Thor tracks and recovers a liver-hit buck 4 days after the shot

By Bob Yax

        

Just got back from a cold rainy day (Wednesday) of tracking.  This afternoon I had to shoot a 12pt non-typical 18 hours after the hit, and that wasn’t the most interesting track of the day!  

The track we started this morning at 9:00 has a long backstory.  The Hunter, Charlie, had hit a big buck this past Saturday morning (11/5) at 9:30.  He thought his arrow had entered low in the ribs, about 6 inches back of the front leg on the right side.  The white hair at the hit site indicated that the exit was near the bottom of the deer. Being pretty new to bowhunting, he waited about 1.5 hours to begin tracking.  He and his hunting friend tracked the deer about 300 yards, when they jumped it.   They then backed out for about an hour and continued tracking a dwindling blood trail.  After several hundred more yards, they jumped it again.  Finally, after about 3 hours of tracking, they jumped it a 3^rd time and then tracked it a few hundred more yards to the last blood sign at the edge of a golf course, on a cart path.  At this point they’d tracked about ¾ of a mile.  After the cart path, the buck headed across a fairway and then along the woods on the other side.  Charlie was able to track the buck’s hoof prints in the soft dirt.  About 100 yards past the cart path, they lost all signs of the buck.  From that point on, Charlie and his hunting friend grid searched the woods on that side of the fairway for another hour to no avail.

         

Two days later, on Monday 11/7 at 8:30 am, Charlie called into Deer Search asking for help.  The rut in our area, as well as cross bow hunting began this weekend.  As a result, we had 30 to 40 calls waiting in our system.  We don’t have the manpower to handle all those calls, so on Monday evening I began deleting calls older than 36 hours and then calling those hunters back to say sorry and to discuss their hits.  Charlie hunts in an area far from most of our trackers and it was now 59 hours after the hit, so I deleted his call and then called him.  After hearing the story of his hit and track (jumping the buck 3x) it certainly sounded like a liver hit.  It went a long way between beds, but it was being pushed.  I knew the deer was dead, and Charlie made it clear how much he wanted to recover it, his best buck to date.  I thought that a body search, to smell the dead deer might have a chance of working – but they usually don’t!   I told Charlie, that I might be in his area on Tuesday and that I might want to give it a try.  Well, Tuesday didn’t work out, but I did catch a call for Wednesday that would be nearby.  Charlie and I traded a bunch of text messages Tuesday night, and he even emailed me a Google Maps photo of the area with his deer track marked on it.   At that point I didn’t realize that the track so far, was ¾ mile long.     The photo showed that the area was very large with diverse vegetation.  I agreed to meet up with him on Wednesday morning at 9 am – 4 days after the hit.  From Saturday thru Tuesday it had been sunny, warm (65deg) and breezy, but Tuesday evening and Wednesday AM the forecast was for rain.  Sure enough it started raining about 9 pm Tuesday evening.  At that time, the thought hit me that with this moisture, Thor might actually be able to follow the 4 day old track! 

      

Wednesday morning, as I made the 60-mile drive to Hume, Allegany County, the rain was pretty heavy, but luckily just about stopped as I met up with Charlie.  After doing our paper work, Charlie showed me his arrow & Rage 2 blade broad head.  The arrow and fletching showed not much blood, and the first 10 inches had a coating of white fat / suet on it.  Likely from passing thru the fat on the bottom of the chest. I decided we should start the track at the hit site in the hope that Thor could actually pick up and carry the track beyond where the hunters had lost it.  I started Thor where we thought the hit occurred and headed off in the direction the buck went.  I never saw any blood, but Charlie convinced me that Thor seemed to be going the right way.  After a short time, I was convinced that Thor did have the track.  

To make a long story shorter, for about the next hour, we followed Thor down what seemed to be the right track through the mixed hardwoods.  On 3 or 4 occasions along the way, Thor got into a circling pattern 30 or 40 yards in diameter, obviously trying to figure out which direction the buck went after it stopped and circled.  Once we got to within about 200 yards of the golf course, Thor got stuck in a circling pattern for about 15 minutes. He was working hard, but couldn’t get out of it. It could have been the Hunters bloody boots that complicated that area.  The 3^rd bed was ahead in the thick brush between us and the golf course.  We were now about an hour into the track and still hadn’t gotten to where the hunters had lost the track.  At that point, I asked Charlie to take us to the last sign of blood at the edge of the golf course, 200 yards ahead.  Soon we were at the cart path where the buck came out of the woods. Still in the path, was a dime sized blood clot.  The 1^st blood I’d seen so far.   Thor caught the scent again and headed off hard across the fairway towards another woodlot.   A short time later, Charlie confirmed that Thor was on the path of hoof prints in the fairway that they had followed 4 days earlier.  75 yards further along the edge of the fairway and we were now at the point where Charlie lost the trail for good.  At that point, Charlie and his friend went on to search the woods on that side of the fairway, and the woods beyond.  Now I was hoping / praying that Thor would take us in a totally new direction.  Soon after, he was in the middle of the fairway, heading back across towards the cart path and woods beyond.  Yes! Charlie, had never searched in this area.  It was totally clean and Thor was heading hard into it. That buck should be lying, dead ahead within a few hundred yards.  So, I hoped!  

