and Tommy ends in a successful recovery

by John Jeanneney

While my beloved monitor (that's Jolanta) was napping on the couch, I had a chance to sneak out on a deer call. With Tracking Dog Tommy on the seat beside me, we hit the road driving south. It sounded like a stomach shot, back in the "rear ribs", but you never know.

When we got to the hit site, thirty miles away, it was mid-afternoon, 23 hours after the deer had been shot. The woods were dry. At the Kleenex marking the first blood, which I couldn't see, Tommy's tail  said "Yes!" and he started off, slowly and carefully

Tommy saved the day. There was almost no blood, but he worked patiently, through one difficult check after another, for 500 yards. We had an audience of the  hunter and three others wondering why we saw only two tiny drops of blood over 500 yards. Could you trust a dog that much?

Then Tommy showed us  the buck lying in the thick stuff. He hadn't been dead long; the venison was still good and this time the  coyotes had missed their banquet. Tommy got his reward of deer heart, and Old John felt 20 years younger.

An Old Man Begins to Accept Reality

by John Jeanneney

Sunday was a busy day for Old Man John. In the morning Tommy and I went out on a call to track a buck that had been liver shot the day before. There was good evidence on the pass-through arrow, but almost no blood on the ground. After the first bed I saw no blood at all. Twice Tommy followed the same track out for 200 yards paralleling a high tension electric line . The buck crossed the line at some point, but we could never find the track. Very frustrating! And this sort of thing has happened to me before.  My theory is that the magnetic field generated by the high tension power line ionizes the scent particles, so that the dog can't scent them. We worked 4 hours through thick brush and clinging vines, and then gave up. I hate to quit.

At four I met Jolanta at the Beagle Club Pork Roast and got a few leftovers before heading back home to feed Tommy, and get the lights for the next call that was nearby. This time Old John was accompanied by Jolanta. On this call she expanded her role from companion to tracker-in-chief!

We started out on blood near the hit site, but there was very little of it considering that we were dealing with a wound by a two inch expandable that had passed though the guts and then one lung. Tommy got off on another line, and since I was moving pretty slowly on a steep hill Jolanta took over handling Tommy. After 200 yards we decided this couldn't be the right deer, and went back to known blood that we had marked.

This time Tommy got off on the right line that we could confirm by a few specks of blood. Within a 100 yards Jolanta  yelled, "Here he is!"  Jolanta handled beautifully, and I was very proud of her. I have to admit that I was a little ashamed of myself and my tired, cramping legs. I haven't prepared myself psychologically to be an Old Man.

It was very rewarding to see Jolanta glowing with happiness as she experienced the find. In the future we shall go on together. Very often I will be the one marking the line and carrying water for Tommy and Jolanta. 

                                     

Two Old Men in the Woods

by John Jeanneney

Yesterday  was the first day of our bow season and my first day of tracking at age 79. I have total confidence in my tracking dog Tommy, but I confess that I was a bit concerned about my own agility in  the woods. Jolanta was even more concerned and went along so that she could call in the EMS helicopter if necessary.

I was almost relieved when I met the hunter. He was slightly younger than I am, but in considerably worse  physical shape. I knew that no one was going to laugh at me in this situation. It turned out that he had brought along his own daughter/caregiver, who got along just fine with Jolanta.

Fortunately Tommy Tracker was the one who really had his act together. The start was complicated because there were no markers, and the hunter could not find any blood to verify the line. We ended up going  to the "point of loss", which is  not the ideal place to begin. Here there was  a confusing pattern of muscle blood that had been walked over by the hunter. Tommy figured the mess out and took a line. Blood... Blood.... Then a long stretch with no blood, but I could see that Tommy was confident. "Trust your dog."

The deer was a big doe, shot quartering away with a Rage expandable broadhead. We had hoped for a one-lunger at least, but had seen nothing but muscle blood. As you know, Rage broadheads have been know to deflect along a rib cage. The doe never laid down, but after a quarter mile in very dense cover, I could tell by Tommy's body language that he had jumped her. The hunter also found a drop of blood, which laid any doubts to rest.

We were on the line.

