Registered: Nov 2015
Location: NC
Posts: 88

Had a youngster tell me that if the track was over 30 minutes old then it was a cold track, I have been in this game a long time and couldn't help but laugh on the inside, so what's yalls opinion, when is a track considered COLD? To me 3hrs is still HOT!!!

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Registered: Sep 2006
Location:
Posts: 903

Time doesn't have a lot to do with a track being cold, I've seen tracks 3 minutes old that was cold. What's cold for your dog might be hot for you're neighbors dog.

A cold track is determined by the ease or problems your dog has running that that particular trail.

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Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Clarksville, AR
Posts: 1077

Conditions play a major role, but...

I'd bet there's not many dogs living that could "run" a two hour old track. If you got one that can tree a three hour old track consistently and not make a mess of it I'd nearly make the drive to come see it...

I've actually played around with this a great deal with multiple dogs over the years hunting out of a boat by marking a coon's location on the bank and coming back later and later to see how the time impacts the trailing. Usually, the dogs do better on a 5-10 minute old track than a red hot one. At about the thirty minute mark, they start to stumble. Rare is the dog that will accomplish much with an hour old track. At three hours most of what I would consider my "good" dogs would have sense enough to skip out and find something better to do.

Last edited by Cory Highfill on 11-14-2015 at 12:31 AM

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Registered: Sep 2014
Location:
Posts: 562

i think it depends a lot on the weather conditions and the dog both on how hot or cold a track is , i know the dogs we run bear with you can tell by their bawl about how hot or cold the track is and i got without a coon dog once and coon hunted a couple of them and i never seen a change up in their bawl or the mouth they gave on any coon track they ran and treed and one would think that some of the tracks would have been a lot colder than others , i think a dog that has a good nose can take a colder track and make it look hot and a dog that don't have that good of nose can make a hot track look cold ..

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Registered: Jun 2013
Location: PA 16646
Posts: 1120

When your dog is yelpin like hes steppin on hot coals and cant get the words outta his mouth, thatsa hot track!!

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Registered: Jan 2013
Location: Marietta
Posts: 10790

Any coonhunter that's hunted any amount of time should know the difference. I like it when you hit an old feed track they work it up and get it jumped and just before they get it treed they are screaming on that track and start locating 20 yards from the tree makes me happy, happy,happy lol !!

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My experience makes me agree with what Cory H. wrote.
I have deer hunters and bear hunters everyday in my store talking about the 12 hour old track their dogs took and jumped. Well I hunt coon and it ain't happening.

I have traveled a lot of sandy dirt roads only to see a coon track in my tire tracks I had traveled several hours earlier. The dogs just ain't running them. I will say the time or year, mainly the humidity will be a factor but your not talking adding hours but minutes to the life of the track.

Last edited by on 11-14-2015 at 01:38 PM

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Registered: Apr 2012
Location: west central Il.
Posts: 350

I remember back in the late,70's my buddies had a couple plott hounds that would track a coon from the night before.
At least I thought so as I hunted the same pasture the night before and seemingly run the same tracks and treed coon.
His dogs never would tree just run.LOL( YOUNG PUPS)
BUT THAT WAS 40 YEAR AGO.I think we have lost most of the cold tracking ability. Nite hunts main reason.IMO.But I like to tree coons and not run a 2 hour track for 3 hours to tree 1 coon.I would call this progress for coons.
Maybe not Bear,Mountain Lion or Bobcat.You need a cold tracking dog to get it going then release dogs that will drive it once you get it going.
Different strokes for different folks!

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Registered: Jun 2003
Location: Washington, NC
Posts: 3315

I believe that atmospheric conditions play more of a role than time does. Also depends on the tracking style of the dog. Over the years most of the coons my dogs have treed are laid up asleep before the dogs even strike the track. On hot tracks that the dogs actuality ran the coon up the tree the coon is usually in the very top of the tree

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Registered: Aug 2013
Location: sw mo
Posts: 971

quote:

---

Originally posted by D. Davis
I remember back in the late,70's my buddies had a couple plott hounds that would track a coon from the night before.
At least I thought so as I hunted the same pasture the night before and seemingly run the same tracks and treed coon.
His dogs never would tree just run.LOL( YOUNG PUPS)
BUT THAT WAS 40 YEAR AGO.I think we have lost most of the cold tracking ability. Nite hunts main reason.IMO.But I like to tree coons and not run a 2 hour track for 3 hours to tree 1 coon.I would call this progress for coons.
Maybe not Bear,Mountain Lion or Bobcat.You need a cold tracking dog to get it going then release dogs that will drive it once you get it going.
Different strokes for different folks!

---

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Registered: Jun 2006
Location: Fairbanks In.
Posts: 571

So if u can breed more or less nose on dogs can u breed more or less eye sight on hearing on them tooooooo!!!!!

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Registered: Dec 2012
Location: Afton, Virginia
Posts: 61

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cory Highfill
Conditions play a major role, but...

I'd bet there's not many dogs living that could "run" a two hour old track. If you got one that can tree a three hour old track consistently and not make a mess of it I'd nearly make the drive to come see it...