Well, we continued into the new section of woods for another 200 yards with Thor seemingly, still on the trail – I sure thought so.   Then, just as I was beginning to doubt him (I shouldn’t do that!) I spotted what I thought was a blood spot on a wet leaf.  I stopped and dabbed it with a white paper towel – BLOOD!   The last blood sign I’d see on this entire track.    A short time later, Thor was in his 4^th or 5^th area of circling.  I stood by for 5 minutes trying to be patient – it’s hard!  Finally, he was off on another 200 yard line thru the woods.  I expected to see the dead Buck ahead of us at any moment.  We’d been in this woods for at least 400 yards, the buck should have bedded by now.   After another 100 yards we were at the corner of the woods and a clover field.  Here, Thor spent at least 10 minutes circling a 30-yard diameter area in the woods.  This is torture!    Multiple times, he would seem to head off on a line out of the area, only to come circling back!  In our early tracking days, I couldn’t take it, and would pull him off in a direction I wanted to go.  Now, I’ve learned that he almost always figures it out, if I give him the time he needs. Finally, Thor headed into the clover field and then took a good straight line, for about 100 yards, across it to the woods beyond.    He quickly got thru the woods and then we headed into a large thick brushy basin.  We were now more than a half mile beyond the last bed, with no sign of the deer.  I began to have my doubts, but Thor was still determined as we headed down the narrow deer trails in the dense brush.  After a 200-yard arch thru the brush, Thor’s nose was suddenly up, scenting hard.  10 yards later I caught a whiff and a few yards later I saw half a rack poking out of the weeds ahead – we had him!!!  The buck was a big 6Pt, and the shot was just about where Charlie thought.  The broad head looked to hit the bottom of the liver.  Unfortunately, after 4 days, only the rack was salvageable.  But that, and the track it took to find him, will provide memories of this Buck well into the future…  Photo below shows Charlie and his Buck.  Map shows total track route.  Red portion is where Charlie tracked the Buck,   Thor tracked the entire route.  I learn more and am amazed more every day!

Bob and Thor track and find three deer in one day

Thor von Moosbach-Zuzelek, a brother to our Tuesday and Darren Doran's Theo, has had a great tracking season so far. He helped hunters to recover their deer that otherwise would go to waste or feed coyotes. This is what happened today, in Bob Yax's words:

After breaking my streak of Birthday recoveries yesterday, I was ready for some success today. Boy, did we get it! 3 recoveries on 3 tracks that were all hit yesterday and sat overnight in the heavy rains. Thor was awesome today... relentless on every track.

Track 1 was in Romulus. I started it yesterday afternoon thinking it was a liver hit. We then postponed it till today when I saw only intestine matter on the arrow. The arrows level / broadside path could have not have hit liver and intestine so we needed to wait overnight. Yesterday there was no blood found on the 1st 20 yds of the trail. That's as far as the hunter tracked it. This morning just as the rain was ending we took up the trail - 0 blood was seen, but Thor took off hard down the trail. To our surprise, we found the buck dead 100 yds from the stand. Autopsy showed arrow deflected (off a branch) down thru the back strap, lung, liver, stomach and came out the intestines. The 9pt was likely dead after 5 or 6 hours. We found it at the 24hr mark and it was still good, likely due to the heavy cool rain.

Track 2 was in Pavilion. Hunter wasn't sure what he hit on the big buck, but he had a pass thru with only blood on the arrow (no guts). Yesterday, he and his wife tracked it for hours over a mile till the blood petered out. We started the track 29 hrs after the hit. The arrow look almost clean to me, maybe from skidding thru very wet clover? Over the next 30 min we covered the mile long trail with 0 visible blood again. We did go right past 3 markers the hunter left along the buck’s path. That is always reassuring! Finally we hit a railroad track where they had stopped tracking yesterday. The thick brush on the other side was a promising place for the buck to bed. Thor headed down a trail into the brush, then came out into a clearing in the swampy woods. About 50 yds later his head was up scenting the air hard - was the buck nearby? - yes! It was laying in the open wood 40 yds ahead. It looked dead, but it was laying straight up on its belly with its chin on the ground and antlers up? Thor was barking like crazy! I had the hunter hold Thor's leash as I slowly approached the buck. Soon I was 15ft from it and it was still motionless. Just when I was sure it was dead, it blinked and took off running. I got my 20ga up and shot when it was going away at 30 yds. It tumbled into one of the big puddles then ended up lying head up in the woods 40 yds ahead. My hit to the back knee put it down, but it was still trying to get up. Too long story short - 2 more shots finished it! (this included an "ammo run" to get a 3rd slug!) It was a Big 10pt. The Hunters shot passed thru the top of the lungs just under the shoulder blades. PS, it was a 4 blade Muzzy. This was the 1st marginal lung shot we've ever recovered, and it wasn't easy...

Track 3 was in Dansville. Hunter said that yesterday he hit the buck broadside and far back. He saw stomach contents on a tree. The arrow showed me only intestine contents, but I did find stomach matter on the tree. Yesterday the hunter tracked it (pushed it!) about 175 yds with a little blood, he then backed out. We started on the track 23 hrs after the hit, again no blood was visible (dam rain!). Thor again got hot on the trail and was soon passing the hunters backpack that he left where he backed out. About 300 yds later, Thor again had his nose high in the air looking for the Buck. We then saw it dead, 50 yds ahead. The 8pt was very fresh, no rigor. It had only been dead a few hours. The entrance wound was halfway back and about 6 inches from the bottom of the deer. It hit Stomach and exited out the intestines. A day that started with driving in the pouring rain, turned into our best tracking day ever. Tracking conditions were great, damp and cool, and Thor was really on his game. The heavy rain that washed away all blood sign probably helped us.

