Hello all, this is my first post and Im new to the forums, so, I will start off by saying "Hello" and I have hurd great thing by several people about this forum.

I have just got a new Beagle <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />, I know it is not a GSD, but I know there are people here that will know and does know alot about any dog.

The Beagle I got was bread by a older man here in TN about 50 miles from me. I saw the parents and many other dogs in the line. The males were 23-25 pounds and the females were 18-22 pounds. He has 20 years exp with the line and has bread them for work. Now I know what work means. I do a little rabbit hunting and want to use him for that, but what else is a Beagle good for? Can you do sent training or fun ball with them? I want him to like car rides and swiming, he will also be OD trained.

So, does Leerburg-Kennels have any videos that would help with Traing him for rabbit hunting? How do I start his rabbit training and at what age?

Can you guys help me with any kind of work I could do with my new dog? He is 8 weeks old now, so he is still small and likes to sleep alot.

Thanks a million for any help.
Dave.




*Mod'd for picture removal.*
Feel free to post a picture of your dog in the members bio area though.

Will Rambeau
Moderator

Hi David,
I don't think the moderators want you posting pics in this section, we normaly post pics in the "members bio and photo section" As for training beagles to hunt rabbits, well I don't have much experience with that but with my last beagle it was "place beagle in field and wait" I think they take to it automaticaly like birds take to flying <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/4142446/an/0/page/0#4142446 would be a good place to start.

Dennis, thanks for the input. Sorry about the picture, I did not know, I should have read more into the rules.

Dave.

You introduce rabbits at a young age. The best resource I've found is beaglesunlimited.net. This is a working beagle website and goes through all the steps.

Beagles are not natural retrievers. It can be trained, but this is not a game working beagles play willingly.

As for OB--beagles have terrible reputations for a reason. They are slow dogs (mentally) so the learning period for commands is a lot longer than for most other dogs. Also, there is a tendency with working beagles to want to bond with other dogs rather than with you, so if you are training OB don't kennel up the beagles together like a working pack.

Good luck.

Erin, very good imput! Thank you. In your opinion should I get another Beagle? I only have one. Will they work rabbits better in a pack? And, if I get another Beagle how long should I wate, should I get one while there both young, or could I wate a year or so?

Thanks all.
Dave.

A few other sites to check out are rabbithuntingonline.com, beagler.com, rabbitsunlimited.org and betterbeaging.com(more of a field trial site).
A friend of mine hunts his pack of three beagles and puts in alot of obedience work during the puppy stage, only introducing the rabbit scent a bit later. It might go against some of the schools of thought from other hunters, but his beagles will hunt all day and have a decent recall when its time to finish. He still has go search for them ocassionally, but they're much more reliable than other packs that I've hunted with. Drop me a PM if you'd like more info.

My unckle has a pack of beagels for rabbit hunting. Beagels are mostly instinct dogs. They are hard to train to do much besides hunt. You really need at least 2 beagels to hunt and the best way to train them is make a friend with a pack of them and let them hunt together. I think it would be hard to teach them from scratch without other dogs but not impossible.

Psssst, Gene, it's beagle, not beagel. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

 Quote:

My unckle has a pack of beagels for rabbit hunting. Beagels are mostly instinct dogs. They are hard to train to do much besides hunt. You really need at least 2 beagels to hunt and the best way to train them is make a friend with a pack of them and let them hunt together. I think it would be hard to teach them from scratch without other dogs but not impossible.

Just curious, what made airport security decide to use beagles for food & agricultural sniffing? Would this fall into the same category as hunting? Or did this take them alot of work to get the dogs to work alone to find other things?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you're wrong, I just always wondered why they used beagles other than their size and the floppy ears not scaring travellers <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />