Canines are our passion.
They are our addiction.
They are our way of life right down to the very core and without them we would be lost.
The canines of this world really are something to behold.
They assist us at work, they accompany us at home, and they perform for us in the field.
No matter where we go, they are by our side.
Canines really are a ride or die and for that we are grateful.
This podcast will showcase working canines of various breeds and disciplines as we search
for those canines and their handlers who are always striving to be the best at what they
do.
Those who are always grinding.
Those who are always pushing the limits.
Those who are always dogging.
Join us on our adventures as it is sure to be a wild ride.
I'm your host, Bryce Matthews.
And I'm your cohost, Stephen Basham.
And this, this is Semper Doggen.
Welcome, welcome, welcome back to another episode of the Semper Doggen podcast guys.
I am your host, Bryce Matthews, and today we're going to do things a little differently.
I recently went down to the Grand American Coon Hunt all the way down in South Carolina.
Went down there specifically for the sole purpose of pushing this podcast.
Trying to get the word out to people.
Let them know what we had going on.
Get the best content that we could get for you guys, the listeners.
We've got big names from John Strickland, Jeff Frickliff, Ashley Oxidine, all the way
down to your local Coon Hunter who you may not have ever heard before.
But guess what?
They've got the same passion those big timers have.
We've got everybody.
We've got them from old all the way to young.
We've got Coon Hounds.
We've got Mouth Calling on here.
This was a fun, fun episode to record and I hope you guys like it.
I did make this trip by myself this year, so Basham will not be joining me on here.
But guys, I'm telling you what, this was just a really fun time for me to go down there,
get to interact with everybody, spread the word of the Semper Dogg and podcast, let them
know what we have going on, our goals, our missions, our future.
And I met some really good people along the way.
And you know what?
I've actually been in contact with a few of them since this recording and I would consider
them friends at this point.
We've talked about every day since then.
So that's the beauty of this podcast, guys.
It really is all about bringing people together and the camaraderie.
Those of us who are always dogging have with each other.
It's a beautiful thing.
So, all right, guys, without further ado, we're going to get into this thing.
I hope you guys enjoy it.
If you do, that's great.
Leave us a review.
Give us a like and a follow.
Come join us over on our Facebook page, Semper Dogg and podcast.
Make sure you follow our sponsors and I hope you guys really, really, really enjoy this
episode.
I am down here in Orangeburg, South Carolina at the 60th anniversary of the Grand American.
And I am joined by a familiar face to me, at least, Mr. Good Luck Genie himself, Michael
Mitchell.
How you doing, bubby?
I'm doing great, guys.
What brings you down here, guys?
How far are you?
First off, how far are you from home?
About 10 hours.
Okay.
What makes you come all the way down here in South Carolina?
Never been to the Grand America.
This is your first time?
Oh, I didn't know that.
Yes, sir.
I figured you'd been here before.
I've been to Winter Classic, Autumn Oaks.
I've been to a lot of them, but not Grand American.
Okay.
So, first impression, Friday afternoon.
What do you think?
A lot of people here are getting ready.
Getting started Friday.
The hunt tonight.
Who you hunting?
I got my handler Lee Wade hunting Hook.
Hook.
Tell me a little bit about Hook.
He's just an English dog, not flashy, just trees, coons.
Now, that is a lie.
He is flashy.
He is one of the prettiest English dogs I've seen.
Well, looks don't treat them coons.
They don't, but by guy, he is a beautiful tri-colored English dog.
I mean, he's got the blue and the red.
He's got it going.
He's a good looking dog.
Yeah, he's got a good head on him, too.
Now, where did you get Hook at?
I bought him from Bub Blackwell when he was 15 months old.
Yep.
Okay, so how old is he now?
He just turned two, June 25th.
Right.
And you've had a pretty good run.
You, Lee, and Hook have had a good run.
Tell me a little bit about what all Hook's accomplished.
Well, I got this little dog.
He could treat a lot of coons.
Right.
And I didn't have a handler.
So I had the dog up for sale.
No one even wanted to come and look at him.
I had a thousand tire kickers.
Finally, I got ahold of Lee.
Told Lee if he'd buy a half interest, we'd run with him.
He did.
Got a few things fixed on him.
Took about two nights of hunting.
Right.
To fix what we needed to fix.