I've actually played around with this a great deal with multiple dogs over the years hunting out of a boat by marking a coon's location on the bank and coming back later and later to see how the time impacts the trailing. Usually, the dogs do better on a 5-10 minute old track than a red hot one. At about the thirty minute mark, they start to stumble. Rare is the dog that will accomplish much with an hour old track. At three hours most of what I would consider my "good" dogs would have sense enough to skip out and find something better to do.

---

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Registered: Jan 2007
Location: Al
Posts: 3069

Iv seen hounds that acted like ever track they struck was a day old and then iv seen-um that you couldn't tell how cold it was cause it never got any better or never got any worse .... some dogs is just dumb that way I think

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Registered: Aug 2008
Location: SE Ohio, Glouster
Posts: 2244

I like YadkinTar's style of dog but finding them is danged near impossible. I'm thinking this old 8 year old female I have right now could tree a two hour track without looking flat stupid, but I may get fooled when I put her to the actual test. She is off my original line of dogs but watered down just a bit over time. I know she is not quite as cold nosed as my dogs of yesteryear, but I tested them and they could move a two hour track with relative ease when the tracking conditions were good. Such as they are right now after a soaking rain and a cool night with temps in the 40's

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Registered: Oct 2006
Location: Pleasant Plain OHIO
Posts: 1291

I guess I have a special kind of dog , I was coming home from work , seen a coon out in a field near one of my spots stopped and watched it for a few minutes, seen the direction it was traveling , on a small ditch ,, so went home ate relaxed , decided to go hunting , maybe 4 hours latter , I cut my dog on the ditch I seen the coon , he starts off with his voice that tells me, this is an old track ,, gets it up moving pretty good and falls treed ,, 600 yards from where I cut him, it did take him about 15-20 minutes to get it treed ,, The coon laid sleeping on a Limb ,, If it was the same coon ,,I don't know ,, But I would bet it was

Let me back up to 1988 ,, Dad and I was training some pups at a state park close to the house , we turned a cage coon lose the pups ran and treed it, we shot it and the coon hung ,, 25 hours later we went back to go hunt with the old dog Worm and the same pups , Worm struck right where we cut that coon lose and trailed it to the tree where the coon was still hanging and treed ,, It was 300 yards or so ,, and did it in probably in 10 min.

So to define a cold track and put a time limit on it , Not sure you can , depends on the dog and weather conditions , More than Time

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Registered: Aug 2013
Location: sw mo
Posts: 971

Ive seen the same type of thing... watched a coon leave a corn field draging an ear of corn watched it cross right in front of us we drove off went on huntin came back 4 1/2- 5 hrs later cut a dog in that direction the coon went. struck about 100 yrds. and tracked cold to medium 1000yrds. and treed with the coon ear of corn at the bottom of the tree. and that was the only corn patch in the area. knowing the dog it wasnt mine i say it was the same coon. but i also saw the same dog struggle more on tracks i know were no were near that old.

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Registered: Oct 2013
Location: Fulton county AR
Posts: 64

A couple of years ago I set out a few DP coon traps .I went and run them around 8:30 am .One off them was gone the wire had pulled loose from the tree I had tied it to .I look around for the trap and the coon but couldn't find it so I decided to go home and get my 10 month old English and see if he could find it .I got back around 9:00 am and turn him loose were the trap had been tied .He struck but did not say a lot on track but kept working the trail after about 30 yds he open and moved the track about 150 yds were he bayed the coon .That track had to be more than two hours old because it had got daylight at 6:00 am that day.I think this track was more like 6 hours old but who I don't now.

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Registered: Aug 2013
Location: sw mo
Posts: 971

It may have started out 2 hrs old but if the dog bayed the coon and didnt tree it i would think the coon was millin around hurt and the pup ran alot hotter track than you think

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Registered: Mar 2012
Location: Canada
Posts: 338

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cory Highfill
Conditions play a major role, but...

I'd bet there's not many dogs living that could "run" a two hour old track. If you got one that can tree a three hour old track consistently and not make a mess of it I'd nearly make the drive to come see it...

---

Last edited by firebird on 11-19-2015 at 03:27 PM

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Registered: Jun 2003
Location: Central Michigan
Posts: 6544

I agree that a hounds ability to run a track has less to do with time than many other factors. Scent trails are more similar to a vapor trail than not. I believe air temperature, air moisture, ground temperature and moisture as well as a rising or falling barometer determines a hounds ability to run a track.

I have mentioned the following scenario on here several times before. My buddy had a female directly out of Sackett Jr. Her name was Tess. Tess was by far the best track dog in her litter despite the fact that her litter mates were no slouches.

We pulled up to hunt a piece of state land, and as we parked the truck we could see a coon sitting up in a large oak at the end of a tree line along a fence. We walked Tess in and cut her to the southeast. We ended up hunting a half circle for 2 hours after making several trees. Our last track was a hot track that Tess moved over a 1/4 mile and slammed a tree. Yes, it was the same oak with the coon sitting up at least for 2 hours. If i didn't know any better, I would have thought that track was no more than 15 minutes old. I could cite many other similar observations over the last 42 years.

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Registered: Mar 2015
Location: Michigan
Posts: 40

iv been out lots of nights with my male dog and hes ran many tracks over or short of mile rain or snow and coon is up there sleeping.think with the right moisture tracks will last for hours.

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