Dog bark on fox scent.

223vmax

I've a couple of 1 year old dogs that I'm hoping to train up and run with the main pack of dogs for fox hunting/flushing dogs from cover. The pups are from hound/labradors and bark freely. How do I train them to bark at fox scent. I don't know where to start TBH. Any pointers or advise appreciated.

Eddie B

It comes natural lad! If its in them, its in them! It always helps to run them with an experienced fox dog!

Kiltris

Running with experienced dogs is helpful, not essential, but very helpful. We always start them on rabbits as young dogs in the summer months & progress onto foxes then in the winter with the others. But at the end of the day, they will open on foxes only if it's in them, some do start younger than others alright & I've seen young dogs to bark on rabbits and after a few good fox hunts the preference changes to foxes, they will trail the rabbits but won't open on them. All depends on the dog and it's breeding I guess.

223vmax

They do run with 3 older very good dogs. However the experienced dogs are always miles ahead of the young ones. So young ones have no idea what the older ones are barking at most of the time. Maybe I should run them alone on rabbits and see what happens - they're only 1 year old.

Kiltris

Sorry that's what I meant, we find the best results with starting them on rabbits on there own. Then introduce them to hunting with the others once scent improves coming up to nov/dec. I've seen dogs to become very free on the bark when put out with older dogs too soon, they end up chasing them rather that barking on the trail themselves.