Got him May 25th, I believe, at Black and Tan Days.
PKC Black and Tan Days Monticello.
Was a double cast winner.
Got him in.
Took a little run and been hunting him ever since.
He was third in the PKC state standings for 2023.
Got a tournament champion ticket.
Got a pup ticket in July.
Got a national ticket, of course.
And made him a grand night.
He had 15 UKC wins with all the PKC hunts we put him in also.
That's pretty impressive.
I know he had a good run at the UKC Indiana State too this year.
Yeah, he won it.
Double cast winner.
Put up a pretty good score.
And just trained those coons in state ground.
So have you had Hook down south?
Have you traveled him across the country?
What do you think he's going to do down here?
I expect the dog to travel.
He travels real well.
I expect the dog to do what he does.
He can tree any kind of coon.
He can tree the layups that ain't ever been down.
He trees the real hot coons and the feeding coons.
So I look for him to just do his Hook style training coons.
Is he the only dog you guys brought down here?
Yeah.
Because I know you own a couple other dogs.
I know you had another English dog.
I think you've still got a walker, right?
Yeah, I got Rackham Up Ben, silver champion.
Three-year-old Cody Burrows hunts him.
And Cody went through.
You know, he got married.
Now he's expecting his first child.
So he hasn't been in a lot of hunts, but he's getting ready to rack him back up.
Right.
And he's a nice dog.
I mean, I handled him once and I've drawn out with him a couple of times.
He's a nice dog.
Yeah.
You never even heard the dog bark since I owned him.
And you went and regional and got him in the first round and we got beat late.
Yeah.
But I mean, it still was a good time.
Oh, yeah.
And just helping buddies out.
That was more of it for me, was just trying to help you out whenever you were in a pinch.
So what draws you to the English breed?
Is that what you've always hunted?
No, I've hunted about anything.
But English dogs, me and Lee owned a dog named Freak.
He placed sixth in the Supersteaks last year in the spring.
And he was a coon trader.
And then when I got hooked and Bub talked to me about him, I bought him sight unseen
because me and Bub's good buddies and he's always he knows what a dog is.
And when I started hunting him, I seen he was a country or two.
So the English dogs have really put a big impression to me lately.
And what are you seeing out of them that you might not be seeing out of the other breeds?
I mean, is it just are you seeing something specific?
Well, I see good dogs in every breed.
But the Walker dog I got a little flashy.
He's action packed where he'll miss a little bit.
But with Hook, I mean, when you're going to a tree, you just know you're either going
to see a coon or a dentary.
Right.
Now, an English dog, if I remember, I think the English dog Big Lee won this hunt last
year.
Yes, sir.
I talked to Chris Harley just about an hour ago.
Is Lee down here this year?
Do you know?
Yep.
He'll be hunting tonight.
That's right.
Have you heard anything about the hunting down here?
No, I heard.
Is there any place you don't want to get drawn out to?
I guess it all depends where you go, but you're going to get wet.
I reckon so.
And I think there's a storm coming in tonight.
Yeah, I'm going to stay pretty dry in the truck.
Oh, you've got a nice sweatshirt on says truck man.
I really like it.
Well, every good handler needs a good truck man.
That's pretty slick.
Yeah, I got the two knee replacements and I just it's in my blood.
So I just love to be involved.
So I just help Lee when I can and we go hunt and have a good time and when we go to these
hunts, he takes over and he does a phenomenal job with the hook.
Yeah.
Well, that's what it's all about.
You know, just run these hunts with your buddies, having a good time.
And this is kind of the kickoff.
This is the start of the 2024 season.
Obviously, we're early January down south next month.
We're in South Carolina this month.
Next month, we'll be down in Mississippi.
We're winter class.
You're going to be going down there.
And we got a lot of hunts early spring.
So we're going to have to sit down and decide where we're going.
But you know, with the truck ticket one and nationals and PKC World being moved to the
spring, I think it favors hook.
But there's a lot of hunts and you just with term and champion, you just got to figure
out where you're going to go.
Right.
I mean, that's the thing.
You can really look around at any given time and find a hunt somewhere.
And when you've got a dog that you think can be hauled all over the country, you've got
to pick and choose where you're going to go.
Absolutely.
Hook, you know, I've had a lot of good dogs where you get down here a day or two early
and get them adjusted to travel.
But hook is he travels well.