We pushed another 100 yards, and then all agreed that this big venison package was not "gettable". The hunter's family was in need of the meat, but we had to face reality. At least I could  face the reality of some fine dog work. This was enough for me and Tommy and Jolanta. We will help this hunter another day.

Muscle blood

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Update on Tommy

On Saturday Tommy was injured while he got away from John and followed a wounded buck. Today he had a surgery to repair his abdominal wall. His injuries proved to be more substantial than our vet initially had thought, and today Dr. Montario had to stitch through 5 layers of muscles. On the top of it, as it turned out, Tommy had a sharp plant piece stuck in his right eye, very far, almost behind his eye ball. Only when Tommy was sedated and his eyes thoroughly examined the problem was discovered. 

Tommy's recovery will take several weeks, and for the next two weeks he will be confined to a crate. We'll give him a lot of TLC, but I am sure he'd rather be tracking than staying in the house by a warm stove.

 

Tommy gets injured on Saturday while following a one-lung shot deer

Saturday was not a good day. John and Tommy went on a call to help a local hunter recover a lung-shot deer.  At one point John had to drop the tracking leash in heavy brush. He thought that he could recall Tommy, as he had done many times, but this time Tommy was hot on the deer. He was located two hours later tangled in goldenrod 400 meters farther on.

Tommy had already tracked two miles, but he was ready to go, and now three of us tracked another 1/2 mile through a big swamp. We finally quit when the deer swam across a big pond and water became to deep to follow. Actually Jolanta got stuck in the swamp up to her butt. We had smears of blood to verify the line right  until the end. But that's just the beginning.


This is the last leg of Saturday's track with Tommy. Tommy was found hung up in the brush around 4 pm where the yellow marker is, and we restarted him by the red marker. We found the first blood smear on the branch around 1/3 rd into this track leg. Now the swamp is not as big as it is pictured on this google map. Once we entered the swamp we started to see fresh blood smears on swamp grass. We terminated the track where the purple marker is. When we got back to the car people in the house by Rte 157A said that they had seen a deer running by from the swamp direction. This graphic was created by My Tracks, an app for Android phones.

On Monday we noticed a bulge on Tommy's right flank. It looked like a big hematoma, but we took him to our vets since he also had bad eye irritations. We wanted to be sure he did not have a scratched cornea. The eyes were not damaged, but the inner abdominal muscles had been torn and intestines were bulging out as in an umbilical hernia. Thee was no internal damage beyond this and no damage on the surface of his hide. We don't know exactly what happened, but probably he had an altercation with the buck during the time  that he was out of John's control. He was tough enough to keep tracking,  and we were unaware of his injury.

Another problem. We have a bitch that was brought in from southern Pennsylvania to be bred to Tommy. She is not quite ready yet, and we don't want to ask Tommy to breed her right after his surgery. So we must wait until Thursday, after the breedings, to have the damage to his abdominal wall repaired. Tommy does not seem to be in any pain, and he is eating well. But we are watching that hernia! He won't be able to track for 2-3 weeks following his surgery.

A perfect afternoon of deer tracking and photography

By John Jeanneney

On October 8  I had a call from a young college student at SUNY Cobleskill. He had bow shot a mature doe that morning and had tracked it about 300 yards to a lawn behind the house of the property owner. He was "pretty sure" that the deer had turned back up into the woods, but he couldn't find any more blood.

It was a beautiful fall afternoon when Jolanta, Tommy and I met the hunter and drove to his hunting  area which was about 25 miles from where we live in Berne. Jolanta had her camera and was ready to shoot anything, dog, deer or landscape that might present  a photo op.

I like to start at the hit site, but since we had good blood much closer, Tommy and I started up in the woods about 50 yards  from the point of loss at the  lawn where the doe was supposed to have turned back. Tommy locked in on the scent  line, and when we came to the lawn he did not hesitate. 

Out across the lawn he went, across a road, and then we had to stop to get permission to continue. A 100 yards  of lawn stretched out ahead. No visible blood and the scent line was ten hours old on closely mowed grass. How could Tommy track with such ease in  such a situation? Was he making it up?

We were reassured when we got down into the brushy woods and  saw blood. No problem. Tommy went another 150 yards to the dead doe. Meanwhile, Jolanta's camera was constantly at work. You  see the results here.

 

A good ending!

