small game hunting

Steve and his buddy Nubbin Moore made the trip to Batesville, Mississippi for the 36th running of the prestigious event in early February.  This episode contains a collection of on-the-spot interviews with several of the events’ attendees that stopped by the Gone To The Dogs Podcast booth.You’ll enjoy the interviews conducted at the booth located at centerstage in the massive Batesville Civic Center.  Surrounded by live sounds from the arena, it’s the next best thing to being there. 

The conversations span a wide category of subjects that will be worth your time.  Listen to one at a time or enjoy them all in one setting.  Either way, you’ll enjoy this visit to one of the coon hunting game’s most enjoyable events. 

In this episode we resume the interview with James Oliver Laws. It was said of Mr. Laws father, Uncle Jimmy Laws, that he would know the day before the hunt where a bear would move that night. He served as the paid guide at the famed Hazel Creek Rod and Gun Club where Von and Little George Plott hunted bears with hounds. In this episode you will hear James Oliver Laws give descriptions of the dogs that were hunted by the Plott family as well as other famous houndsmen of that day. Descriptions of the dogs by Mr. Laws often conflict with the UKC breed standard for the Plott dog of today. 

Mr. Laws’ accounts of the ways the hunters would breed to the dogs of their fellow hunters is much the way the hunters of West Virginia and Virginia did when Steve was a young hunter. There are many parallels in the experiences of Steve and James Laws, especially in following, the footsteps of their famous fathers on multitudes of bear hunts in rugged mountain terrain.. Mr. Laws’ frankness in describing not only the hounds of the Plott family and his own but also in describing the demeanor of the men themselves is eye-opening. His revelation of the origins of the Plott family dogs as well as the original breed type of their dogs will no doubt raise questions about previous historical accounts associated with the popular breed. Due to the overall length of the interviews, Steve has chosen to run it in three parts. This is the second episode of a three-part series. Merry Christmas!

In this episode Steve and Fred catch up after their brief visit at the 2023 Autumn Oaks where, true-to-form, Fred was on his way to catch up with his cast for the Saturday night hunt.  Ageless it seems, Moran continues to compete with his beloved Redbones long after most hunters have retreated to the recliner but that’s not Fred Moran.

This episode is vintage Moran with stories, accounts of hunts recent and long past, and recollections of the good Red dogs he’s had on his leash over his many years. 

This one is for flannel-shirt wearing, tailgate-sitting, tobacco-spitting, long-shaving- whittling good ole boys (and girls) to enjoy. Scooch up close to the fire, work that chew up just right and let ’er rip.

Our guest this week is a young man with impeccable credentials in the UKC show ring over the past few years. He and his wife Kelly are familiar faces among the Bench Show faithful and have had considerable success competing at the higher levels of the sport. In 2016, Dave won Opposite Sex at the UKC World Show Championship with GRCH Laurel Valley Doc Holiday HTX, a Black and Tan Coonhound. Steve served as the Bench Show Judge at the event and naturally the conversation covers that experience. The following year, Dave’s wife Kelly won World Show Champion overall with her Treeing Walker male GRCH Laurel Valley Backwoods Boondocker. Steve and Dave discuss the competition that exists between the husband-and-wife team. This is an easy going, coon hunter to coon hunter conversation that illustrates the types of sportsmen and sportswomen that exist within the sport today.

The episode begins with the “First Family of Autumn Oaks” consisting of Curtis Elburn and his two daughters Nikki Elburn Rorvik and Andi Elburn Emory.  Curtis has attended fifty-one consecutive Autumn Oaks events dating back to 1972 and his daughters have attended thirty-eight and forty events consecutively themselves.  Steve remembers the ladies as babes in strollers as their parents attended Autumn Oaks. Shortly after the interview was conducted, Andi won the prestigious National Grand Show Champion of Autumn Oaks with her Redbone Coonhound. 

Newcomers Shane Richard of Idaho and Esther Weimer traveled across the nation to attend their first Autumn Oaks and present an interesting interview including their first impressions of the event and an inside look at the part UKC-registered coonhounds play in their hunts for bears and mountain lions in the American West. 

Rounding out the episode is an entertaining visit with three young hunters, ages 13 through 15, from New York and Tennessee, that met at Autumn Oaks.  It’s a look at the grand old event in the eyes of the future and will be much enjoyed.  

This is a don’t-miss episode for those that have attended Autumn Oaks for years and for those that have never been.  It’s all here, recorded live at the Event Where History Is Made.  