Well, you got to have that, especially at these longer hunts and out of town.
But Mr. Mitchell, I wish you nothing but the best.
You and Lee, hopefully your handler don't throw it away for you.
Yeah, well, we're here to have a good time.
So we'll let the dog do whatever he's going to do.
And we'll walk away and have a good time either way.
Absolutely.
So I appreciate you sitting down with us here.
Like you said, guys, we are live at the Grand American.
We're going to see if we can't find a couple of other people walking around, sit down
and record with us.
We got Michael Mitchell, his handler, Lee Wade and Hook going to be competing tonight.
So wishing nothing but the best, buddy.
All right.
I appreciate it, Bryce.
Let me sit down and talk to you and everyone needs to come by and stop by and get some
of the Semper 5 Semper Dog.
Yes, sir.
Remember, will you?
They got out here, they got some nice sewn hats and shirts and I ended up buying one.
You did.
So like you said, guys, you can you'll be hearing this here a little bit later after
this event's already over.
You can always hit us up on our Facebook page, Semper Dog and Facebook page.
We've got hats for sale.
We've got shirts for sale.
It's good.
We appreciate you guys supporting us and helping us support the veterans down the road.
Absolutely.
All right, guys.
Well, that does it for Michael Mitchell.
We'll catch you at the next one.
All right.
Appreciate it.
All right, guys, we are sitting here with the current interim world champion of the
EHS, Mr. John Strickland.
We got him strolling around today.
Mr. John, how are you?
Good.
That's funny when you say it like that.
I like it.
You and old Jim had a good little run there.
Yeah, they they they doing a good job so far.
And the format is unbelievable, you know, and it's something fun, different, different
than the sport.
Yeah.
I believe a lot of people have a good time with it.
Yeah, I did too.
I enjoy watching them.
I mean, the live stuff on YouTube, I guess.
You know, I've had people like in my little town.
It's funny.
I don't even never heard of coon hunting in their life.
And I'll see them at the grocery store and McDonald's or wherever.
They'll be like, man, we watch that video.
We watch that video.
You know?
It's just kind of hilarious.
I'm like, what?
How would you find that video?
Yeah, it's fun.
So, yeah.
OK, tell us.
You're down here at Grand American and I believe you had a Poth Point castman last time.
How'd it go?
Yeah.
I hunted the champ, though, you know, he's off country and oh, gosh, I want to sound
like I was 16 years old and I hunted it with Apollo again.
The year he won, we went out of Motes or the year I won out of Motes with him.
I thought it'd be cool when I'm out and then the Grand American.
I won my cast the first night then.
The second night I got on the beat on tiebreaker.
If it hadn't been for that, kind of got a bad deal.
But if it hadn't been for that, I'd have been in again in the Final Four.
This year, we counted it was a last minute deal.
I got it over to the governor's spot over there in Yemacy, South Carolina.
And the dog should have went north and he swung back behind us and went south.
I had a slick, you know, you can't hardly minus a palm tree because they're tall and
they've got a bowl down on top of them.
Well, I get a baby palm tree only about eight foot tall right out of the truck.
You got Seggit and First on it.
So minus that.
Now, you know how it is when you pull a minus right 200 out of the truck.
You got to catch up.
Anyway, he ended up treading.
He got through the country and he treated a big den.
Then he got through the country and treated a coon.
Cut him off that and he fell in there about 700 and treated a triple.
So he treated only two coons we looked at.
Yeah, he had a good job.
But he ended up with 125.
You know, not that slick.
Are you finding with him that you can take him across the country and he's the same dog?
Or how do you think of that?
Yeah, yeah, he's an incredible layup dog.
And that's like last night.
You know, I think one dog had 375 minus at the end.
One had 400 minus, one had 500 minus.
I had a hundred quarter plus.
So you know, if you look at it that way, you say, well damn, you know, look pretty good.
But still wasn't enough to get you.
You got a cast win.
We need to put probably 657, 5800 maybe tonight, you know, with a cast win and you might have
a chance to get in this thing.
But yeah, he's really the same dog in any kind of country.
He does better when he can stretch out and get more open woods or field edges and stuff
like that.
He don't do really good and a lot of coat over and blown down timber.
He is still a blue dog.
Right.
Gotcha.
So have you already drawn out tonight?
Do you know who you're hunting against?
