Selecting a Cur for Coyotes?

Chris_Brice

Chris_Brice

New member
How to select a Cur (Mountain/Kemmer/Stevens/Treeing/Etc) for coyote/varmint/decoy work?

The only "cur lines" that I know of that are being used for this work is you guys at PM and a few over at coyotegods. Obviously I'm not talking about BMC's and Catahoula's here. 99.9% of the Mountain/Kemmer/Stevens/etc/etc Curs out there are tree dogs by nature. This is where I'm most familiar with them.

So if a guy were to go searching for a Cur what the heck to look for? Is a Cur born of good hunting treedogs "good enough"?

For most of us out here the only "readily available" access to curs is from tree dog lines. Obviously, that's all you guys had to start with too. Fill me in on where to start.....

CB

 
Chris, are you just trying to "jazz me?"
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Any of the cur breeds will work for decoy dogs, you just have to look for the traits you like.
 
No Duane, not trying to jazz you. Not this time anyway! LOL

I guess my main question was what should we look for in traits for a Cur Coyote/Varmint dog? You say to look for traits I like but what the heck would those be? Coon dogs I know, coyote dogs I don't.

Maybe I should revise my question so Duane won't have trouble keeping up
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What traits do you guys look for in your coyote/varmint/decoy dogs?

CB
 
I couldn't mess with you if we weren't freinds.
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It boils down to what you like, lots of bite,long range, loud voice, babble mouth.
Little bite, short range,just a bark, silent, semi silent.
For a decoy dog to be good, you will spend alot of time with him(or her). So talk to the sellers about what their dogs are like, or what they try to breed for.
They all have good and bad points, and there are many ways to use/hunt them.
My very best decoy dog was no range (100yrds), silent, no nose, and lots of teeth.He is retired now.His main replacement, has med nose, short range (1/4 mile) trails silent, bays hard and fast at the catch,and lots of bite.
He's fixin to bypass the old dogs yote numbers.
I could go on and on about each of my dogs, with the specific traits, but the point is that whatever "type" of dog you like if you hunt them, and train them properly, you will be successful.You will find some of these traits in any of the Curs, and they will change from litter to litter,and pup to pup, within a litter.Thats part of the fun.
I left out size, you need enough to get it done, but to big, and your dogs will over heat fast, and tend to run out of steam.I'm breedin for smaller frames.
CB, I hope this gets you started.
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Chris,,,,,,,,, the answer's actually pretty simple.

Just get one of Dasher's pups from the litter that's due shortly...
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At least that's my plan...
I've got dibs on a smallish Female (hopefully a darker brindle). You can have what ever's left over...
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Just kidding ya. I know he's a long way from Iowa but the folks that have his pups sure seem happy with em...
Good Luck

Charlie
 
Heck, I think my stuff is pretty good, and I bought two dogs from Dasher for brood stock.
My last litter is out of one of his females.
One of his dogs might suit you well.
 
I would highly recommend you getting in touch with Cal Taylor in Wyoming. He is thoroughly experienced in both training and hunting with decoy dogs. My experience, though limited, tells me the Yellow Black Mouth Cur is an excellent choice. They want to please you, bond with you. Even though they are natural treeing dogs, they can be switched over to coyote with a little training. I had a female really starting to come on strong when I got down with some bad back trouble, and sold her because I couldn't do her justice. She was smart as could be and had more guts than any dog I have ever seen. Jerry Hunsley's great dog Wiley is that breed and he is a dandy. I only got to hunt a little over two days with Jerry, but could easily see why he loves that dog so much.
 
You guys want to know the truth, I'm not too far off with what I already have. My Jagd suits me fine but I'd like a little more handling and need about another 20 lbs. Don't know how much I want a straight decoy dog. More of a chase type hunt with some decoy thrown in. Duane brought up a good point about a dog with nose or no-nose. Sometimes I think a smallish stag in the 40-45 lbs range would work well for what I want. But I want a good handling (i.e. close hunting while walking) dog.

Thought about Airedales and BMC's for years but both are rare as hens teeth around here and both are being bred for sizes bigger than I want.

My experience with Mt. Curs re-enforces the reason why they work well for decoy work. But I'm not sure that the curs I've been around have enough "balls" to put much pressure (either bay or teeth) on a coyote. They need a little of the terrier attitude from what I've seen. That's why I was asking what the other cur hunters looked for.
 
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