When the recovered was being dressed Tommy had to be tied to a tree on a light chain. In the past he chewed through many plastic leashed in similar situations

We gutted the doe and the hunter dragged it up the hill and across the expanse of lawns. Jolanta took more photos in the beautiful, late afternoon light.

When Jolanta posted the landscape photos on a Facebook group for Hilltowners that evening, a comment soon came in,  "Hey, that photo was taken in front of my house."

The next day another message came in from the same man. "Did you find the deer? Was just wondering because one of my Labs brought me home a wonderful gift this morning: the mammary glands that had been cut out of a doe. Hahaha... I had to laugh, especially after seeing your photo and knowing the story behind it"

What a small world!

From a goofy puppy to an accomplished tracker: Happy 5th Birthday Tommy!

Today Tommy has turned five years old. He has undergone amazing transformation from a very goofy puppy to an accomplished mature tracker. To read more about Tommy go to http://www.born-to-track.com/dogs/tommy.htm. To see his pictures click here.

Happy Birthday Tommy!

Sportsman's Dinner provides an opportunity to educate hunters about the use of leashed tracking dogs

The picture is supposed to catch your attention :) It was taken on October 21, 2010, and it was Tommy's first "real" deer that we found for a local hunter Dan Hardin. 

Since then Dan has become a good friend, and our Keena has fallen in love with him. Now Dan has his own tracking license, and Keena has become his tracking partner. 

On MARCH 16 Dan and John Jeanneney will be giving a PowerPoint talk with video in conjunction with the Sportsman’s Dinner at the Westerlo Baptist Church. There will be two presentations: 2:00 and 4:30 PM. Dan and John will be talking about the ethical importance and also the adventure of using leashed tracking dogs to locate wounded deer and bear that would not be found by eyetracking. The address is 618 State Route 143, Westerlo, NY 12193. Call Terri for tickets at 518-797-5126.

 

 

Our plans for two litters of puppies in 2013

In 2011 we had only one litter (Moose by Paika), which produced five "S" puppies. In 2012 we repeated the breeding and had four "T" puppies. It looks like the 2013 spring and summer will be much busier with two litters of puppies we are planning to have.

The above pictures show our FC Mielikki Raptor who came in heat on February 26 and will be bred around March 9. The sire of this litter is going to be our FC Sky von Moosbach-Zuzelek. We are very excited about this breeding as in our opinion these two young dogs are going to be a very good match. This is going to be a complete outcross, and all puppies should be wirehairs as Mielikki carries two copies of the gene for the wirehaired coat.

Our second litter this year - FC Tom vom Linteler-Forst, SchwhK by FC Keena von Moosbach-Zuzelek is also going to be a complete outcross and should produce exclusively wirehaired puppies. This is going to be Keena's last litter (Sky is her grandson).

We don't know how many puppies we are going to have. Both females come from very fertile lines but you never know an outcome in advance. We decided to take "only" 10 deposits (we have them - thank you!), and then have a reserve waiting list in case we have more than 10 puppies. We still have some room on the reserve list. We also know of several litters that other breeders are going to have this spring/summer and will be happy to refer you to them. For more info contact us at info@born-to-track.com .

Last recovery of the 2012 season: Tommy and John find a nice buck

Yesterday was our last day of deer hunting season. On Sunday John and Tommy recovered their 12th deer, and John reported:

This call offered a lot of excitement for the three hunters present. Certainly it was good exercise and a challenge for the old man handling Tommy, his young tracking dog. The ten pointer had been shot in the hip with a muzzle-loader, and we were able to shorten his suffering from days down to a few hours.
 
For Tommy it was a relatively fresh and easy track, although the buck left almost no blood as he traveled 700 yards from the hunter’s point of loss. It was where he traveled that amazed the hunters and even me. Tommy led us down a steep ravine, through a creek and up the other side, not once but three times. We were grabbing trees and roots to keep from tumbling down to the rocks and water below. The terrain was best for four legged critters like Tommy. The buck, with only three legs was truly amazing. It was not a place for poor two-legged humans.
 
I really enjoyed hearing the hunters marvel over Tommy every time he found another drop of blood in an improbable place. Then I saw the glowing eyes and yelled “There he is!” The buck could go no farther.
 
