It’s the first day of deer season — the day that most all hunters look forward too. I get up and get dressed in my briar pants and orange hat and head to the club house. Everyone is meeting there to get some eggs, bacon, sausage, grits and biscuits. As daylight nears, hunters arrive and many stories are told while breakfast is served. 

After socializing and eating, everyone heads out to the yard, and we start loading up the dog box. We load up Leroy, Digger, Rose, Blanche, Cletis, Charlie, Bubba and Barbara. The time is coming that all houndsmen have been looking forward to all year.  The hunt masters tell us what block we are hunting and we are off to line up the woods and the pulpwood paths. We turn the dogs out and, it’s not long and they got one up. Boom boom boom.  They cry out, “just got a nice one. We got a 10-pointer down.”  After about three more hours of hunting, we get two-10 pointers, three eight-pointers a big seven-pointer and a six-pointer. 

It was opening day of the 2007 season and a day that every member of the club will never forget. This kind of day does not come every day when dog hunting but something that you can expect every week is a good time. Everyone is respectful of each other and everyone works as a team to get in front of what we call the prettiest sound in the woods: the sound of an eager walker chasing the buck of a lifetime through the swamp.

Dog hunting is a great southern tradition and is part of many sportsmen’s lives throughout the southeastern part of the United States and one that brings many families and friends together and gets many young children into hunting. Dog hunting for deer is one of the most exciting things to do when done right and also can be very successful with a good plan of attack. 

With the thick and dense covered terrain throughout many southeastern states, dog hunting for deer is a good way to kill a big buck. Unlike still hunting, this form of hunting does not require quite as much patience and also requires skilled marksmen to kill moving deer through the woods or crossing a path. One must also be able to anticipate the route the deer is taking and also know where to turn the dogs in.

This tradition is a part of many hunters’ lives throughout the southeast and is a tradition that families and friends take part in year in and year out. Dog hunting for deer can also help keep the deer population down while also having a good chance at killing a big buck. With big timber company leases and dense terrain throughout the southeast, dog hunting should be a long living family and community tradition.