I've drawn, but I don't know who I'm hunting against.
I didn't go back there and look.
All right.
So Champ, is he the one you're gonna be pushing here for a while?
Yeah, he is.
He is.
I see some really, really, really cool greatness in him, you know.
I've been saying I haven't ready by mid-March.
He's a little ahead of schedule.
I think I'm mid-February, first of March, getting him really ready.
But he's the right kind.
He's got coons when he trees.
He's independent and, you know, good hunting dog.
So yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So one of the questions that I had when I was kind of intrigued when I saw you and Oxidine
and Jeff Rickliffe down here was there was a pro hunt going on last night and you guys
are down here at Grand American.
What drew you down here to this event?
Well, there's a couple of things.
Number one, I have a place in Georgia and I'm from here originally.
So we come down Thursday and we'll stay all the way through next Sunday.
So this weekend you get Grand American.
I went hunting and Ashley Oxidine, you know, he hunted a whole lot of hunts and he thought,
man, I want to hunt Grand American.
He had a 350 cast one with Hobo last night.
So he's in pretty good contention, you know.
So he took the reins away from Rickliffe last night.
He did.
Rickliffe walked around.
So, but Ashley's calm.
He's older.
He's, you know, he's pretty calculated.
He's good.
He'll do what it takes.
So the pro sport truck hunt is next weekend.
So we come down and hunted this and then we'll hunt all week and get ready for pro sport
truck hunt next weekend.
Gotcha.
That makes sense.
Well, I was just glad to see you guys walking around.
You both got good plus points wins.
I mean, it puts both of you in contention for.
Yeah.
You're not out of the question.
No, absolutely not.
Like I said, you get 750, 650, 750, 800 bucks or 800 points tonight.
And when you cast, you're two casts, you know, wins you, you're probably in there.
Yep.
All right, brother, man.
Well, thank you for sitting down here for just a few minutes and we appreciate you.
Good luck tonight.
Appreciate you, brother.
Anytime.
This is going to be fun.
Okay.
Guys, I am sitting down with Craig Lewis.
Just met him.
Don't know him from Adam, but he walked up here to the Semper Dogging Table and we was
able to sit down and have a chat and a conversation.
And through that conversation, found out that Mr. Craig has won this grand American hunt
before.
How was that?
When did you do that, Craig?
In 2000, the 35th annual, I had a dog, a ball, stylish hickory nut storm and had a handler,
Jamie Stone.
Okay.
He handled the dog for me.
So you were the owner.
I was the owner.
Yes.
What kind of dog was a tree and Walker, Trian Walker.
Yep.
And you said it was the 35th anniversary.
Yes.
Okay.
So this is the 60th.
Yes.
And have you been coming to grand American for all them years?
Um, since 79.
79.
Have you missed one?
Um, about four.
Wow.
That's still a pretty good record.
Yeah.
Okay.
So we're in South Carolina.
Where are you from then?
I'm from like Shillote, North Carolina.
Okay.
As the crow flies, how far is that?
Um, three hours.
That's not too bad.
Right north of Myrtle beach.
Okay.
Gotcha.
Okay.
Do you have a dog entered this weekend?
My son does.
I'm with him.
Gotcha.
So he's handling.
Yeah.
He's the handler and the owner.
He's the purr.
Hey, it takes a good truck.
We just had another podcast just a few minutes ago with the truck man.
Yeah.
Those are important to have.
Yeah.
Okay.
So what, tell me about the dog you're hunting this weekend.
Give me a little background.
Um, he's, uh, Alan Rambo, which was the original owner and he's still the co-owner from Mayfield,
Kentucky.
Yes.
Oh, he and I are great friends.
Yes.
I know Rambo.
But it's a dog he trained and owned forever.
My son wanted to start hunting and he just said, Hey, I got a dog.
So he's been off and running.
I think he's hunted 11 cast and one seven this year.
That's so he qualified for the tournament of champions.
Right.
And, um, just, and then he's, he's bought a pup off of a jail cell.
Okay.
Sean Welch.
Yes.
And he's, I think he's like 15 months and he's just getting to go in.
Right.
So do you guys run to all these competition hunts?
You guys mainly pleasure hunt.
What do you guys are going on?
He does a lot of pleasure hunting and competition.
I come with him sometimes.
Okay.
