"Just a Dog"

Just a dog?

                     

     

“From time to time, people tell me, "lighten up, it's just a dog,"
or "that's a lot of money for just a dog."

                                         de la Houssaye's Jesse James @ about 6 months old

They don't understand the distance traveled, the time spent, or the costs involved for "just a dog."

Some of my proudest moments have come about with "just a dog." 

Many hours have passed and my only company was "just a dog," but I did not once feel slighted.

Some of my saddest moments have been brought about by "just a dog," and in those days of darkness, the gentle touch of "just a dog" gave me comfort and reason to overcome the day.

If you, too, think it's "just a dog," then you will probably understand phrases like "just a friend," "just a sunrise," or "just a promise."

"Just a dog" brings into my life the very essence of friendship, trust, and pure and unbridled joy.

"Just a dog" brings out the compassion and patience that makes me a better person.

Because of "just a dog," I will rise early, take long rides and look longingly to the future.

So for me and folks like me, it's not "just a dog" but an embodiment of all the hopes and dreams of the future, the fond memories of the past, and the pure joy of the moment.

I hope that someday they can understand that it's not "just a dog," but the thing that gives me humanity and keeps me from being "just a man."

So the next time you hear the phrase "just a dog," just smile,
because they "just don't understand."

Blood Trail Dog Training Consultations and Dogs for Sale 2018/2019

I have been moving from south Louisiana and it has been a while since I published a post, 

so I have a lot of catching up to do.

Above is a 6 month old de la Houssaye's Catahoula who found 3 deer on her first weekend ever hunting in October 2017. She was born after the deer season closed, ate raw beef meat as a main part of her diet, and was trained by me, Marcus de la Houssaye in my blood trail dog training facility in south Louisiana. Although I trained her off leash at my facility, because she was purchased so young, she transitioned right into being handled on leash as that was a hunting club rule where she went to.

 Notice the green light on her dog collar to aid in finding the dog at night, should you go 'off leash'

Above is a Louisiana Catahoula puppy out of my blood line from the past


For 10 years now, I have been engaged in studying, breeding, training and selling blood tracking dogs. Like with cow dogs, hog dogs, bird dogs and all other working dogs in general, the majority of buyers who come looking for a tracking dog, are only interested in and want finished dogs.

However much that seems the easiest and quickest route to getting a high performance dog to work for you, nothing could be further from the truth!

Why? Primarily because dogs are neauvophobic which means that they are shy or scared of anything new.

A finished dog usually needs a a few weeks or even months to warm up to a new owner and many are one man dogs who will never be the same with a new owner as they were with the man who raised 'em up from a puppy.

For instance a new scent, sound, location or person(such as a dog buyer) can cause a dog to get very sensitive and not be 'themselves' and then freeze up and not work for you.

If you are a working cowboy, I am preaching to the choir, because the same thing applies to horses when around someone new. And cowboys know this from real life experience.

So based upon my experiences, for 10 years now, 95% of the people who have come to buy tracking dogs don't understand that the 'best' way to go, is to buy a well bred, high performance, genetically predisposed, high prey drive PUPPY and raise it up AND TRAIN IT YOURSELF.

Valyrie, a great grand daughter of NALC registered Blairs Diamond Cutter

Ohhh, I know the concern is that it won't work this season and we are now full on in the deer hunting season for 2018/2019 so we need a trained and experienced blood trailing dog that will find deer now.

The Catahoula puppy above was trained by me and was running 500-600 yard tracks and finding lost deer the first year she hunted and it was not even six months old!

 Here she is guarding 'her' first deer after the find!

Robert Miller of Michigan Blood Trackers and his Dachsund Sypris who together have found hundreds of wounded and dead deer in the midwest.

OK, I feel your pain, but a well trained, well behaved, and 'experienced' dog FOR SALE is not something that is easy to find! The reality is that most people who breed and train tracking dogs are not selling finished dogs, they are selling puppies.

They are hunting experienced dogs, NOT SELLING EM! What they are likely selling if in the business of selling dogs are started puppies up to 2 years old.

Just think about it: how many 'for real', during the deer season, blood tracking experiences can a trainer put a puppy on and give that dog credit for finding X number of wounded or dead deer in any given deer hunting season?

One thing I have noticed is that potential buyers want a dog that has found a lot of deer on its own. And they want to know how many? Who is counting? They want experience and I understand why, but once again how common is a great dog like that offered for sale?

All this leads to my conclusion that what needs to be trained is 'the people' not the dogs! So I am available for consultation for a fee to help you get up to speed and train your dog, or help you track and learn how to handle your dog. It appears to me that many people who want to buy a trained dog, don't know how to 'handle' it when they get it. I am Marcus and can be reached by email: catahoula1@gmail.com.

I have been doing free consultation for too long! Hire me and you may be surprized at what I can share over the phone.

A well-bred, experienced, trained tracking dog is not something that you can buy like a machine that you can flip a switch and it instantly work for you. It is a living being who is loyal and needs to be a part of the 'team' or 'family' and have the heart or 'desire, to serve you and help put meat on the table.

To quote my girlfriend who is a certified NALC breeder of Louisiana Catahoulas: "People are too civilized." And what she means is that we have become too computerized and mechanized and do not depend upon working animals like horses and dogs that are born and raised on ranches and farms, like it was when we grew up 50 years ago and beyond.

How many people are actually still in the saddle today @ 74 years old like my good friend "Doc" below?

Today we have tractors, trucks, ATVs, air conditioners, computers, GPS, and many other great conviences that have removed common sense from practical working animal applications and caused a vast majority of us and potential dog buyers to think that the 'best' and safest way to get a 'good' dog is to buy a finished dog.