How the hunters got the buck up out of that deep gorge can only be explained by adrenaline and an easing of the force of gravity. We arrived appropriately enough in a cemetery where a farmer friend gathered us all up in his pick-up. He drove us back, with the buck, to our own vehicles. I was very glad we didn’t have to walk.

****

 

BTW, this year Tommy got to track John's own deer. Even though it was a perfect shot placement, the deer went 400 yards without leaving any blood at all. We would not be able to find this deer without a tracking dog. Young dogs such as Tuesday and Mielikki got an opportunity to get a good chew.

 

 

A gut-shot buck recovered by John and Tommy in Berne

On November 21 John and Tommy recovered a gut-shot deer in Berne. It was around 0.5 mile track. At the beginning it was not obvious that the deer was gut-shot. There was a stretch of no-blood, and later every few yards or so there was a small speck. Tommy jumped a deer, and followed it well. John had to dispatch the buck at the end of the trail, which was around 6 hours old. This was 10th recovery for the team.

Tommy finds a wounded deer with a broken leg

This was Tommy's recovery #9. The line was 16 hours old, and the deer had its hind leg broken above the hock. Tommy cold trailed the buck for 300 yards in very thick brush, jumped the deer and took it 250 yards to where Doug, the hunter, could finish it. John was very pleased with Tommy's work.

The picture shows John and our friend Michael Relyea, who is the hunter's nephew.

Michael Relyea is holding Tommy. To the right Doug, Michael's uncle.

Being in the woods is a good therapy

A big thank you to all for your support, encouragement and offer to help with Joeri. Yesterday he was worse than on Thursday, his hind legs completely immobile, his bladder had to be expressed. So far he has not responded to the meds: high dose of prednisone, tramadol, methocarbamol, pepcid. But his tail is still wagging. He has an appointment on Wednesday for acupuncture. We are going to give him some time and see what happens. Today he has a better appetite and his eyes look brighter. He is a hunting dog through and through, and for him to spend the rest of life paralyzed, in a cart, is just not an option. 

Today we were in the woods and it has helped both of us. John was tracking and I was hunting. John found his buck, and I shot a doe. All in all today was a better day than Friday.

Tommy found this nice 8-pointer in Cairo, NY

John was prouder of me than I was. While he was tracking in Cairo, I was hunting. I actually managed to stalk this doe, so now we will have some venison for the freezer.

John and Tommy recover a stomach-shot deer at the edge of big swamp

John handled Tommy to his 7th recovery in Malta, NY. He has reported: Stomach shot deer are usually easy to find, but I had my doubts about this one. The line was 22 hour old; the leaves at the start were very dry, and I could not see any blood. For the first 200 yards Tommy strolled nonchalantly along a ridge overlooking a large, deep marsh. Then the hunter spotted a fleck of blood and I relaxed. In another 100 yards Tommy veered down off the ridge, skirted the marsh and then turned abruptly into it. The hunter was carrying chest waders for good reason, but Tommy and I were not as well equipped. We were tracking now in muck and reeds, but the deep water was still 50 yards ahead. Tommy is a good swimmer, and I used to be good. Oh well! Oh hell! And then Tommy grabbed the butt of the deer.

John and Tommy track and find a wounded deer in the thicket

John's report on the November 1 track says:

 

This 184 pound buck was bowshot the previous afternoon. The broadhead hit near the edge of one lung, then through the diaphragm and through a lobe of the liver, through the stomach and out. The hunter tracked it about 200 yards with decent blood and into a very dense thicket, the kind that requires clipping vines and briars to get make progress. The hunter ran out of line about 50 yards into the thicket, but did he mark the blood that he saw well.

 

Tommy and I tracked from the hit site 21 hours after the shot. We went into the thicket and to the dead end of the trail.. Tommy worked around at the point of loss, and then worked what was apparently a back track for about 50 yards to a spot of blood in a new direction.

 

There was not casting around for the new line. I was on my hands and knees or cutting vines most of the way. Once we were on the new line it was easy for Tommy. More beds and vines to cut for 200 yards, and then there was the deer dead. Not much of a rack, but the photo does not do justice to the size of the body. This was Tommy's 6th recovery of the season.

 

John and Tommy at the end of successful track.