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-- how to stop my dog from treeing a possum! (http://forums.ukcdogs.com/showthread.php?threadid=369391)

I had one dog I just could not break. Somebody obviously figured it out because he is doing very well now, but when I had him that sucker would tree a possum twice as hard as a coon and look good doing it. I tried a lot of stuff, none of it slowed him down.

Got to the point he was scared of me not the possum.

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The fun is over once you pull the trigger

Ron Ashbaugh
CROOKED FOOT KENNELS

Someone with the handle of "peanut" , who has one post , asks a question that is proven to start an argument and pull the experts out of the woodwork ... and everyone still falls for it .

Nobody can answer these questions without knowing more about the dog ... it's personality ... how it was started , etc .... but yall fall over yourselves to try ...

Making a top notch hound takes alot of time and hunting ... if you take the easy path and let a dog get bad habits .... then don't expect to be bailed out so quick with some internet advice ....


- The things I mentioned not to do are no-no's written down in stone by the fathers of hound training ... they were true in the dark ages and there is no reason for folks to still be learning them from scratch ... build on what we have been given folks ....

Trash Breaking; I will possum break your dog, guaranteed for as long as you own the dog. Tom 580-765-4308

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Breaking

Every dog is different. It is always best to not let bad things become habits, or for a dog to get to liking game not wanted. I will scold a young dog the first time. After that, it's shoot the possum out and light him up with electricity as soon as he sinks his teeth into it. Dogs look forward to chewing on their treed game.If he don't want it anymore, he will not tree it. I have used this method on several young dogs and it has worked for me. Dogs that have been getting away with it for a while are hard to break. The smarter the dog the easier it is to break.

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Phil Vogel
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I've had several possum treeing fools, (it runs in my line of dogs). I never shoot one out, to me that is just encourages a dog to tree one and then leave it just before I get to the tree.

My school of thought is if they won't run one they won't tree em. I do all my possum breaking in the yard, nothing is done around a tree. A shock collar and a live possum is a wonderful thing and can go a long way in making a dog think twice about fooing with a possum.

My mutts killed one in their pen not long ago but they don't go 'possum huntin in the woods. I didn't even scold em for it.

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Johnny Williams

The key is to get them to realize what they have in the tree is wrong without making them feel punished for treeing. I honestly have no idea if a bad one can ever be fixed. You might fix them from treeing them but they also may start another set of bad habbits such as leaving trees killing them on the ground etc..

quote:

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Originally posted by hound-hunter101
The key is to get them to realize what they have in the tree is wrong without making them feel punished for treeing. I honestly have no idea if a bad one can ever be fixed. You might fix them from treeing them but they also may start another set of bad habbits such as leaving trees killing them on the ground etc..

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Johnny Williams

some dogs CAN'T BE BROKE----I had one I will not tell you what I did by the things I did to him --he was't bad only treed one or two year --but it would be at a larger hunt--only thing was he stay until he new you were coming --I could tell on the first bark what he was treeing---he lived to about 14 years old ---I mean I try everything

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ALLNITER DOUG CHEEK

ALWAYS GO BY THE RULES AND NEVER A PROBLEM

---------------------catch a opossum in a live trap--------------------- Then put that possum in the kennel wit the dog for a week or so after they eat together sleep together and live together for a week or so the dog will have absoulty no interest in a possum.... ive seen this work on dogs that PEOPLE TOLD ME COULDNT BE BROKE...... good luck

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You dont have to tell me how good your coondog is! If you want SHOW ME!!!!! LETS KICKUM!!! One at a time right by there self????

shoot the dog!

Ifen my dog cant kill a grinner in a week im gonna shoot the dog and hunt the possum.Just a little humer.

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Always be yourself because the people that matter dont mind and the people that mind dont matter.Rock River Plotts

Once they have treed a few and got nothing but a bad word or two, the problem is set in. At that point, corporal punishment when they tree one will get them to stop getting caught at a tree with one but won't stop them from treeing and going on before you get there. (Thank you, Garmin, for helping me find that out, lol.) I haven't figured out a shortcut to get them broke at that point. Its work.

IMO, they need to be broke before it becomes a habit. I haven't done much of this but I've tried to figure out ways to turn them off on possums before even going to the woods. In the woods they are likely to be trailing them and getting fired up on them before we even know they are doing it and well before they tree their first possum.