And all I got to say to that is: "Good luck folks!"

I am Marcus de la Houssaye and I am available for consultation and can be reached by email
catahoula1@gmail.com

To Train Or Not To Train?

The subject of 'How to' train a tracking dog has as many variables as there are people and dogs. But training may do more to create a bond that motivates the dog to please you and ultimately help you find your deer, more than actually 'teach' the dog how to track. Why? Because well breed natural hunters like Catahoula and Blue Lacy, will hunt for food if they are hungry and... we are inferior trackers compared to dogs, in that we desperately need their help after 24 hours or more, after it rains, if there is no blood because the deer is bleeding internally, or worse: if the deer crossed water! All four scenarios most likely will stop us in our tracks, cause us to waste a lot of time, and walk around in circles hoping we luck out and stumble across the deer, and we will be lucky to actually find the deer anytime soon.Unless we have a dog!

It has been an interesting week, starting with Albert calling me about ‘problems’ he was having training a Blue Lacy to track. The Blue Lacy is a cur and is closely related to the Catahoula as breeds go. The Blue Lacy is the state dog of Texas, just like the Catahoula is the state dog of Louisiana. 

The 2 photos below are compliments of Roy Hindes

 The 2 photos above and below is Roy Hinds (in the black hat) with an awesome Blue Lacy

Here is a link to John's website about Roy and his Blue Lacy tracking dogs:
http://borntotracknews.blogspot.com/2009/01/roy-hindes-iii-his-tracking-dogs-and.html

Albert told me that his dog was starting to run or 'hunt‘ rabbits when in training. I asked “What is the dog’s experience with tracking deer?” And the man told me that he never tracked a wounded deer with the dog, but had only “trained” it.  I then asked how old and he told me 1 ½ years old. I advised him to start ‘working’ the dog on real natural ‘deer made’ blood trails and stop ‘training’ the dog.

 It is hunting season, he wants to hunt, so take the dog hunting!  

This one phone call got me to thinking about the emphasis hunters, trainers and trackers put on training with man-made blood trails and I began to see that training is everything in most people’s mind. Much like someone wanting to buy a finished dog because in their mind experience is everything and many people shopping for a tracking dog and having no experience to base their purchase on and are guessing a finished dog is the best way to go.

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Both presumptions are wrong!

 When I started studying the blood trail dog as a business, about 10 years ago, it was obvious that too many people were over-complicating the training process by focusing on tarsal gland or interdigital gland training. And the result of that has been several people calling me this year to get 'another' dog because their dog was trained specifically to track bucks only using the tarsal and or interdigital gland method and now it will only track bucks. Duhhhh!

The tarsal gland is a furry bump on the heels of the back legs of a buck as seen below

                                                                         
                                                                  interdigital gland

 I recall all the blood trail dog propaganda years ago being presented by a local blood trail dog association about a dog knowing if a deer was mortally wounded OR NOT by the smell of the interdigital gland which is located between a deer’s toes. . Here is the theory: If a deer is mortally wounded, it gives off a different scent through the interdigital gland, than one that is not mortally wounded. And… an experienced and well trained dogs knows it.

And if a dog knows it is not mortally wounded, IT WON'T TRACK?

 OK, how can you ‘prove’ that theory? Ask the dog? Of course we can’t get a verbal confirmation of that so we must base that judgement upon the dog’s body language and performance.

So here is my observation: A professional tracker and his dog was 0 for 4 at a local hunting club that was located near the tracker. Four times in a row he was called in the first month of archery season here in Louisiana to track a deer and the dog couldn’t find it. A member of the club later called me looking to buy a tracking dog for their hunting club because they were not calling the ‘other’ tracker anymore due to a lack of performance.

In short, the professional tracker excused his dog for ‘not tracking’ due to the dog knowing it was not a mortal wound due to the interdigital gland 'theory'.

Well on two occasions of the four, the next day after the tracker came out, the deer hunters went out to the blood trail at the crack of dawn and looked for the deer and found it without a dog. One of the deer was about 60 yards from where the dog stopped tracking, and the other was about 100 yards away from the point of last blood. And on the latter, the dog wound not track at all. He just ran around and played with the hunters.

 Now folks this is a dog that had found many a deer in his day and had been tracking for many years successfully. OK, well bred, well trained, and well experienced, so why wouldn’t the dog hunt?

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Above is Rob Miller and his dachshund Sypris who has found several hundred recoveries in Michigan and Ohio.

    If you need tracking services, Robert can be reached by cell phone @ 810 240 4891



Based upon my personal experience, my best guess is that the dog was over fed. Always remember the common sense wisdom of the old timers: “Hungry dogs hunt!” Also, consider that the tracker was a member of an association at the time that was hung up on the interdigital gland theory and was using that to make unwarranted excuses for the dog.

My guess is the dog was so over fed on a regular basis that he perhaps wouldn’t hunt on a regular basis and it is not the dogs fault! Proper handling while actually tracking may be more important than early training because if the dog is a genetically predisposed 'natural', they may not need to be trained to the degree that most people believe.

And I believe the diet factors are more critical than the training and I feed my dogs raw beef when it is not deer season as you can see below.

I also like to supplement that with road kill as often as possible, as you can see below.

I am not opposed to using man made tracks to train puppies but the real blood trail dog training occurs during deer season unless you have does that need to be culled during the off season and have doe tags to that effect.

Starting in 2018, I will be moving into a 13,000 acre high fence trophy ranch and training my pups on culled does in the off season and eradicating the wild hog population on the ranch.

I am Marcus de la Houssaye and I breed and train Louisiana Catahoulas.

I can be reached at 337 298 2630 if you are interested in buying a puppy or started dog or have questions about training one.