Dog owners establish network to help hunters find deer

You wait all day, and just before shooting time ends, that big buck that has been taunting you on your trail camera all season moves right into the crosshairs of your rifle. You fire, the deer jumps and darts off into the shadows of the sunset.
“I hit him, right?” you think to yourself as you look around the spot where the deer was when you fired. It’s getting dark fast, time is not on your side and there is not a speck of blood on the ground to follow.
What to do? Get on the horn with a tracker from the Louisiana Blood Trailing Network ASAP.
Josh Miller, with the network, said “If you think you missed because there is no blood at the site, that’s when you call us, when you see just a speck or no blood at all. Out of the five deer my dog Lucy found this year, two of them had no blood. Another had just a piece of hair and two had good blood.”
In October, Miller, of Church Point, and fellow dog owners Kyle Barnette, Kristi Brown, Chris Haygood, Bo Brown and Landon Walker launched the LABTN Facebook page, and on the page is a list of tracking dog handlers in parishes throughout the state. Contact a tracker in the parish you are hunting in as soon as you lose the trail of the deer or leave a post on the page with your location and contact information.
If a tracker is not available in the parish, the page’s administrators will work to find an available tracker.
The best things about the tracking service? It’s completely free for hunters, and the handlers get to work their dogs on a live trail.
There are about a dozen trackers listed between St. Landry, Acadia and Evangeline parishes.
“It’s modeled after similar groups in other states,” Miller said. “They’ve got tracking groups in Florida, Arkansas, Alabama and Georgia. We have more than one tracker available for most parishes, but we are struggling in north Louisiana. We’ve got about five parishes left without a tracker, and we need people willing to travel.”
Since the group started, more than 75 handlers have signed up and more than 2,000 people have joined the Facebook page. Handlers in the group use a range of dogs for tracking, including curs, catahoulas and labs. Miller estimated that the group has helped at least 100 hunters recover their deer this season, and Allen Parish handler Dustin Reeves has recovered 17 alone. The page administrator said he would like to have 10 trackers per parish.
Miller’s bloodhound Lucy has tracked six deer this season, primarily in Allen, Beauregard and Vernon parishes, where Miller’s lease is located, and the tracker said he is also available to track in St. Landry and Acadia parishes if needed. Of the six deer Miller and Lucy have tracked this year, the duo has located five deer, including a deer shot by Miller’s father
“My dad shot a deer and there was no blood,” Miller said. “Lucy tracked it 80 yards ‘til we found some blood, and she stayed on it ‘til we found the deer about 400 yards from where my dad shot it. Dad thought he had missed the deer, but the bullet had stayed in the leg and prevented blood from coming out at first.”
“That’s the biggest thing, if you think you hit it and you don’t see any blood, contact us as soon as possible so a tracker can get on his way there.”
Training on a live trail is the best way to train, Miller said, and the handler uses beef liver, deer hearts and a deer hide when working Lucy practice on trails around his home.
“I’d much rather find a deer than use liver,” Miller said. “I’ll drag the scent in figure eights, along the fence and then hide it in her cage to practice. I also like to work her on a leash so we won’t ever spook a live deer.”
When it comes to retrieving a deer, time is of the essence for several reasons including recovering the animal before the meat has gone bad and before other animals get to the kill.
“If it’s cold outside, the next day the meat should still be good,” Miller said. “If it’s 80 degrees outside, you have maybe eight to 10 hours, depending on where the deer fell, if it’s in the shade or in water. Bacteria will set it. If you’re hunting in north Louisiana and it’s really cold, you may have a day or two before the meat goes bad, but coyotes and buzzards may get it by then. Just look at it, and you can and tell. If rigor has set in, it’s done.”
“We’ve had dogs still successful on a trail 24 hours after a deer was shot, and we can at least help the hunter get their horns.”