[Ulysses]

Joettu,

Sounds like you have a smart wife. :lol: I love beagles. I've had several. They have noses like you wouldn't believe. Their main thing is tracking game and barking on the trail, but they are smart and I don't think it would take long to train one to track quail or pheasant. They aren't going to "point" the birds, but they would flush them up for you and retrieve downed birds.

I'm a dog person and I like most dogs, but beagles are just special. Don't be surprised though if you get a beagle and your wife then makes a house pet out of him. That way, then you could go ahead and get a Brittany (or whatever) as your outside hunting dog while she keeps the beagle at home so he won't get hurt or lost. :wink:

 

[Ulysses]

Beagles love to hunt and they crave attention. They are not the kind of dog to keep penned up in solitary confinement. If you are going to keep them in a kennel, then at least get 2 beagles so that they can keep each other company.

I never had any trouble with my dogs howling unless an emergency vehicle with a siren went by. Then they would howl for a short time, but so would my bird dog.

They LOVE to hunt or just chase rabbits. I could just drop the tailgate on my pickup truck and then open the kennel gate and the beagles would literally race to the truck and run around it until I put them in the dog box in the back of the truck. They are ready to go hunting any time. They are not like some hunting buddies who sometimes can't get away from their wife or who sometimes have a hangover and can't get out of bed. The beagle is ALWAYS ready to hunt. But then again, so are most bird dogs. It's just that beagles have a way of endearing themselves to you. They can read you like a book and they know how to get attention and get petted. They are also smarter then many people give them credit for.

I had a little female named Daisy who, while out hunting with me, followed up my scent trail and limped up to me carrying her right rear leg. She sat down on her butt and then stuck her whole right rear foot in her mouth. I knew something was wrong so I went and looked at her foot. She had a BIG thorn stuck right in the bottom of the pad of her foot. Every time she would take a step, this thorn would go in a little deeper. I pulled the thorn out and in less than 10 seconds she was running back to the other dogs to help find a rabbit.