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-- Mt.Gilead OH, TOC (wow) (http://forums.ukcdogs.com/showthread.php?threadid=928558863)

Mt.Gilead OH, TOC (wow)

The numbers hunting out of there are crazy. I think people are going to be disappointed with the scores there this yr, unless they hunt feeders. All the State ground is dogged bad. In fact 3 very well known guys were up from KY last weekend while myself and a buddy were there. It has been hard to get a clean place to hunt there since it opened this yr. From day one there were people even on weeknights all around me. Last yr by the end of dec. it was quite and you could hunt no problem, not this year. 2024 was the 1st year in a long time i have had issues on private land as well. Guys pulling down lanes to drop in where i'm already hunting. Which is upsetting because most of the private land I hunt i'm the only one with permission to coon hunt, do to guys rutting up lanes and letting dogs tree behind houses in the middle of the night. just a matter of time before I get kicked out, because of others. I'm not sure if its local guys or people up here working on the solar panels. Or guys from other states up for money hunts, dumping anywhere, which I have seen that happen as well. So yes we might have more coon here in general than some of the other places however they have been very well educated and don't have far to go to hit up a den. I look for low scoring double cast wins to take most of the spots. I don't know that there will be room for a sat night bucket high score or not.

I believe you hit why permission to hunt is hard to come by.

Score wise if you get a good guide. I've seen expensive dogs tree nothing, unheard of dogs tree 5 singles same cast,same spot same time. Someone out there has a special dog, scorecard don't lie.

I’m Entered there and there going to haven to come up with 60 guides. So your guide is Going make a big Difference

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If You Don't Have A Tree Dog Then You Ain't Got $hit

You have to draw the perfect cast these days. I use to guide all the big events in this area. Myself or my cast winners were always in the top 4 scores. That was before dogs blew out of the woods for no reason. I even had several $kc cast score over 1000, and yes they were split trees but all very close together and the time of year where you could quickly score the trees. My woods were patch woods for the most part, but full of coon. I can't guide anymore because these dogs aren't looking for coon when you cut them loose. I only have 3 places left that I can recast my dog for 2 hours let alone 4 dogs.

I’ve only hunted Ohio one time and that was this past Autumn Oaks and I was very very surprised on what we hunted for timber. No fault of the guide by any means. Just very small and it surprises me, folks don’t run into more issues with dogs running everywhere. Couldn’t imagine having 4 big hunting dogs, hunting the pieces we were in.

I went along as a backup handler with a friend this weekend. Friday night I logged over 4 miles walking back and forth to dogs crossing roads in both directions. The dog that should have won withdrew with 20 min left in the hunt because he was gutted. It made me sick, the guy was 67 yrs old and kept up every step. But 2 dogs were treed .53 away and he was done. Mind you there was no reason for this as on our was back we counted 4 coon the dogs ran past. Sat night was ugly from start, drew two dogs out of the same kennel and one was the judge and guide, so you knew before you left it was going to be rough. They young man handling the dog was not handling the dog his back up handler was. They tried to get the judge to scratch someone on every tree we walked too. They minus 3 trees with coon in them. Two times dogs were handled as we were walking by them (not declared treed) to a declared treed dog. It was a mess the whole card should have been thrown out.

X

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If You Don't Have A Tree Dog Then You Ain't Got $hit