It always seems to help explain any concept if you can include a visual aid. I used Paint to make a crude sketch to reinforce what we were just talking about. This is the most difficult part of a track for any dog, especially the young ones. Even an old experienced dog is likely to have to check many of those false lines before figuring out where the real one exits the search area. It confuses a young dog and the more complicated it is….the more likely they are to give in to mental fatigue. An old dog knows that if they keep looking eventually they’ll work through it and their mature brains can work for an hour or more though this mess if need be. Its hard to predict how long a young dog might go….it varies with the given day and track.

Without this one obstacle, tracking with a dog would be pretty simple and straight forward. The more complicated the search area is muddled up though then the harder it is on any dog and tracker. An old experienced dog may be able to work through it eventually but it may mean spending an hour just trying to pick it out. Maybe they eventually do, maybe they don’t. It takes a really good dog will the experience of dealing with this situation over and over to pull it off. It’s going to be hard for that dog up the road that only goes on a few tracks a year to figure it out. It’s also going to be hard on any young dog until they get enough experience.

Just take this info and put in the back of your head. The rut is just around the corner and they’ll be a lot of marginal shots made on a lot of coveted bucks. We, the dog trackers, can find these deer for you in many instances. Below is one of the biggest obstacles that you put in our path though. If it wasn’t for this obstacle, many tracks would just be a straight run to the deer. If you make a bad shot on a buck and you really want to find the thing….then call us first, not last.

The X is the hit site and LB stands for “last blood”. The dashed lines are the false line made from searchers tracking back and forth across the real scent line.

Really interesting to follow the track. Cool sketch. Like the football analysts use on tv. Appreciate you sharing information with us. Neat stuff

Good luck. Quite a few years ago, I shot a big buck. We found where he crossed the paved road. My buddy and I started following blood. We ended up on two separate blood trails, his going about a quarter of a mile in a semi-circle back in the direction of the road. My trail went practically in a straight line to the Northwest and petered out after about a half mile. Very confusing to this day.

have you worked Otis on really FUBARed practice tracks at home...where you can help him work em out to a good ending???

training in real life situations is critical for success in the field.

I ran into this when working my K-9 Mal Taz. Night hunter ran from me one night, then bailed out of a moving vehicle. Quite comical seeing him bounce off the blacktop like he did. Then the alcohol numbed idiot decided to run into the woods. I had stopped right behind his running self, and sent Taz to apprehend(bite and hold) the idiot. She had sight on him and blasted into the windshield of the truck..once..twice..three times before I could grab her and throw her out the door.

I had assumed she KNEW how to get out of the truck..wrongly it turns out. She got the guy and all worked out (for the good guys) but I realized I had failed in my training.

We started the next day sending her on a bite FROM the truck. First time in training she hit the windshield again. LOL She got the hang of it next time and all was good to go.

try to think of EVERY dang situation ya'll might get into and train for it.

I turned a track down last night. I’m going to have to learn to be a little more diplomatic about it. I think it might have pissed them off a little. The optimism of the hunter seems to outweigh the reality of the situation sometimes though. This track was a good ways off and was going to take me over 2 hrs to get there or I might have tried it anyways since we’re still training. It just didn’t sound like a very high probability of recovery and had hints of what experienced trackers have described to me as “bad tracks”. The one positive sounding part of the story was that they were finding decent blood. The bad part about it though was when I asked how far they had tracked the deer….the guys answer was “Aw man whew! We’ve gone a good half mile or so at least. He’s made it up and down two big steep ravines and then crossed the road back up a big ditch bank. The spot where we lost blood was going back off into the next big ravine down by the water.”

I’m afraid they blew a leg off or either clipped the brisket low and the terrain didn’t sound like an area where I wanted to unsuccessfully chase a deer for a mile or two. They had tracked it a long ways and never reported having jumped the deer or came across a bed. If the deer hasn’t tried to bed up and you’ve gone over 800 yards, then I’d have to question how bad its really hurt. Leg hits are bad injuries but not immediate killing hits. The deer might eventually die but it won’t likely be due to the immediate injury. They reported finding drops of blood for a little ways then a small puddle…..drops of blood for a little ways and then another small puddle, etc..etc. The little puddles of blood are where the deer stops for a moment. The areas where there are only drops of blood are where the deer is on the move. I pictured the deer moving forward 50 yards then stopping….moving ahead another 50 yards then stopping.

After listening to the story I just had a gut feeling that this one wouldn’t turn out well so I chose not to make the long drive. When I get to the stage where I feel Otis is fully trained and I start charging a fee for “showing up”…..I may not be quite as picky about it. I’ll still be upfront with the person about what I think happened but if they want me to come anyways then I’ll likely give it a try. I can tell folks don’t like to be told…. “I think I’ll pass on this one.”

[In my experience deer that are hit badly in the leg or shoulder will not attempt steep climbs. Or they will, but circle back down when they decide that it hurts too bad to be climbing.

Makes me want to gut shoot one just so I can meet you and see the dog work