A long track for Darren Doran and his dachshund Theo leads to successful recovery

A big thank you to Darren Doran who wrote this report a week ago. Following Monday he had a rotator cuff surgery. The surgery went well and Darren is recovering home. Darren's tracking partner is Theo (FC Theo von Moosbach-Zuzelek).

A hunter called about a deer he hit on Friday morning, October 21, about 7:30 am. At the hit the deer walked off about 60 yards and lay down. The hunter thought that the deer was going to die right there. After about 20 minutes the deer got up and slowly walked away. The hunter stayed in the stand for a while, then climbed down and snuck out. He came back around noon to check the arrow and look for the deer. During this time it had rained heavily and was threatening the rest of the day.

When the hunter checked his arrow he smelled gut on it and saw white hairs on the ground. Despite the rain, there was a substantial amount of blood in the bed. He began to track the deer and eventually lost the blood alongside the creek. The hunter looked me up on the UBNJ web site and called me. It turns out that the hunter was a new resident to the town I work for and was hunting right out of his back yard.

At this point I would like to say that this swamp buck was a mature deer over 3 ½ years old. I have seen this behavior in this age class of a buck many times. At the hit the deer doesn’t run or panic. They don’t elevate their blood pressure by running, and by bedding quickly they slow their blood loss. With the onset of the rut, this type of buck with this type of hit can be very hard to kill and recover.

I made arrangements to meet the hunter after work and I was at his house by 4 p.m., 8½ hours after the shot. We went to the hit site and I got Theo ready. The arrow had a slight gut smell and the white hair was there just as the hunter had said. I started Theo and he took the track and ended up in the wound bed. I could see good blood indicating it was a liver hit. Theo tracked to the creek to where the hunter had quit and began searching. He kept going up and down the bank and then just jumped in and swam to the other side. The creek was about 15 feet wide and I just kept feeding out my lead. Theo got to the other side and after a quick check started up a little draw away from the bank. 

It looked like we were going to get wet. The creek was mid-thigh deep and a little chilly but had a pretty good bottom. We got across quickly and tracked along the top of the creek to an ox bow. Theo started down towards the creek again and stopped on a log that was in the water. He was stretching out and sniffing but hadn’t committed to taking the plunge. The creek was deep here but not wide and if we went in we were going to have to swim.

Theo came back up to the top and began searching the bank. All of a sudden he took a line right over our track in. The deer had back tracked. He bedded high on the creek bend with the deep water at his back looking over his back trail where he crossed the creek the first time. It’s quite possible that the deer saw or heard the hunter from this vantage point looking for him earlier in the day.

Theo then tracked out of the flood plain and up to higher ground. I hadn’t seen any blood since the bed at the creek and we were heading right for a housing development in the neighboring municipality. Theo was tracking right behind the backyards of the houses and I was praying that the deer stayed in the woods. All of a sudden Theo’s tempo picked up and the hunter said he saw a deer get up and go to the right. Theo was really excited and tracking left towards the road. I just held back on the lead and let him settle a bit. It was obvious that there was more than one deer here and they left in different directions. Theo took a line that was straighter, and the hunter said that the deer went right. I asked him to stand by and wait. When I saw a small drop of fresh blood 30 yards later I knew he had the right deer. I went about another 30 yards, found another spot of blood and called up the hunter. Theo was tracking towards a mowed retention basin behind the houses and he was pulling hard. I planned to track up to the edge and look across and check for the deer. The basin was about 125 yards wide and there was no dead deer in it. I pulled Theo back and it was time to discuss our strategy with the hunter.

I was afraid to push the deer because of the houses. I’ve lost big deer to the developments before and did not want it to happen now. I laid out our options. We could continue and risk losing him in the development, we could come back around midnight and re-start, or we could take our chances with the rain and start in the morning. I reassured hunter that Theo could track after a rain and it wouldn’t be a problem, but I didn’t realize how much we were going to get.

We decided to resume tracking in the morning. It had poured over night and was raining hard in the morning. I sent a text to the hunter to make sure that were still on and he said yes. I was a little apprehensive about tracking to the deer but felt confident that if it stayed in the woods we could find him. I picked up the hunter and we started at the first creek crossing. I swear when Theo saw the hunter he knew we were going to finish what we started. 

I brought Hip Boots for the crossing and just made it. Theo swam across and was dragging he short lead following the exact same track to where we stopped yesterday. I hooked up Theo about 50 yards from the edge of the basin and started. He ran down yesterday’s line and into the basin and began searching his way across.

