Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, December 12, 1993 TAG: 9312130303
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By MELISSA DeVAUGHN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MCCOY LENGTH: Long
``Well, look at that - there's two 'coons up there,'' Brilhart said in disbelief. ``No, wait a minute, there's three - no, there's four coons up that tree.''
Faw didn't believe Brilhart. He shined his own bright halogen flashlight into the tree, examined its occupants, turned to Brilhart and said: ``Carl, those aren't raccoons. That's a sow bear and three cubs.''
As far as Faw, 62, is concerned, that cool fall night is one of the most memorable experiences he's had in almost 50 years of coon hunting. His dog, Buster, had an unforgettable experience that night, too. ``The bear messed the back end of that dog up and he just didn't walk the same,'' Faw said.
Raccoon hunting is a sport that conjures up images of an old Southern way of living. In the popular book ``Sounder,'' William Armstrong describes a wounded Georgian hound dog who is faithful to his owner, waiting months for him to come home.
The reality is, coon hunting is more widespread than just in the South. Take for example, ``Where the Red Fern Grows,'' a book set in the Ozark Mountains near Oklahoma.
Coon hunting enthusiasts compete in national competitions, for the chase, not the hunt. They're found from as far away as Florida and Oklahoma. In Canada, coon hunting is one of the more popular mountain sports as the country has a larger population of raccoons than the United States.
Champions of the national competitions do not win cash prizes, yet money is made by stud fees for champion coon hounds and pups of those litters. In these coon-hunting competitions, four dogs, one per owner, are assembled into a ``cast.'' The cast is let loose and the dogs run in search of a raccoon scent. Each dog has its own voice for running.
``Everybody knows their dog's voice,'' Faw said. ``If there was 100 dogs out there I could pick mine out.''
In coon hunter circles, they say a dog has a ``pretty mouth'' when it is tracking the fresh scent of a coon.
Once a dog in the cast picks up the scent of the raccoon, it bellows out a unique bark that indicates it has ``struck'' the scent. The dog that strikes first picks up points in the competition.
After striking, the dogs clamber off further into the woods, hot on the trail of the running raccoon. Sometimes the masked creature will try to outsmart the dogs, climbing a tree, jumping the branches to another nearby tree and escaping. On most occasions, however, the frightened raccoon will climb up a tree and cling to a branch trying to make itself seem smaller among the leaf cover.
The first hound to locate the hidden raccoon will ring out its own particular series of barks (called ``singing'' by coon hunting enthusiasts). The dogs will bound excitedly around the base of the tree clawing to get at the raccoon, tucked safely in the branches. Faw said he has seen dogs that will stay at the base of a tree for four or five hours, waiting for the raccoon to tire of the game and come down. In competitions, the first hound to sing has ``treed'' the coon and will receive even more points.
``I think a lot of people think we just go out, run [the raccoons] up a tree and slaughter them,'' Faw said. ``That's not so ... it's the love of the sport, the competition and the breeding.''
Faw is one of a growing number of coon hunting enthusiasts in the New River Valley.
The Blue Ridge Coon Hunters and Sportsman Association started in 1961 and has about 50 active members. Some of the members have been with the club since its beginning, a sign that once a coonhunter, always a coonhunter.
``Some are in [coonhunting] for the raccoon hides, some even eat them,'' club treasurer Wendell Bond said. ``I haven't eaten coon in years . . . they say it tastes sort of like chicken, but it`s greasy.''
Others, he said, hunt coons for the money they can make at it. A good coon dog brings a stud fee of up to $400; the more successful the dog, the more money the coon hunter can make.
``And some people just enjoy fooling around with the hounds,'' Bond said.
Coonhunting takes more dedication than other types of hunting, Bond said. It's ``almost like another job.
``When you're out there, you're moving around, always on the move - not like deer hunting where you just sit in a tree stand. Coons can go in some pretty rough places.''
Coon hunters also spend hours and hours training their dogs. Much of the drive to chase raccoons is innate, but producing a champion hound takes intensive training. Such a dog can sell for anywhere from $800 up to several thousand dollars, and in rare cases, $10,000.
Faw, who is retired, spends 12 to 15 hours a week training his two Red Bone dogs and new Blue Tick puppy. He starts training them at about 7 months with a ``drag'' - a sack covered with the scent of a raccoon. He pulls the drag around the yard, through the woods and up a tree, training the pup to follow that scent. A dog is trained up to about four years. Dogs are good to track raccoons until they reach age 12 or 13.
Faw's current coon hounds are Ruby and Thunder, both Red Bones, both a beautiful deep brownish-red. When they are on the leash, ready for a hunt, they are transformed into two bundles of muscles, quivering with excitement. Faw is particularly fond of Ruby, whom he named after the first coon hound he ever owned, a Texas-born Red Bone he bought when he was 13.
There are many other breeds of hound dogs used for coon hunting: the Treeing Walker, Blue Tick, Red Tick and Black and Tan. In this area, Faw and Bond agree that Treeing Walkers seem to be the most popular. They are
tri-colored, like a beagle, yet slender and fast like other coon hounds.
At one time, raccoons were hunted for their hide, which could bring $30-$40. Now, the going rate is only a few dollars, according to Game and Inland Fisheries figures.
Bob Duncan, chief of the Virginia Game and Inland Fisheries wildlife division, said hunters today are not interested in hunting for the hides, ``but in the breeding and raising of the dogs, just as the horse people are with their horses.''
Duncan said there are more raccoon hunters per square mile in Southwest Virginia than anywhere else in the state, even though there are more raccoons in the Tidewater area.
The hunt season for raccoons is Oct. 15 to Jan. 31and the chase season is even longer - Aug. 1 to May 31 on private lands only. National Forest chase seasons are more limited.
Whatever the reason, whatever the season, Charles Faw is content to set out on his Mount Zion property and run his dogs every other evening or so. For him, ``it's being out in the woods and with the dogs'' that he loves best.
``I've been coonhunting all my life,'' he said. ``It doesn't matter if you [tree a raccoon] ... sometimes you don't at all. I just enjoy it.''
by CNB