Times change, but one thing that stays the same for many is the annual pilgrimage to Autumn Oaks.  It’s that time of year again and the anticipation continues to grow as plans are being made, maps plotted and dogs/handlers are gearing up for the big show! Jason and Steve talk  a bit about Autumn Oaks, its predecessor the “Leafy Oaks” field trial and the history behind the event that is easily recognized as one of the most prestigious hunts in the world of coonhounds.  They also talk about how many of the early well know coonhounds contributed to the make up of “big game” or “West Coast” dogs.  Find out where you can find Steve along with several other fellow podcaster and past guest if your fortunate enough to attend this year's event.  We look forward to Steve’s report of the event coming in future episodes.

Steve and Gary became acquainted through their legislative activities and the mutual love for the Plott breed and have had many conversations over the years.  Gary is a humorist with a gift for telling stories from his native West Virginia, many centered on hunting with hounds and jam-packed with local color.    

Knapp provided material for Steve’s monthly columns in American Cooner magazine under the heading “Mule Tales.”  Gary was given the nickname Mule as a result of his strength and work ethic when a younger man.  This one is seasoned with mountain flavor like smoked pork sausage or country ham.   Get yourself a biscuit and pass the blackberry jam.  We’re about to share country word-vittles, Gary Knapp-style.   

From the first episode in September of 2021, the aim of the Gone To The Dogs Podcast has been to reach out to guests from across the whole spectrum of the hound-hunting sport, competitors, breeders, trainers as well as forks of the creek practitioners that ply their trade on the creek banks and woodlots down home.The podcast seeks out the guys that know good hounds and always seem to have one at the end of their leashes to fill the guest’s chair in every episode. 

Troy Hoffman is that kind of guy.  A heavy equipment operator that manages the 500-acre family farm in western Indiana on the side, Hoffman hunts coons and coyotes with hounds, outwits big gobblers and trophy-class bucks with gun and bow and still puts up the occasional coon hide for area buyers to bicker over.    His appeal to Steve and hopefully to the listener of this episode is that our guest is neither enticed nor enamored by the spotlight of major league competition hunting.  He’s a tell-it-like-it-is kind of average guy that, if you listen closely, you’ll agree has an awful lot to say. 

In this episode, Steve takes a break from the normal routine to replay one of the most popular Gone To The Dogs episodes in the ninety-six-episode history of the podcast, a visit with South Carolina’s Jim “Wildman” Meeks.   As a bonus play, Steve sneaks in a candid conversation with soon-to-be-ninety-yea-old coon hunter Johnny Brinkley who will be appearing in a special episode with Steve and mutual friend Lee Currens, scheduled to air in August. 

In this episode Steve talks with Corey Gruver of Greenville, Pennsylvania.  Steve and Corey have a common denominator in their backgrounds, each having worked for United Kennel Club, the recognized chief registry of coonhounds worldwide.  Furthermore, each worked with coonhounds and coonhound activities in what is now the Hunting Ops Department. 

Steve became interested in having Corey share the Gone To The Dogs microphone as he recognized Gruver’s wide interest in several breeds and combinations of breeds of tree dogs. Steve wanted to, and does, explore the reasons his guest has chosen to enjoy several breeds instead of being a single-breed hunter as most are. 

While at UKC Gruver wrote several articles that piqued Steve’s interest as well convincing the host that his guest would be an interesting speaker and he certainly doesn’t disappoint.  He’s a very interesting guy and has no difficulty expressing himself on several subjects of interest to listeners of this podcast. 

Sit back and spend a couple of hours with Corey and you’ll readily see why Steve invited him to join the impressive list of hunters that have shared the Gone To The Dogs Podcast microphone with the old coon hunter. 

Fresh off their $100 K first place win in the Pro Sport extravaganza, the guys were ready to roll with candid answers to my sortedlist of questions. Smith the engineer, Strickland the greatest competition mind in the game, and Sizemore, the relative new comer with a $100 K win under his belt, reveal the inner workings of a team that’s become the force to be reckoned with when it comes to today’s game of exorbitant entry fees and enormous purses.   

Breeding, training, handling, dog work and travel are all on the table with Steve dealing the question cards.   It’s a great episode with these key members of a cutting-edge team, honed to razor sharpness at the absolute highest levels of coon hunting competition.   Big names, big personalities, big results.  You be the judge!

Steve finds Fred in the market for a new hound and coaxes him to spill the beans on a two-year-old Redbone (of course) female that Fred says is his only hound at the present.  The old friends talk about Fred’s recent hunts with fellow coon hunter Patty Bizitch, about treeing bears while coon hunting, about hunting spots where he maybe shouldn’t ought to go and the perennial summertime nemesis of coon hunters, snakes.   

Fred was in rare form for this one and Steve struggles to get a word in edgewise.  But that’s fine because like fine wine, Fred’s stories get better and better with age.

The United Kennel Club’s annual Tournament of Champions, open to coonhounds that have earned the registry’s prestigious Nite Champion title, has rapidly become  the most-sought-after competition in the realm of purebred coonhounds.  Held annually in Greencastle, Indiana, the annual competition consists of more than one thousand eligible coonhounds competing for the overall win.