At the other side he began checking runs. I was really hoping to find the deer just inside the edge but it didn’t happen. We had the wind in our face,a and I was sweeping Theo in a search mode from the houses to our side of the creek in an effort to pick up the trail of the deer or air scent a body. Theo was working nicely through the thick green briars and brush and we went about another 500 yards sweeping through the bottom without any luck. Now the plan was to work the creek back and have Theo check the runs leading up to a crossing. We had gotten about 150 yards from the retention basin when Theo started sniffing the briars while standing up on his hind legs. When he does this it usually means he’s confirming the scent of our deer or has caught a piece of familiar scent. Theo started to take this run towards the creek and worked down to the bank and was looking across the water. I happened to look downstream and there was the deer floating in the middle of the creek stuck against a fallen tree. As soon as I saw him I shouted out my favorite saying “I gottem”. The hunter came running over and because of the briars and the creek bank he couldn’t see him. He said “where, where “. I said "he’s in the creek, you got him".

Theo got him!

By now Theo had seen him and was swimming over to him. He climbed up on the deer and began to pull out his hair. I waded out and dragged the deer back to the bank. The deer died about 100 yards behind the hunter's stand and looked like it was headed back to where it had come from. We had a heck of a celebration, and I was genuinely happy for this hunter. He was a good guy and I’m glad we could find his deer. The deer was hit low in the liver and because of the way it acted after the hit, it lived a long time.

This kind of track makes believers out of hunters and legends out of tracking dogs. This may be my last track this season and if so it was a great one. Theo is still learning and getting better every time we track. We have developed into a team that knows what to do to get the job done. I love working this dog and finding deer with him.

Darren and Theo at the end of successful track

Blood Tracking Dogs and Snow

Alain Ridel, who lives  at Mont Carmel between the St Lawrence River and the State of Maine, is a long time tracker with a brilliant wirehaired dachshund that he imported from France as a puppy. He has been an active in the Quebec handlers association, ACCSQ,  and he is also a member of UBT.

Alain's specialty  is tracking wounded moose, but he also tracks whitetails. This story supports our American ideas about tracking a scent line under snow cover. However, we would all agree that it is a major achievement to track a wounded deer when six inches of snow have fallen on the line.

By Alain Ridel 

Is it possible for  a blood tracking dog, especially a dachshund, to find a deer after a good snow fall? The answer is YES.

My dog Théo, who is six and a half years old, proved this to me on November 3, 2014. I had already taken several deer calls with Théo after a good snowfall, but we had never been able to recover the animal, and this left me with doubts about the capability of a dog to follow and find a wounded big game animal in the snow.

Monday, November 3 at 11:15 AM, I got a call to track a deer that had been shot the previous day at 3 PM. The hunters had waited an hour, and then they had taken off to track their game. Unfortunately they jumped him  at 180 meters from the hit site, and because darkness was coming (it's dark at 4:30) they decided to wait until the next day despite the fact that snow was predicted overnight.

Tuesday morning, when they woke up, six inches of snow had fallen. In spite of this, they decided to go back to the woods in order to find the deer. They had found blood and  also stomach contents in the bed where they had jumped the deer. Despite three hours of searching by three people, they had found no sign of this wounded deer. There were only numerous tracks in the snow made by other deer that had roamed around all night long. They decided to call me. So I found myself out in the woods in a six inch+ layer of snow, and I was there to find a deer that had been wounded nearly 24 hours earlier.

When I started Théo at the hit site, the only place that the hunters had marked, he stuck his nose, and practically his whole head, down into the snow; after several minutes he took off on scent line, which only he could figure out because there was no visual sign that I could use to confirm that he was on the right line. But as usual when we tracked together, I accepted the fact that Théo is better in these matters than I am, and I had full confidence in him.

Obviously this search took place without much of a track to follow, but at every bit of remaining   scent, I could read my dog like a book. He would enthusiastically plunge his head down into the snow, and as I followed  10 meters behind, I could hear him breathing in the scent of that deer.

The first 180 meters to the deer's bed, from which he had been jumped the day before, took 25 minutes.  Théo showed the bed to me as he scraped down to the ground where blood and stomach contents were still visible. Two other times he dug down to the earth and showed me blood on the soil that he had uncovered. With the  snow often coming up to his chest, Théo  also had to contend with fresh deer tracks everywhere, but he was never  distracted and never left his line. The area was also tracked up by the hunters, who had searched, but that did not bother him either.

After an hour and 55 minutes, he found the buck dead, half buried in snow, on the edge of a lake. He had traveled 1,315 meters.

Summary

The search took place 24 hours after the shot.

There was more than six inches of snow.

The temperature was -8 Celsius,  17.6 Fahrenheit.

There were numerous  deer tracks in the snow.

The search lasted for an hour an 55 minutes.

French version: Les Chiens de Sang et la Neige?

Est-il possible à un chien de sang et, particulièrement à un teckel de retrouver un chevreuil  après une bonne chute de neige?

La réponse est : OUI

Mon chien Théo, âgé de 6 ans et demi m’en a fourni la preuve le lundi  le 3 novembre 2014.  J’avais déjà effectué plusieurs recherches avec Théo après une chute de neige abondante mais, nous n’avions jamais pu récupérer l’animal blessé, ce qui me laissait un doute sur la capacité d’un chien de sang à suivre et retrouver un gibier blessé dans la neige.

Lundi, le 3 novembre, à 11h15 , le téléphone sonne pour une recherche sur un chevreuil qui a été tiré le dimanche, 2 novembre à 15h., les chasseurs ont attendu une heure, puis sont partis a la recherche de leur gibier.  Malheureusement, ils l’ont relevé à 180 mètres de l’anchuss et comme la nuit allait tombée (il fait nuit à 16h30), ils ont décidé d’attendre le lendemain pour poursuivre leur recherche malgré  de la neige annoncée pour la nuit.

