Jack Russell Terrier Colorado Hunting story, Jack Russell terriers hunting in Colorado, USA - Conquest Terriers, Buffalo, New York USA

Serving Brantford, Hamilton, London, Milton, Toronto, Niagara, St. Catharines, Fort Erie, Buffalo New York.

Our group consisted of Pat and myself and Paul and Debbie along with their son and his girlfriend. We met at Paul and Debbie's house. Paul was finishing up with the early morning chores with the horses so Pat and I pitched in to help so we could get out as early as possible. With that done we loaded the dogs and hunting gear and got underway.

As seems typical here in Colorado, you walk for miles looking for quarry. We spent most of the morning doing just that. The terriers enjoy the walking and the owners get some exercise. We looked and walked rural farm areas bordering the city and some vacant fields on the outskirts of town following mounds of dirt or ditches that have a southern exposure as this is favored by most animals as it helps keep the ground warm in winter. We managed to locate some holes around an old cottonwood tree. Pat took Madison and entered her in the first one. She started to work something almost immediately. Scanning with the locator box he found her to be about six or seven feet from the entrance and 2 feet down. He began to dig and I was listening at the entrance to the hole. She was vigorously working at whatever was in the den as I could hear her with that muffled barking which sounds like she is half way to China. Pat continued his digging and a few moments later I smelled skunk...That is always a bad sign as you never know how badly a dog may react to the spraying. Fortunately for Pat, his dogs are well trained and will come back out when he calls them. Madison did just that and she was taken to the side and we broke out the rubber gloves and the bottle of "Skunk Off" and he gave her a good dousing.

Paul in the mean time had one of his favorite hunting dogs Mick entering a hole in this hollow cottonwood tree. Looked like a good coon hideout. Mick looked and looked but it seems the coons didn't like it as well as we did. We entered another of Paul and Debbie's dogs, Cubby and she went right in to have a look also but came back with the same results. Well...one skunked dog and no quarry so far...off and looking again...

Driving for about 20 minutes we came to a river bottom that Paul thought might hold some possibilities. We walked for about 1/2 mile or so, investigating some holes as we went. Nobody at home this morning. As we got close to the edge of the river Pat walked over to a large pile of driftwood washed down during some high water in the spring. He let Dillon go to take a look around and almost immediately he began working something in the log pile. Pat said he could hear a coon growling in with Dillon. He began moving logs and branches to get in closer to action. Dillon was backing the coon up in the woodpile and he soon had him cornered. Having found him with the locator box, Pat once again started moving logs and branches closer to the animals while we kept the other terriers out of the way. About 2 feet down, there was Dillon holding on to the backside of this raccoon and feeling rather proud of himself. Pat pulled Dillon out of the pile first and handed him to me and then pulled the indignant raccoon out and let her go. She immediately ran across the woodpile and crossed the river thinking she had had enough of these pesky little white things for one day. About the same time as this was finished Paul and Debbie's dog Mick was in another hole and working actively at another raccoon. He was pushing the coon back and forth in a large network of tunnels. Paul thought entering a second dog to keep the coon from moving around so much might be a good idea so he could get in and get to the dogs and the quarry, so in goes Cubby. Cubby immediately located the coon and Mick and started working from the other side. Things began to get a little hectic as this coon had an attitude and had the size to go with the attitude. The dogs were still moving it back and forth. Barking was getting more intense and so was the growling of the big coon as the two dogs worked hard to corner their quarry.

Occasionally you would hear a yelp as one of the terriers would get too close and the coon would make them pay for having disturbed it's nap. Paul had determined that the group had stopped moving and was moving branches and logs as fast as he could get them out of the way. He was able to get down to the group in a few minutes and found that Mick had a grip on the coon and the coon also had a mouth full of Mick. He pulled the whole ball of coon and terrier out of the pile and he and Pat worked on separating them without taking any bites themselves. Debbie extracted Cubby from the den and noticed she had a pretty serious bite on her front leg that would require stitches. She did what she could to stop the bleeding and to contain Cubby who still wanted to get loose to get after the coon that Paul was holding. Paul in the mean time had separated Mick and the coon and was looking Mick over and it appeared that he also was in need of stitches with a large cut on his lower lip. The raccoon was indeed a big one weighing over 30 pounds. Paul said "As tough as our terriers are you should never underestimate the fierceness and determination of a raccoon as they are a very formidable foe that will fight to protect it's den and as Mick and Cubby found out can inflict some serious pain when they feel threatened. They also will go to a source of water for protection if they feel they can not fight off the terriers and have been known to drown many dogs who make the mistake of following them into the water."

Well, it was an exciting day's hunt. We were tired and the terriers were tired and sore. We loaded up the dogs and gear trying to think about what we had learned from the days hunt. It was an expensive day for Paul and Debbie as they had several hundred dollars worth of stitching work to be done on the two little hunters. We ended the day with some pizza and brew and talked about this and past hunting trips, petted our tired little terriers and then had to head for home looking forward to the next hunting trip.

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