I've tried tying a possum out in the yard, on the ground and then turning a pup loose thats just about ready to go to the woods. When the possum gets his attention and the pup approaches....correction. The next step would be to lay a drag trail in the yard with the possum and let the pup loose. If he takes to the track....correction.

My thinking is that if they ignore the scent the problem is solved. Once a treedog has been treeing a few minutes they are treeing for the adrenalin rush and aren't thinking about the game they have whether its a coon or possum. They need to be nipped in the bud when they first smell a possum, imo.

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The best you can hope for is to be able to cut loose around a pecan grove or something like that where you can see coon and trash moving .... or cut loose in a creek where you see possum ... or throw cat food in some creeks you hunt and come back later and at night and shine for trash ..

.. but , it's gotta be a hunting situation where the dog has to hunt through it and you can see what he's trailing .... you can't wait til he thinks you gave him persmission to run something to a tree and it was ok to tree til' you got there ...that messes up a dogs head ... they can't figure that part out ....


... If the dog starts after the possum ... shock him good or scold him .... and re-send him after a coon or keep hunting ....make him get right and make him think you are faster about shutting him down than God himself .... that reinforces your authority big time ..


When you stop and dump on trash ... then reload the dog to go to a real turn out ... you are training one of them sorry a** dogs that think they have to come crawl in the dog box anytime you correct them ....


If you break them at the tree .... you still haven't broke them from messing with possums ... dogs are like kids .. they will test you as if to say " But you didnt' say I couldn't trail a possum , daddy".

It takes work ... and you gotta be consistant ... it has more to do with disciplining yourself than the dog ...

breaking

A few years back we box trapped a opposum, left it in the trap, put it and the dog in a inclosed area, everytime the dog went near the opposum we shocked him. Dont shock him so much that he comes back to you when he smells a opposum in the timber. It usually doesnt take much to break them. Good luck.

Possum dog

Some dogs are coon dogs and some are possum dogs and we use to call the ones you all are talking about combination dogs. Now where I am from we never would interfeir with a good possum dog or a good coon dog, but sometimes we wswitched the combination to posum or coon. It was a natural process or just happened. IF YOU JUST LEAVE THEM ALONE THE WILL MAKE EITHER ONE OR THE OTHER. Rex

Now let's get serious

The first Wick book has a shocking box in it that will stop any dog from running or treeing any game. I have used it on a Vaughn Bluetick that was as bad as I have every seen. He finish as a broke coon dog. It is a 13 day prosess, but it works. The second book does not have the breaking box because of the animal right groups. Hope this helps. Rex

unless you're competition hunting there is not reason to break a dog from possums.. i have a friend that said he want his dog to tree only squirrels and coons. what makes coons any better for treeing than possums? they usually tree in smaller trees, closer to the truck and don't hurt your dog. you still have a pair of eyes and they go thump when they hit the ground and there are more of them. rejecting possums remind me of when i used to go stripped bass fishing in the del bay. some of the captains would say things like, "we can catch the strippers if we can get past the blues." the blues are big, aggressive fish that aren't as good to eat when they are big, but they're fun to catch. because the blues were easier to catch, no one wanted them. as far as treeing goes, the possums are just easier to tree but that doesn''t mean the dog will pass up a coon. it's just treeing a possum on the way to a coon.
if you're hunting squirrels, a fox squirrel is bigger, slower and easier to tree than the willy gray squirrel that will sprint through the tree tops. yet, i've never heard of anyone breaking a dog from fox squirrels or of anyone wanting to break a dog from gray squirrels because they are smaller.

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The best little female I ever owned was the harest to break off of opposum. Only 1 good woopin for a deer though. she just liked to tree. She won her first hunt at 8 months old with 75 other dogs there. we did the shocker, woopin her, tied one to her. pretty much everything you could think of. Once she hit about 3 years old, she would only do it when she was about to come in heat. I figured since it was then that she did it, that i could live with it.

Tree possiums

Most young dogs will tree a possium, mostly because they can see it up the bush. The better they get on coon the easer it is to break one. You are right we make more out of it than it really is unless you are compatistion hunting. Just my thought. Rex