Lundi matin à leur réveil, il avait tombé 6 pouces (15cm) de neige, malgré cela, ils ont décidé de retourner en forêt pour essayer de retrouver ce chevreuil car, sur la couche du cerf relevé le soir d’avant, ils avaient trouvé à part du sang, du fumier de panse.  Malgré 3heures  de recherches à 3 personnes, ils n’avaient vu aucun indice de ce chevreuil blessé à part de nombreuses pistes dans la neige de chevreuils qui avaient voyagé toute la nuit. Ils ont donc décidé de m’appeler, et je me suis retrouvé  en pleine forêt avec une couche de neige de + 6 pouces  à la recherche d’un chevreuil qui avait été blessé il y avait presque 24h00.

Suite à la dépose de Théo à l’anchuss (seul endroit de la recherche que les chasseurs avaient marqué) celui-ci commença en mettant son museau et pratiquement toute la tête dans la neige, et au bout de quelques minutes il parti clairement sur une voie qu’il était seul à comprendre car il n’y avait aucun indice visuel pour nous confirmer qu’il était sur la bonne voie, mais comme en recherche, je pars du principe que Théo est meilleur que moi, je lui aie fait entièrement confiance

Évidemment, cette recherche  c’est déroulée avec beaucoup de perte de  voie, mais à chaque fois je lisais mon chien comme un livre ouvert et celui-ci replongeait gaiement la tête dans la neige, et nous qui étions à une dizaine de mètres (30 pieds) derrière lui, nous l’entendions inspirer tous les sentiments de ce chevreuil,

Le premier 180 mètres jusqu’à la couche où le chevreuil avait été relevé le jour d’avant a été atteinte en 25 minutes et Théo nous l’a montré en grattant la neige jusqu’au niveau de la terre où le sang et le fumier du chevreuil se trouvaient encore.  Deux autres fois (drapeau rouge) il creusa la neige et à chaque fois il y avait du sang sur le sol découvert.  Avec de la neige souvent plus haute que ses pattes, des pistes de chevreuils fraîches (Théo n’a jamais pris un change) de nombreuses traces de pas (les chasseurs dans leur recherche) ,   il retrouva ce cerf mort sur le bord d’un lac à moitié enseveli par la neige au bout de 1h55 de travail sur une distance de 1315 mètres.

Pour résumer la recherche :

-    - recherche effectuée 24heures après le tir,
-+ de 6 pouces  de neige au sol,   
- température de -8 degré,
- nombreuses pistes de chevreuils dans la neige,
- durée de la recherche  1H 55 minutes .                                            
  

It looks like a White Christmas this year in the Helderbergs

This picture was taken on the night of December 9. Then it snowed pretty much for two days.

This is a view from our field onto a barn and dog yard. While it is a beautiful picture, it also brings back a memory of all the inconveniences of winter in the country: being snowed in and feeling isolated, a need to get a long driveway plowed, a dog yard filled with snow etc etc.

These two pictures were taken after a sunset, without a flash or tripod. The ISO setting was 20000.

Young dogs love to play in the snow. This picture shows Luna and Volt having a lot of fun for as long as it is not too cold!

A very tough winter for all of us in the Helderbergs

This is one of the toughest winters that I remember in the 15 years we have lived here. Snowfall is almost double of what we had last year. It has been cold, and today is an exception with temperature above freezing. It will dip much lower tomorrow again. Wildlife has been suffering.

The picture below shows "our" deer a month ago, and they looked in a really good shape. Actually this winter we have seen more deer on our property than ever before. They feed in large groups on the browse at the edge of the field. One morning we saw 20 deer there, and our neighbor reported seeing 30. They come to his bird feeders and try to to eat sunflower seeds.

February 12 - deer looked in a good shape.

Few days ago we had yet another winter storm, which left a glaze of ice everywhere. It stayed on for two days. This is when I took the three pictures posted below. It sure looked beautiful, especially in the sun, with trees sparkling as they were decorated with Christmas lights, but deer were not able to feed at all.

Brunches were covered with ice, and deer stayed hungry.

Deer lost a lot of weight. Some of them (not the one in the picture) look really thin.

Craig Dougherty, our friend and outdoor writer, wrote this article for the Outdoor Life blog two days ago. "As I write this, western New York is cleaning up from yet another winter storm. My whitetails may be in trouble. I’m not sure they can take another hit this late in the season. We began to sound winter deer alerts more than a month ago as the winter weather continued to intensify and spring seemed but a distant fantasy. Sadly, not much has changed since then. Most mature does entered winter with a 90-day supply of fat reserves, but those reserves are running dangerously low. It may be the middle of March, but the thermometer is still saying winter. Most Northern areas are well into what the Winter Severity Index (WSI) refers to as “severe” to “very severe” winter conditions."

We see a lot of wildlife activity on our driveway. I wonder how many different tracks you can see here.

John gets some outdoor exercise every afternoon when he goes for a walk with a dog. His walk are limited to local roads that are plowed. The picture shows Tommy.

Let's hope that the second half of March will bring some warmth and snow melting!