Have you, are you out of the competition game yourself now?
Basically.
Yeah.
You've been to it, didn't you?
Well, yeah.
When he was young, I brought him here when he was young, you know, back in them days,
he was four or five years old, but he's hunted.
He got back into it after school, college and all that.
And he got married.
He's he hunts now.
Right.
Okay.
So somebody who has not been to this event, give me your best description of grand American.
What is it?
What does it mean to you?
Oh, it's just the, to me, it's the grand daddy, coon hunt.
It's definitely close to my house, but it's just fun place to bring everybody.
Your kids for sure is to me.
You know, the kids are represented well here.
They are.
They got a good youth show.
Yep.
They got a lot of stuff going on for, for the kids.
Yep.
You walking around a lot of these vendors, they're selling kids chaps and kids vests
and man, I saw one little boy, he walked down here just a minute ago.
I mean, he was decked out from head to toe.
Yeah.
He had him a new lie, a squalor is chaps.
I mean, he was proud of the peacock.
Hey, that this is where kids get started.
It is.
It's wonderful to see the youth getting out here and having a good time.
Okay.
What part of the 20 or 2000, sorry, the 2000 win, what part meant the most to you on that?
Was it because it was close to home?
Was it because of grand American?
What was it?
Just there were so many friends, Mr. Roy Braddock.
He guided our cast, you know, just meeting people that I met, you know, I'd met him for
years, but then the, you know, to have it all turn out.
My dog was represented as a stud dog.
Okay.
So everybody knew him from magazine.
Right.
And then he won.
So he, okay.
So he was in the magazine.
He was in the one.
He was in the one that day and he won.
Okay.
So that is kind of backwards from the way that I see it today.
Yeah.
A lot of times them guys don't push them as the, in the stud barn or in the magazines until
after they've won something big.
Yep.
And then they're going out trying to push them and do their thing with them.
That's right.
But that is really interesting that, you know, he had the whole total package.
Yeah.
He was, he was, it was a lot of fun with him.
Okay.
Did you, did you keep any pups off of him?
I did through the years.
He was an accident.
I brought him back.
I brought him, I retired him for a while and started back hunting.
Then he was an accident and you know, he was gone.
He died.
Right.
He got ran over.
What kind of pups did he throw?
Pretty good.
I mean, there, there were a lot of them close to like him and I, I enjoyed a bunch of them.
I hunted them for five or six years, eight years, maybe after he passed.
Gotcha.
But he was throwing some good pups.
Okay.
Now personal question here as far as opinion.
Yep.
Can you take a dog from the South and win in the North and can you take a dog from North
and win down here in the South?
Which one's easier?
Um, well, coon dogs are going to, they're going to show wherever they go.
Um, the South is harder hunting in my opinion.
There's more of a coon population in the North.
Right.
But honestly, you know, it's the good Lord's blessing.
I agree with that one.
I mean that, that one there, I mean there's good, good hunters and good dogs everywhere,
but when it's your turn, it's your turn.
But I believe in hunting, when you're hunting with people, show, show them, you know, do
right.
Always help them find their coon and be a, nothing but a gentleman of sport.
Cause you're going to win, you're going to lose.
That's right.
And saying that there, you know, I just say, um, good luck to everybody wherever you go.
Absolutely.
And we know we need some more of that attitude around here.
Cause it's not what some people think it is.
If you're new to the sport, you're new to the podcast and competition coon hunting.
It's not everybody got cheated.
Everybody got screwed.
There's a lot of good people in this sport.
That's right.
And we need to all continue to try to be that way.
I've met a tremendous amount of folks through coon hunting.
You and me both brother, you and me both.
Just like right now.
That's right.
Just right right now.
All right.
Well, Mr. Craig, thank you for taking just a few minutes to sit down and talk to us and
we appreciate you.
Thank you.
Have a great day.
Have a good one.
All right.
All right guys.
I have got a very interesting guest sitting here with me today, buddy.
Tell me your name, where you're from.
I'm Case Walker.
I'm from Manson County.
Manson County, South Carolina.
Uh, North Carolina.
North Carolina.
What are you doing down here?
What are you doing down here at Grand America?
Uh, we coon hunt.
My stepfather coon hunts down here.
He's got a plot dog and he's going to be hunting.
Did he hunt last night?
Yes, sir.
Well, how do you do?
