Month: April 2020

Saturday morning came around and once again I found myself with a bad case of rabbit fever (not Tularemia but, a strong yearning to be outdoors with my rabbit dogs). I had been kind of under the weather with a sinus cold for a day or two, but I woke up on this day feeling better and it didn’t take much to convince myself that a day in the field was just what I needed.

My dogs and I had been getting a pretty good workout for the past two weeks. One of my brother-in-laws had been visiting on his way to Idaho and he had never hunted rabbits with beagles. I was more than happy to introduce him to my favorite sport and wasted no time in volunteering to take him. He and I had spent several days checking out some of my favorite hunting spots. There was no shortage of rabbits to run and we were able to harvest a few of them and thoroughly enjoy the hound music. He owned several deer hounds at one time when he lived in Alabama so he was not unfamiliar with running dogs.

I have four seven month old male pups from a litter out of my older female Kiss’ Blue Maggie and ARHA GRCH BC Morning Star Blue Buck. I had been splitting them up and taking two of them at a time. They all showed a lot of natural curiosity and thoroughly investigated everything that they came in contact …

The new rabbit-hunting season and the onset of wintry weather arrived hand-in-hand in Kentucky.  With the rabbit season having been moved to November 1, the cold air mass and the rainy days that preceded it could hardly have been more welcome for area rabbit hunters and their hounds.

The hot weather that characterized early spring and persisted throughout the summer, significant infestations of ticks and fleas, as well as this year’s mosquito-borne “West-Nile” virus, went a long ways towards keeping a lot of houndsmen and their hounds out of the fields until cooler weather arrived.

Suddenly, pickup trucks loaded with dog boxes and Beagles were everywhere—the belated labors of hunters and hounds rendered all the more urgent by the early season.  Add to that mix the persistent reports of excellent rabbit populations, and it’s easy to see why area hunters are excited about the new season.

As always, opening day is attended by anxious expectations. That is particularly true when the season is kicked off at a new hunting venue.  There’s something about a new hunting spot that inspires wildly exaggerated hopes of bountiful game and excellent hunting.

Like many hunters, I grew up listening to my father’s exciting tales of golden fields and magical thickets where rabbits flushed like birds before the hunters and the hounds. Over the years, I’ve hunted some excellent locations, but the hunting paradises my father recounted have always somehow eluded me.

Nevertheless, those lofty expectations rode with me as we embarked for our new …