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REBEL RED JAKE August 2002 - December 2005
Some folks never get that "once in a lifetime hound." I have had mine and his name was Jake. I bought him from Wayne Campbell at Timber Chopper Kennels as a six week old puppy and although I had no idea at the time, he changed me forever. I had told several folks that Jake was my one and only attempt to hunt Redbones. If it didn't work out, oh well, I'd be a Walker man for life. Wow, did it ever work out. Jake was treeing on coon tails donated by the local road kill at three months old. He was an absolute natural and shattered all of those myths about the breed. They're too slow to start. They're bred for show not for go. They're not good treedogs...on and on. He was all I had at the time and he had to learn how to hunt by himself without the help of an older hound to show him the ropes. A few catch and release coons later, he treed on his first wild coon at eleven months old. Over the next couple of years, he developed into one of the most balanced hounds I've ever seen. He, without question, had it all. Your first impression upon seeing him would be that he was definitely a looker. He had that nice deep red coat which made him a gorgeous 80 pound hound. He lived to hunt. He had a nice bawl & chop on track and gave a long triple bawl locate, you seasoned veterans know the kind I'm talking about, the one that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck, and then he rolled over into a bawl & chop tree bark. He loved to split tree and was deadly accurate. Jake was an absolute dream to hunt. So, he was a nice hound that had looks and ability but it didn't stop there. The thing I like to see most in these hounds is intelligence. He had a big dose there as well and I believe that's what separated him from the rest. He was a quick study whether it was learning to load/unload, tree raccoons, or know he shouldn't bark at all hours of the night upsetting the neighbors. He did do things that made me scratch my head. He would not eat his food from the feeder. Jake would scrape it out onto the floor and then eat it. Most males do their fair share of marking their territory. Well, Jake had things confused and he marked them differently. He would back up to trees and do a number two on them. Again, made me scratch my head. I never have seen a hound do that before or since. Two interesting hunts come to mind when reminiscing about Jake. The first was a hunt where he treed but didn't sound quite right. He would tree and pause, tree and pause which was not how he did it. He always treed with style. When we found him, he had to be about 45 feet high up in a fallen tree that was resting in the forks of a huge hardwood. There was simply no way to get him down. Long story short, we acted like we were going to leave him and he turned around and made it most of the way down the tree where he lost his footing on the slippery bark and fell about 10-15 feet. He got up and started treeing. By the way, we saw the raccoon in the big hardwood. The second memory is of a hunt where he treed in a hole in the creek bank. By the time I got to the scene, all I could see was his hind end and tail wagging. I grabbed his leg to pull him out and had almost succeeded when I lost my grip. As you can imagine, he was pretty wet. He dove back into to the hole and pulled the coon out. I've been on a lot of hunts and I've never seen it done before or since. That's gritty. I had always hoped that Jake would live a long life here at the farm spending lots of time in the stud pen and training the next generation of redbones. He was one of those rare hounds that could have had an impact on the breed. He was taken from us in the worst of ways. His dog food contained deadly levels of aflatoxcin and he received a lethal dose dying from aflatoxcin poisoning. At this point, I'm not going to give any details due to the legal matters at hand. To this day, we feel the void that he left behind. Folks, you simply don't get the pleasure of having this caliber of hound often and I miss him dearly. His legacy to me was change. He changed my opinion of redbones and has made me a believer in the breed. He changed many of my training philosophies that I will continue to use for years to come. He also changed my attitude. I will never take a hound for granted. I knew he was special but I never dreamed he would be gone in such a short time. Jake has become the benchmark for me. Truly the measure of which all of my future puppies will be judged. I like to believe he now resides in the happy hunting grounds above where he spends his nights chasing those crafty raccoons and his days sleeping in the sun.
Three Months Old Three Years Old |
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Last Updated on Thursday, June 19, 2008 |