Spring training in the snow

by Andy Bensing

I have two 13-month-old pups, Addi and Axel, and I am hoping to take to the Deer Search Competition in April.  I would prefer to train on open ground but the weather has not been cooperating so I am practicing in the snow.  I do like training in the snow as it is a great way to practice line control.  Here is the set up I laid out today to run the pups on tomorrow.  I laid out 2 lines like this today.  I will run each dog tomorrow at 24 hours on their own individual training line and then swap lines and run the pups again at 48 hours on opposite lines.

Blood and hair at the hit site

That looks like a lot of blood doesn’t it?  Training in the snow lets you see how much blood you are really putting down with a VERY small squirt.  What you see in this pic is one small squirt.  When I squirt this amount every other step, about every 5 to 6 feet, it meters out the blood to 8 ounces over 1000 meters, which is the concentration of blood put down for most blood tracking tests around the world.  

Less than 10 meters after the start I try to trick the dog by putting some blood both ways at the first “Y”.  It is only natural for a dog to just continue straight going the easiest path on the right but the blood line actually bears to the left through the rougher snow.  The prevailing wind tomorrow will likely be coming left to right so that may help the dog a bit.  Regardless, right after the start the dog will have a potential issue to deal with.  This kind of set up discourages overexcited fast starts which can get a dog in trouble.

I am approaching another “Y”.  I am walking in the left hand tire track and dripping blood in the right hand tire track.   The wind is from left to right and will certainly be in that direction tomorrow.  By running the blood line up over the rough snow  into the far left tire track it will set up a great misdirection exercise for the dog tomorrow.  The dog will almost certainly get sucked to the right for several reasons.  First of all before the “Y” the blood is already in the right track and the wind will continue to drift scent down that  track quite a distance even after the blood line goes to the left.  The dog will also naturally be sucked down the easy path of least resistance to the right as well.  At some point the dog will realize he has lost the line and will begin to search.  With the wind likely coming from the left at that point, hopefully the dog will work the check into the wind, and have to cross some deep snow and 2 empty tire tracks to re-acquire the line.  Watching your dog do that work and knowing EXACTLY to the inch where the line is allows you to learn a lot about your dog and teach the dog a lot as well if need be.

You can see how I just simply drove around the field a few times setting up crisscrossing tire tracks.

 Another kind of misdirection not at an intersection.  I just switch over to another tire track right on a straight section.  Wind from left to right makes this more difficult.

Here is a tricky turn with a short backtrack.  I took the bloodline to the left in the left tire track past the intersection about 10 meters then brought it back in the right tire track to the intersection and went to the right.  I will enjoy watching the dog work this one out.

Here I am going from the right tire track, over the rough snow into the far left tire track.  Notice all the natural deer tracks.  By tomorrow afternoon there will be even more and likely right in the tire tracks themselves. This should be interesting.

Here is a video https://vimeo.com/87678126 of my male, Axel, doing the exercise the next day at 24 hours.  I had not checked the weather forecast closely and as it turned out it rained pretty hard overnight.  That rarely causes a problem with artificial trails laid on bare ground but it did seem to make a pretty big difference with the blood line laid in the snow.  Axel had very successfully work blood lines laid in snow tire tracks twice before and had virtually no trouble.  As you watch this video you will see that scenting was much more difficult on this rained on line. Additionally, because of the rain I had a hard time knowing exactly where the line was at.  The rain had washed most of the visual blood away.  Normally when you lay lines in the snow the next day you can see faint brownish smears where the blood is but the rain had washed that all deep into the snow.  The snow was pretty frozen when I worked the line.  Perhaps that prevented much of the scent from percolating up out of the snow or maybe it was just gone similar to the effect rain has on artificial lines laid on bare ground when it rains on that artificial track before the blood dries on the ground and leaves.

The video is long, 10 minutes, and you don’t have to watch the whole thing to get the idea, but if you do watch it all take notice of how I work the dog to balance helping him to be successful and allowing him to make his own mistakes to learn on his own.  You will see how by handling the dog properly Axel eventually figures out how to work the much more difficult scenting conditions than he is used to.  By the end of the track he is nailing it.

When I ran my other dog Addi on her line it was even harder and she took almost to the end to get it figured out.  For whatever reason, the visual blood on the snow was completely gone.  There was only one or two places on the line where I could see a slight discolor in the snow and I believe the available scent was even less than on Axel’s line as well.  Because of the poor scenting conditions I did not run the opposite  lines the next day at 48 hours as planned.  That looked like a disaster waiting to happen. 

As you might have read in a previous post, I had laid a tracking shoe only / no blood  line down in the snow the same day as these lines for my Eibe.  Interestingly, the rain on the tracking shoe line gave my Eibe no trouble at all.  Whether that was because she is an experienced dog and knows how to adjust quickly to different scenting conditions or tracking shoe scent on snow holds up better to rain I can’t say.  But it certainly gives raise to some interesting questions.

Four days after the shot, in deep snow, Thor finds the deer

By Bob Yax
Deer Search of Finger Lakes
owner of Thor von Moosbach-Zuzelek, born April 6, 2012

With gun season being such a tracking bust due to all the snow, (we only took 3 calls) it was nice to get back on an Archery call this past weekend.  At least the hunter knew where he hit the deer!

