By Steven McGonigal
Never doubt the Dog Cider tracking a wounded deer
S
pring is here and I’m glad to see it. When I was a little younger, I never looked forward to the end of winter as it brought with it and end to winter sport. However, times change and people change with it and these days I look forward to a little down time as spring arrives. It is most welcome after a busy winter and gives me the time to knock a few jobs off the list and get on with dog training and the likes over the long evenings. This spring I have a young teckel bitch to work on. She has completed most of what I had intended for her, but now will require just a little more to get over the line. Eyka was bred from my German bitch Cider and sired by a brother to my other bitch Poppy. A smallish bitch, she is very much her mother’s daughter, with her nose always down and a busy keenness about her. She is looking like she’ll make a reasonable blood tracker and has completed quite a number of laid tracks and assisted in a live one over the winter. A likeable and easily managed little bitch, there is simply no fuss with
her and even at only 5 or 6 months old, she kept up with the others when we were raking about on Saturdays over the winter and got under fences, crossed drains and climbed through cover without a problem. I find blood tracking a most fascinating subject, the ‘mystery of scent’ discussed, argued and pondered over by dog men and hounds men in particular, since time immemorial. Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could, just for one day, have the olfactory powers of a hound or dog. Imagine being able to see for ourselves how they scent. Or indeed, what exactly it is like for them to hold the scent of a fox or hare, or even an injured deer, which holds most fascination for me. And that takes me back to a cold October evening in 2021, when my good pal Nigel and I were out stalking as the light fell. I had been with him since early morning and we had been hunting a few pieces of cover here and there with the teckels and later, a fine brace of beagles brought along by another guest. I have always loved beagles or jelly dogs as
they were known by the Victorians. I followed the beagles for many years and found nothing more satisfying than hearing them in full cry across a field or bog. Many people prefer the deep bay of the English foxhound and it is true that there is nothing can make the hair stand on your neck like a dozen couple of fine foxhounds in full cry. However, for me, there is something special about beagles that I could never place; their keenness and enthusiasm for the chase, their kind nature and quiet temperament, I always liked. Beagling is a fine sport and it is such a shame that it is misunderstood. In my years of following them I have never known them to catch a hare, of course there are occasions when they do but it is often a sick or elderly hare that would likely befall a worse fate anyway. The hare is an athlete and reaches speeds of up to 30mph. One only has to see a hare opening up in full speed to really appreciate their ability. The beagle certainly never was a match for them, a little 12/13” high hound running with its nose to the ground is never going to do
Irish Country Sports and Country Life Spring 2022
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