Any good?
No, sir.
He treated a couple coons, but I think he drew minus.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So I saw you over here looking at these duck calls and goose calls and stuff that the Fallen
Outdoors booth has going on.
And then I heard you make a little call and I thought you were testing one of the calls
and you weren't.
You were doing that straight up with your mouth.
Yep.
Where did you learn how to make these calls?
And did you sit at home practice?
How does that work?
Well, I practice about every day to be honest.
I think it was 2019.
I saw two turkeys go by, a couple turkeys when I was with my pop and he started making
a turkey call.
I'm like, how do you do that?
And I've been practicing since then.
And how old are you?
I'm 12 years old.
12 years old.
And you told me you won some type of event, right?
Yes, sir.
I've won the Dixie Deer Classic Turkey Calling event.
And I think second place with my mouth, with my voice right here.
Yeah.
All right.
So how many different calls do you think you can do?
I can do a turkey, speckle belly.
I'm practicing on my goop like a honker.
I think I can do a little bit of owl.
Okay.
Give me your best of each one of them.
Let's start with the speck.
All right.
That's pretty good.
Okay.
Let's go to the turkey.
Is that the one that you won the contest with?
Yes, sir.
I can tell that's a good one.
Now we got somebody in the background blowing one of them calls that I thought he was doing,
but he was doing it with his mouth.
All right.
Let's let him get done.
All right.
Give me an owl.
I can't do that.
That's pretty good.
Give it another one.
No, that's better than I could ever do.
All right.
What's the other?
What's the fourth one you said you had?
I'm doing practicing doing a honker.
Yeah.
Let's hear it.
That is awesome buddy.
You got it down pat.
12 years old you said.
Yes, sir.
Where do you see yourself going with this?
Do you like to compete in these calling competitions?
Yeah.
Sure.
I like doing the turkey call contest and I like some day I like to do duck calling contest.
Basically any of the contests I like it's fun.
Yeah.
But I bet you got a big future ahead of you.
Oh, we got somebody in the background blowing another call.
These things sound pretty good.
That's the fun of these live events, man.
You never know what's going to be going on in the background.
That's right.
So do you hunt, you can't hunt yourself too?
Yes, sir.
What kind of type of hunting do you do?
I hunt with my own hands.
What kind of dog you got?
None.
I just sold mine.
Oh, you just sold it?
Yeah.
It wasn't no good.
So I sold them for a hundred dollars.
There you go.
Well, what kind of plans do you have to get another one?
I'm probably going to get a plot dog to breed with my uncle's dog.
Gotcha.
All right, brother, man.
Well, that was awesome.
Very impressive.
Keep it up.
You're going to go places with that stuff.
Thank you.
Absolutely.
Well, thanks for sitting down and joining us on the Semper Dog and Podcast and we'll catch
you around.
All right, brother, man.
All right.
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Well, well, well, we have tracked down two more of the finest men in South Carolina today.
Well maybe one of them, I don't know about the other one.
Yeah, you guys know that laugh.
That's Mr. Jeff Radcliffe and he is joined by his partner, Mr. Ashley Oxidine.
How are you today, brother?
Good, buddy.
We both good, bud.
That's what we're here for.
So Ashley, I want to talk to you just a little bit here.
I know you have taken the reins over on Hobo and little Jeffy's your truck man.
Tell me how your cast went last night.
We struck straight out in the truck for 75 and treat for 125, left-handed.
Hobo had a coon.
It looked real good.
Then he treated one more coon through the world at the end of the hunt.
Coons wasn't moving last night, but he looked good for the situation.
Yeah, absolutely.
So I know you've got Hobo back down at your house now.
Have you been hunting him and getting him ready for this event or do you just kind of
pull him out of the box?
No, I'm in hunting him.
You've been hunting him hard.
Yeah, we've been hunting.
So I know you hunted last night.
You and Strickland both got double or got both got a cast win.
Right.
Have you figured out where you're going tonight yet?
Haven't heard.
No, they drew or I went and signed us up earlier.
Well, Ashley was doing a different podcast actually and they got our cast number, but
we don't know who's going to draw.
Who else is running around trying to get recordings?
No, this was, oh yeah, no, Josh McHale.
Oh, Josh over there at Joy.
Well good.
So when y'all get done listening to this, go over there, give Josh some love.