Our guest in this episode is Jeff Ricklefs, a former guest on this podcast, who emerged the overall champion with a Treeing Walker Coonhound owned by John Strickland and Doug Galbreath of Kentucky named Grand Nite Champion Strick’s Hardtimes Hobo.  Hobo took home the $50 thousand top prize for his owners in a commanding performance that is rarely seen at this level.. 

In this episode, Ricklefs recaps his exciting run for the title and the big check.  Jeff is a podcaster’s dream, an articulate speaker with tremendous recall and the ability to put the listener in the truck and in the woods in the fast lane of competition as no one else can.  This is a great episode!

Steve catches up with Strickland for a fast-moving, wide-ranging conversation about his latest sensation, Lone Pine Lady, which he co-owns with last week’s guest Randy Smith and with which he won the recent ProSport truck hunt in Claremore, Oklahoma.  Strickland discusses his partnership with Smith, how Lady got his attention and how he and the three-year old Treeing Walker got on the winning track.  This one is for listeners than wonder what it’s like and what it takes to play in the majors; an entertaining hour and eight minutes that you will probably listen to again.  

Our guests for this episode are two of the most passionate among the ranks.    One is an established veteran, a breeder, trainer and competitor, on the big stage and the other a pleasure hunter that lives for the hunt and “the locate” that quickens the heartbeat of coon hunters across the broad spectrum of the sport.  The thing they share in common is a passion for coon hunting that can only be described as off the charts. Coon hunters at all levels of experience will enjoy these conversations.  When done, there will be no doubt that our guests have gone to the dogs. 

Guests Billy Dwyer and Charlie Butler bring the full range of experience, emotion and elation drawn from their personal experiences. This is one every hound hunter should absorb, just in case.

Special guests Jim Garrison, Morris Hardy and Nubbin Moore provide insight into what it means to reach the golden years in a sport many have enjoyed all their lives.  Garrison shares his own experience at age 72 in addition to the life of longtime friend Warren Wilson who lived and hunted to the age of 97.  Morris Hardy, a lifelong coon hunter and English fancier shares what keeps him going several nights a week at the age of 78.  Steve’s traveling buddy Nubbin Moore, who just celebrated his 82nd birthday, shares his views on whether or not he’s too old to quit.This is an episode for all coon hunters and hound people.  Humorous at times, the guests show the spirit that has kept them at it longer than most and reminds us, that if we keep at it long enough, we each will face the decision one day.   

In keeping with the memory theme, Steve turns the pages of a coon hunting magazine printed nearly fifty years ago and shares the ins and outs of the sport when lights cost less than fifty bucks and a fifty-pound sack of dog food was eight.  A trip to the first Leafy Oak field trial in 1927 is worth the listen.  If trivia is your thing, this episode will have you hankering to turn back the clock to the pretty good old days. 

Billy Dwyer of Slidell, Louisiana and Kesten Jessee of Lebanon, Virginia share a common goal; to finish a well-bred coonhound pup from scratch without help from other dogs.  Both are accomplishing what they intended to do and this episode covers their stories.

Billy’s hound Ruby is a Treeing Walker female and Kesten’s hound Clyde is a Treeing Walker male.  Both are less than two years old and each of them had their owners often questioning their future outcomes.  The boys discuss how they accomplished the goal of having each hound treeing raccoons on a regular basis and making their owners proud.

This is a short list of basic steps that enabled the hunters to realize their goals.  Each hound remains a work in progress but with more than one hundred coons treed to date, the plan is working to near perfection. 

This is an episode for the hunter that would rather have it his or her way than to purchase a hound created by someone else.  Don’t let the title of this episode fool you.  These guys know their stuff.  

Jim Meeks was, at his peak, known as one of the hardest hunters in the sport of raccoon hunting.He is most noted for his association with the Yadkin River strain of Treeing Walkers.  He takes no credit for naming the strain but no man has hunted and promoted more of the famous dogs from the line.  Hounds like Yadkin River Tom, Jeff, Champ, Chico, and Tar Rattler lace his conversations like rawhide on a well-worn pair of Irish Setters.  Jim Meeks and Yadkin River Walkers are forever intertwined. 

Jim and Steve have been sharing conversations around the barns at the Grand American for over forty years.  This episode is but the latest collection of coonhound-related chatter that flows when the two get together.  Readers have enjoyed Jim’s writing in coonhound magazines through the decades as well.  Never claiming to be a competition hunter, his Just Coon Hunting columns are ripe with some of the most entertaining stories to be found.  Coon hunters wet behind the ears and long in the tooth alike will enjoy this episode recorded live at the largest annual gathering of coon hunters in the nation, the incomparable Grand American.