This is going to be long. Please read this if you know anything about these dogs and are experienced in their capabilities.

I have a full blooded female bluetick that I adopted. She was never raised as a hunting dog, only a pet. When we got her, she was about two or three years old, and we have had her for almost two years. Sorry I don't know the exact age. She is spayed.

I'm writing here in hopes of getting some advice. This dog stays in the house, and is kept in the yard by means of a radio collar. She is allowed to roam free in the yard. At night, she sleeps inside and she is house trained.

Now for the problems. This is probably consistent with any hound dogs that should not be an inside pet, but it is very bad with ours. She will not leave trash alone. Whether it is inside or outside, if trash is present, she can't pass it up. She has an uncontrollable urge to eat anything that is left within reach. She cannot be trusted in the same room or area alone with anything that even remotely resembles food. She snagged four deer back strap steaks off the counter just last week. I'd left the room for only a moment and when I got back she had devoured them. The worse part is she is sneaky about it..she waits until nobody is around before she closes in.

She stinks. A week after a bath, she smells awful. It only gets worse. I guess an odor is common with hounds..but it isn't good for a dog that stays inside the house.

Multiple attempts to correct her in this behavior and attempts to train her have failed. We have pretty much decided that it is learned behavior, which the previous owner admitted was a problem, only after we had the dog for a couple of months. I'm almost certain that the lady who gave her to us did not mention certain things like that, because she knew nobody would take her if she did.

We have small children and two inside cats, both of which she has no issues with.

I've contemplated rehoming her for a long time, but I am not gonna be like the lady we got her from and not say anything about her issues. I fear that nobody will take her if they know the whole story. One thing that has been suggested in several conversations is to give her to some hunters. I was initially against this since she has never been a hunting dog, but I'm starting to think maybe this is where she belongs.

I want to know if anybody would be interested in her as a hunting dog. I want to know what kind of living conditions are common, what kind of vet trips, how she will be hunted, etc.

Is she too old to be trained? Is their certain things you can ask me that I can answer for you to make a better recommendation? Anything. This is truly a last resort for us.

She will tree squirrels and other animals. She regularly looks out the window from inside the house, and spots deer standing in the yard and goes ballistic. She definitely has the traits and the genes..I'm just not sure what else is required.

Finally..if it doesn't work out, what will happen to her? If she doesn't meet a hunters standards, will they simply kill her or what? That is a serious question.

I'm only considering this because I think this will be her last hope. I don't think she will be a good fit as another person's pet..just because she is such a handful. Unless the person was dedicated to training her and putting her before anything else, as a pet she will likely just be rehomed again, or taken to the pound. I'm not going to do that to her and I'm not going to give her to anybody that would.

Honest answers on this would be appreciated. Thanks

hounds generally smell worse than other breeds.
hounds of all stripes love garbage.
hounds are stubborn.
as a former owner of hounds, all i can advise is get a better garbage can for inside the house, one that can't be opened by your dog, and be religious about putting food and food garbage away.
get a nice kennel for her to sleep in at night. that way, she can't go looking for garbage.

All good advice. Had not thought about the kennel thing, but that would most certainly solve the late night patrols of the house.

I do still want to hear from anybody who uses these dogs to hunt. If there is any chance she might be a good fit to add to somebody's pack of dogs, I'd be willing to listen to why they think so.

As far as the smell, try giving her probiotics or a table spoon of yogurt a day. We have a 15 yr old lad that smelled, started giving her a tablespoon of plain yogurt a day and it did wonder for her smelled. Also our two yr old lab had ear infections all the time and this helped her. When we were told this I had a hard time believing it would help, but we tried it and it worked. Its called yeast overload.

yep, yeast can produce a bad aroma, make a hound smell worse. we had to go yeast free on our late shih-tzu ...

No she wouldn't be a good fit.. She hasn't never hunted and she is 4 years old. Plus its not like you can just tell a dog to go get you a coon or a rabbit. IMHO she wouldn't make a good hunting dog..

x2

Crating her at night would be a great help, I think. Our three are crated at night. One thing - try the crate both uncovered and covered. two (together) really want a cover over the entire crate. The other (long story - she got creamed by a car, we adopted her, she can be funny about things) freaks if yo ucover her crate. Try both.

Sending you a pm on how I broke one of getting in the trash

We crate our black n tan at night, as for the trash put it out before you let the dog in.
To get the smell under control, take her to the vet and have her anal glands expressed. You can youtube a video to see how to do that yourself but you better have a strong stomach.
Also, ours does not hunt either, she is the worlds loudest doorbell/burglar alarm.