We ended up with a  fun track (body search) and recovery yesterday in the deep snow.  Thor did a great job trudging through the snow that was over his head in some places    The hunter, Jon, had intestine hit a buck,  with a bow, last Wednesday evening.  He tracked it 100 yards that night, then backed out.  The next day he did a big area search for it, with no luck.   It snowed quite a bit since then and it had not been above 20F degrees, so there was hope that the deer might still be good.  We couldn’t arrange a good time to track until Sunday afternoon.

Yesterday we just basically did a casual walk through some areas that Jon had already searched and some areas he didn’t.  Thor would periodically start following pretty fresh deer tracks in the snow.  I’d pull him off after a short while so that he would focus more on the general air scenting that I wanted him to do.  About an hour into our search Thor picked up his nose and headed downhill towards a creek in fresh undisturbed snow – I thought “this is good”.   After about 40 yards, still air scenting,  he crossed the small creek and headed into thick brush.  Not long after, he stopped and buried his nose in the snow.  At that point I saw a spot of blood next to his head (it was the 1st blood we’d seen).  When I looked closer I saw a small tuft of deer hair.  At that point, I thought that Thor had just found some old part of a deer, (it was actually the butt end of the deer that a fox had started chewing on)  the hunter then yelled “there he is” and pointed to the half rack sticking out of the snow.  Holy crap! We found him!  He ended up about 400 yards from the hit site – maybe in his 2nd bed?

The hunter proceeded to gut the nice 9pt.  It wasn’t frozen solid but was very cold.  It had no unusual odor, so there’s a chance the meat may still be good – I’ll find out from the Hunter.

It was a good end to the season; I wish it wasn’t over!  Eleven recoveries just like last year. 

Thor with "his" very cold buck.

Two veteran trackers have started another tracking season with gusto

Hunting season opened in our pat of New York on October 1. John has taken three calls and the last one ended with a successful recovery. This is what he wrote: This buck was shot high through both lungs, but he left almost no blood. The hunter found a few drops in the first 50 yards across a golden rod field--- then nothing. Tommy had no problems with this four hour-old scent line and went another 150 yards to this nice 8 pointer. This was SO easy after the two previous deer calls that did not produce.

John Jeanneney with Tommy

Walt Dixon with Ari

Another Old Timer, Walt Dixon from Tully, NY, also recovered a very nice buck in much harder conditions. Walt tracks with a 10.5-year-old Ari (Ariel von Moosbach-Zuzelek). He wrote: I just came back from Elk Hunting in Colorado and received a call last night that a bowhunter hit a deer at 6:30 pm and after waiting a short while, and before he could start to track, the skies opened up pouring rain washing away any visible sign. He called last night, said he thought he hit the deer near the liver, and I advised him to look for the arrow in the morning and leave the deer alone. It rained again during the night and this morning he called after finding the arrow broken in half near the edge of the woods the deer entered after being shot.

 

With no visible sign, Ari smelled the arrow then entered left the grass field and entered the woods under an apple tree. She seemed to be working hard so I let her go and about 400 yards away she found the buck who was hit in front of the left rear leg, quartering toward the bowhunter, exiting low and puncturing the right rear leg. Intestines hung about 10 inches out of the bottom of the buck and there was no sign visible the entire trail. Even after all the rain, the 15 hour old trail left enough scent for Ari to recover it! This old tracking pair is off and running for another season!

Dubya, a young wirehaired dachshund, and his tracking season in Missouri

This e-mail and pictures came from Matt Willis from Missouri (thank you Matt!). Matt and Jenny are a young couple who own Dubya, a year-and-a-half-old son of Moose and Paika (Strut von Moosbach-Zuzelek).

Jenny Willis with Dubya (Strut von Moosbach-Zuzelek, Sky's littermate)

Jolanta, I hope this message finds you and yours well.  It is amazing how fast the time flies, it is hard for me to believe we are approaching the third month of 2013 already.

2012 presented some unexpected challenges for our tracking training. We were generally able to get 2 tracks per week with Dubya the early part of the year until the heat hit us. It is generally warm here during the summer months and not uncommon to see highs in the 90s with humidity above 90% to match in July and August. This year was unusually hot. We coped with this by training earlier and earlier in the morning, sometimes beginning at or before daylight. Eventually the temps even early in the morning were in the 80s and we began to wonder if we should continue the training as it seemed to get less fun for Dubya. Needless to say we were thankful for your post about training in hot weather and made us feel better about taking a break during the heat wave. We spent as many of the hot days as possible in the water, which Dubya has decided he really likes.

Dubya and I got our first call during youth firearm season. It was a 7 year old boy who shot his first deer and wasn't able to find it. Our interview revealed the track would be 24 hours old by the time we were on it and had been tromped on by every person the hunter and his family know. The scenting condition was very dry, we weren't very optimistic but really wanted to give it a try. We arrived on site and learned the shot had been about 50 yards through some very thick stuff. The deer took 30 minutes to move 60 yards where it bedded down, eventually got up and "crawled" over the hill. It was at this point the hunters Dad went after the deer expecting to find it over the hill. Feeling less confident at this point we decided to begin the track at the bed site. Dubya wondered around the bed for a couple minutes then began working in the direction the hunter said the deer travelled. Dubya seemed to have the track for about 250 yards and then he just turned around never seemed to find it again. We tried to restart a couple times but that didn't yield any better results. We only found blood about ten yards from the bed and then nothing.

