Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-01-12
COON-HUNTING.
FASCINATING FEATURES OF THIS
OLD.TIME VIRGINIA SPORT.
The Coon is an Animal Full of
Tactics and Ready for All
Emergencies.


keen scent of the deer-h hound with the in
telligence of the shepherd dog, and the te-
nacity of the bulldog with the stealth of the
panther. With less accomplishments than
these, he might have been good on fox or
deer trail the lowing herd would probably
have been safe in his keeping, as he might
have been able to hold his own in a fight,
or have stood an excellent chance of sue
ceeding as sheep-stealer, but he couldn't
have been coon-dog; for your coon is a
cute and tricky customer and crammed
with patience.
Moreover, he leaves behind him the cold
est, most scentless trail of animals that
run. He leads you through tangled
swamps and deep stony hollows. He
crosses and recrosses swift-running streams.
He frisks along the top of rough stone walls
as silent and swift as shadow. He stops
within a dozen feet of some convenient
wall, clears the intervening space at
bound, strikes the tree and glides up to the
longest limb, runs to its extremity and
leaps dozen feet beyond it to the ground
again, breaking his trail abruptly on one
side and beginning it as confusedly abrupt
on the other. He invents tactics for emer-
gencies and brings to every consideration of
his welfare and that of his family large
and uniformly level head. He plays his
cards well, and the dog that would beat
him must needs hold both bowers and the
ace, with strong cards to back them. These
the coon-dog of our fathers always had.
TWO KINDS OF COON DOGS.
There were as / remember, twenty-five
wears ago, the still-hunting coon dog and
the coon dog who let you know at every
step that he was getting there. There was
mixed up with the methods of the still
hunter an element of greater certainty that
you would get your coon than there was
with the more melodious system of the
dog that mouthed his presence in the
sbadowy chase, but the style of the latter
put more Jingle in your blood and buoyed
you up with sweeter expectancy. There
was something weird and uncanny in fol-
lowing the still dog in all the windings and
turnings of the gloomy woods at night. He
crept among tangled brush and deep
ravine, climbed abrupt knolls and worked
his serpentine way down into deep hol-
lows, turning, doubling shifting, crossing
and recrossing his track, like the laby-
rinthian tracing of ships capricious
course-silent as the night around him,
SteaIIny as twilight SnduOW
His very silence brought him to the
prize. As the trail of the unsuspecting
coon became warmer, the noiseless pursuer
grew more cautious, until, the game in
sight, he rushed upon it like an avalanche,
and the pent-up music of the soul went
forth in one fearful howl of triumph, and
the surprised and frightened coon knew
that his nights were numbered
But it was different with the dog that
gave tongue as he hunted. He made music
in the night-not the silyery treble of the
fox hound, floating down from the hills on
the frosty air, and drawn out in sweet
cadenza by every willing echo, nor yet the
mellow bass of the deer hound, swelling
over the ridges, clear and far-sounding as
pugle note, but pleasant though staccato
song of his own. half bark, half bays
cheerful mingling of melody.
QUALITY OF THE BAYING Deg.
The baying coon dog always has better
nose than his noiseless brother, and be
needed to have. The coon never knew
when the silent dog was on his track, and
consequently did not bring to his protec-
ton the many wiles and stratagems that he
at once resorted to when the cry of the
other dog rang out on the trail. 1t was
then that he maneuvred to throw his false
scents and the brook and the bramble, the
hill and the hollow, were all impressed in
his service for his race for life, and it was
then that the baying coon dog of our fathers
came out strong; step by step he unraveled
the tangled and well-hidden scent, con-
stantly sounding his wild challenge to the
coon to do his best until the hunted ami
mails repertory of wiles was exhausted,
and, accepting the inevitable, he climbed a
tree. When the dog found he had brought
the coon to this his musical bay changed
to loud, quick bark, the signal TO the
hunter following on behind that the coon
was freed
But with the war coon hunting went out
of fashion as pastime and the race OF
trained coon dogs gradually became ex-
tinct. There are coon dogs and coon hunt
ers yet but they are not the coon dogs OF
our fathers, and the hunters are generally
shiftless, hand-to-mouth members of the
community, who are even ashamed TO have
it known that they go a coon hunting. Yet
twenty-five years ago the Colonel and the
Squire, the dominic and the deacon. were
nightly hounders of this willy game, and
Wed each with the other in being known
as the best coon hunter in their respective
bailiwicks.
Once in those rare days a new preacher
was settled over a backwoods district in
Pike county. He was not wise in the WAYS
on the charge he began the usual protracted
meeting season. By and by he noticed
that on moonlit and starlit nights his con
eregatlon was made up OF women only
Finally he asked the reason of this. a
sister rose and said:
tits cause the coonin's better'n It's in
the dark O the moon, dominic. Soon ez the
moon darks the men'll jine ye."
Sure enough, when the moon "darked'
the brethren were all in their places in the
meeting house, joining heartily in the pro
ceedings. The pastor demonstrated with
them publicly.
"Whileyou have been idling after coons. ,
said he, There have been those in the dis
trict who do not hunt coons, and whom
you might have led here and saved theil
FOULS"
Deacon Brown rose up in meeting, and
said:
Dominic if thez anyone in this district
ez don't hunt coons, his soul hain't with
savin'."
There was sport in the coon hunt for our
fathers, and in great measure a mans
importance in some communities was
Judged by the number of coon skins be
could nail TO his barn door after a hunt
Why the coon has come TO be despised by
sportsmen in these latter days is one OF
those things about which the remark has
once or twice been made that no fellow can
find out. He is as cunning as the fox. and
more difficult TO trail. He is, moreover
the cleanest of animals, and eats only the
most wholesome of food. He should not be
despised, surely, because he can be hunted
only at night, for in threading the woods
in the darkness, following dogs that you
cannot see. and whose baying alone breaks
the stiffness, there is most singular en-
chautment.
Even in localities where coons are the
most abundant, nine out of ten OF the pres
ent generation never saw one, and few
people know anything about them or their
habits. Although the coon prefers the vi
cinity of civilization as his habitat, he
plans to keep aloof from the eyes of men,
and his habits render this an easy task. By
day he lies in out-of-the-way retreats, in
the depths of hollow trees or isolated GREY