After Molly got better at trailing I would take her into the woods and let her trail the real thing, with me following behind at the end of her leash. After a while, I could dispense with the leash and let her run loose. She would trail ahead occasionally but always came back to get me. Evidently, I became her pack or her reliance on me was so great that she would not go alone in the woods far without me. Unlike Lula, Molly would rarely bark. Once in a while I would hear her make a squealing sound but not routinely. She was a stealth deer dog. This is not a good attribute as barking is the way a hunter knows where the dogs are located and in which direction they and the deer are headed, as explained previously.

During the season of 1996 Doug did not come up to our camp in the forest many times as he was training Lula's other pups in the more conventional way, which is to simply let them run with a more experienced dog. He could only do this in an area that allowed dog hunting like Oak Hill. I continued to work with Molly in my unconventional way.

Molly had her first real trailing test in November when she was five months old. A hunting companion in camp had shot a small buck and was unable to find it. There were some tracks and a short blood trail but the blood trail petered out and the tracks became impossible to find in the underbrush. I took Molly to the site and let her smell the track. She scented and started through the woods with me behind. I could not find a track or blood and knew not if she was trailing. We went through some thick woods and my companions doubted that she was 'on the deer'. Having learned the lesson with Lula, I decided to let her take me where she may. We came to the edge of a clear cut and found a track in the sand of the fire break they had cleared around some short pines. There was a drop of blood on the trail that proved Molly to be on target. We started into the short pines when the deer stood up. It could not run well and the coup de grace was given.

Later that year in December I took Molly over to Oak Hill so she could run and learn with Lula. She did very well. She kept up with the pack and was with Lula in the front when I shot the small buck they were chasing. She still did not bark, however, but I did hear her squealing in the woods several times as though she was being beaten. After a few races, it became clear that Molly's squeals were actually a manner of barking and that she would only bark/squeal when she saw the deer or was about to run up its butt. This made it easy for me to determine when the dogs had jumped a deer. The squeal was the giveaway then and continues to be until this day.

I did get into trouble during that weekend however. I figured that it would be good for Molly to run with Lula for a bit so I left her with Doug at the camp, as he was staying for a few more days. You would have thought that I had abandoned a child in the woods to starve or be eaten by wild animals the way Pam took this news. She even wrote me a nasty note about it:

Pam's original nasty note.

This is the note with translation in parentheses:

Hon -
     (you good-for-nuthin' low-life pig)
You stinker - stinker -
     (you doubly odorous swine)
I can't believe you left her -
     (are you that stupid?)
All she knows is sleeping w/us under her blanket,
     (she is my baby and shouldn't be left in the woods)
and you go and leave her.
     (yes you are that stupid!)
This week is going to be awful -
     (you are going to pay for this!)
can't get her out of my head.
     (as in "not this week honey, I got a headache!")
You better hope nothing happens to her - ha ha
     (you're dead meat if it does)
I can honestly say when you left my work - I walked off & chuckled - saying "Ya right Jack - I'll go home - get her from under the blanket, she'll do her yawn and cry."
     (you really really can't be that stupid)
Then I read your note.
     (yup you really really can be)
stinker stinker
     (again with the swine two thing)
meany
     (speaks for itself)
stinker meany
     (a double-dip putdown you swine)
There --
     (Do you understand me?)

Molly made it through the ordeal. So did I!

The original Pam—the note writer!

The regular deer season ends in January. At the end of this period in the Ocala National Forest they have a fox season where hunting dogs can chase fox but these animals cannot be killed. Fox hunting in this manner is more like a sport than actual hunting. I had never done this and did not have a vehicle to do this with ... no beat-up truck, no dog box and no CB. I did have a computer and the internet however. I went on AOL and did a member search looking for people in Florida that hunted deer with dogs. By good fortune I came up with a screen name for an individual on AOL. The name was L----. Her real name ... Janet. I sent an e-mail to this person explaining about my experiences with hunting dogs or lack thereof and telling her that I wanted to learn more about dog hunting. After chatting several times through the instant messenger program, she invited Molly and me up to run fox with her and her husband Roy. Unbeknownst to me they were amused by me and the manner in which I had trained Molly. They figured I was a dingbat with some house dog that couldn't find her way into the woods much less out of them but were kind enough to invite me up to see how it was done.

Continued—»