I enclosed a couple pictures of a bow kill of mine that Dubya tracked through a bean field. It was the first time we had tracked through beans and was interesting to see him navigate through. It was not an old track and he completed it with little difficulty.

 Dubya also got some work at deer camp this past year. One of the tracks I thought was particularly notable. The shot was taken right at dark and not marked well. It was about 2 hours later we came back to the hit site and couldn't find any blood. We walked around the hit site looking for some sign when Dubya looked like he'd found the track, which I was able to confirm with a small spot of blood. He continued down the line for about 100 yards and just as I was feeling really good about it he turned around 180 degrees and headed back the way we came. At this point I was wondering what was going on but I decided to keep going because his body language was telling me he was still on the correct line. After walking 50 yards back the way we came he shot off to the right and continued on, another 50 yards and my light hit a white belly. I have never been on a track like that before and was really impressed with the way Dubya handled it. I really enjoy watching him sort these tracks out. He continues to remind me I am the one doing the learning.

This was not a routine track for Andy Bensing and his dachshund Eibe

By Andy Bensing

Cold, late season hunting draws very few hunters in MD and NJ where I do my tracking so a January 16th call in the snow was a pleasant surprise.  Maybe because it had been 3 weeks since my last track, but I got great pleasure from this call, and there were quite a few interesting aspects to it.  The doe was gut shot with a 20 gauge slug from 180 yards the night before.  The amazing report from the hunter started like this,
" I started tracking the deer 45 minutes after I shot and to my amazement I found her just inside the woods 50 yards from where I saw her leave the field and she was just STANDING there wobbling in some thick stuff.   I stood there 15 feet away for a few minutes in amazement that she did not run off and expecting her to fall over and die.  When she didn't, I made my way up to her through the thicket and decided to try and push her over.  I actually touched her and when I did she just kind of wobbled away into the dark.  I went home, waited 2 hours and went back with my wife to hopefully find her dead a short distance away.  We tracked a fairly easy blood trail about 100 yards past where she had been standing but the blood ended and that was it."

Here is a photo the hunter took with his cell phone while he stood there before he touched the standing deer.

When  got the call that night I decided to wait until morning before tracking.  I expected a pretty easy find of the gut shot doe. The hunter reported he got an excellent look at the location of the hit when he walked up to the standing deer. I doubted she would travel very far if she did not even want to run off when the hunter approached.  Well, for some reason when I started my dog, Eibe, she had a very difficult time picking up the line through the 4 inches of heavy wet snow that had come down during the night.  I knew there was good blood under the snow as reported by the hunter but Eibe just could not lock in at first.  I actually restarted her 3 times at the hit site in the first 45 minutes.  She could not even make her way all the way down the path the hunter had tracked visible blood the night before.  On the 3rd restart, I had the hunter dig down under the snow and find some visible blood. 

Eibe had tracked in the snow maybe a dozen times in the past and I never had to do that before but I gave it a try and it worked.  Getting a good nosefull of that blood seemed to set things in motion, and we started to make some progress.  We got to the hunter's point of loss with a little steering help from me and then Eibe picked her way along independently in a logical direction.  She would lock in and zip along for 50 yards or so, then the scent would seem to dry up, and she would search a few minutes, pick it up again and zip right along for another 50 yards or so.  Four or five places along the way I was able to see a comforting blood smear on a branch or a dot or two of frozen blood coming up from the disturbed snow off Eibe's footprints. 

After Eibe finally was able to lock in on the trail it took her 45 minutes to find the deer dead about 500 yards past where it had been touched by the hunter the night before. The deer took one last jump across a creek and died on the other side.  With the snow partially covering the deer, I thought at first she was just a rock but when Eibe dove into the frigid water, grabbed her tail and yanking, the snow fell off and there was no doubt.

When I got to the deer I could see the bullet sticking out her side, and it looked like it smacked into her, mushroomed but never entered her.  What the ??????  Further investigation revealed that I was looking at the exit side of the shot.  The 20 gauge Remington slug had mushroomed nicely and tumbled around in the deer as it passed through the guts on a 45 degree angle from back to front. It had just enough energy left to punch the tail end of the bullet through the deer's skin but the lip from the mushroom hung up in the skin and prevented the bullet from exiting.  I have seen arrows clog an exit hole but never a bullet doing the same.  Not amazing but pretty interesting to see.

Winter strikes with full force

While last winter was mild and easy this one has already produced around two feet of snow. It all started on December 26.

The night shot taken while I was standing in our garage and our yard was illuminated by outdoor lighting.

The next morning was beautiful even without sun. During the first storm of this winter we received 14-16 inches of snow. We had to postpone our post-Christmas plans to meet with the family.

No sun, no color. Everything looked monochromatic.

I put snowshoes on to make trails in the snow for our dachshunds. Young dogs love to play in the snow but for older ones like Asko, cold and snow are a challenge.

This is Sky, who raced around with Tuesday, and he ended up like a snowman covered in the snow.

This is another picture of Sky. This particular shot was a hit on Facebook, and many people commented that it should make to the next year's calendar.

Yesterday we got more snow, probably 7 inches or so. We had to cancel our travel plans again. Instead we went for a nice walk in the woods. We saw a lot of animal tracks, mainly deer, but also fox and coyote footprints.

John snowshoeing.

Jolanta: I really enjoyed the winter scenery.