I didn't know he was out running around.
No, he was actually at the motel.
He did a big long one with him at your motel.
Yeah, this morning.
Perfect.
Well, we are always here to support all those guys.
Josh does a good job with what he has.
Ashley, what's your plans for Hobo going forward?
You know, I don't get to hunt.
Our season here in the South is we start in October, November.
My good hunting is over March and Jeff will have him back.
You know, it works perfect for me.
So that'll give me some time to enjoy him and hunt him and just he'll come just like
now.
You know, we wanted to truck hunt next week.
He's going to hunt lady.
So just trying to give me an opportunity to enjoy him a little bit.
Yeah, absolutely.
You know, I know that I've been told you work a ton and you know, you're really invested
in what you do outside of Coonhound.
So it's got to be nice to be able to have a nice dog that you can come back, get your
hands on for a few months, enjoy him and then take him back to somebody like Jeff who you
know he's going to be in good hands.
You know you can trust him and you know that you're going to have a good chance at winning
with.
That's right.
Jeff takes care of him and does a good job.
And you know, we have dogs, but not many of them can come down here and treat Coons like
that and just, you know, and Hobo, he loves it.
And he does, he does phenomenal.
That's one thing I want to iterate on that.
You know, Bryce, of course we live 30 minutes apart.
So you know, our hunting is relatively easy compared to this hunting.
And I was at Ashley's for a week last winter and it's a different world.
And I think it's just absolutely awesome to bring a dog.
Some of them never do adjust, but Hobo, he had him down two years ago and he's, they've
never seen a dog from the North take to his water and hunting.
And I think it, it helps them adjust.
Cause you know, we travel all over the United States and hunt in every state there that
has a competition.
So basically Hobo's, you know, he's, he's ready for any kind of trains.
What I'm saying, when Ashley hunts him down here, it helps immensely.
Right.
Absolutely.
Cause we don't get the chance to hunt the swamps and stuff like this.
Being able to send that dog down here and have a working team and a working relationship,
it really puts the dog in the best position and it makes both y'all's lives easier in
my opinion, because if you're struggling with one thing, you need to get ready for one hunt,
bam, it's there.
Just send him and get him ready.
That's right.
Well, you know how our weather can be too.
Like, I don't know if you've looked at our weather for next week.
I haven't, but I heard we're getting snow right now.
Next week though, it's supposed to be single digits with six to 12 inches of snow.
So what, you know, what would I do with Hobo up there then?
So he'll be down here and Ashley will still be hunting him.
It's you know, and that's another thing I wanted to iterate was, you know, Ashley is
a great dog man.
We hunt the same.
We have the same ideas on training.
So it's not like a clash where I'm like, oh man, Ashley's doing this and I, you know,
I don't like that.
Or, you know, we think the same way.
So it's great.
Right.
Now, one other thing actually that I wanted to just ask you about real quick here is that
I've heard that you're not just into coon dogs.
You've got some personal protection dogs too.
Oh yeah.
So tell me a little bit more about that, because I heard you're real big into that and like,
you've got some nice ones.
Like give me a little bit more information on that.
We got, I got three brood females that we imported, super nice, fully trained.
All our dogs, the difference between my Germans and everybody else in training, they have
a year with children.
Like my dogs come in and just like, we put our dogs in, just say like you got two babies,
we train them for a whole year.
Our dogs got to be proven around family.
Absolutely 100%.
And that's the biggest advantage for my dogs.
And we sell a guy from up around Charlotte, he owns the males, he's big and he deals with
like real famous people.
And I invested in three females with him and everything I produce, he buys back.
And he trains them and sells them.
I got some of the nicest dogs on the East Coast.
Yeah, I've heard that and that has always interested me and you know, just to take guys
who can go from different disciplines, you know, you can work with the personal protection
dogs and go work with the coon dogs.
It's just a well, all around houndsman, you know, and it really is simple dog and you're
always dogging.
And I love it, man.
I told Josh this morning, I said just ever since I was a little boy, I just had a gift
about picking out a good dog.
And it didn't matter, you know, coon dogs or Germany Shepherds.
And I got two phenomenal females that's I mean, first class, like they're the real deal.
You wouldn't even know they're female, you'd think they're males.
Yeah.
And I got a fortune in them too, but I love it.
Yeah, well, that's what it's all about, man.
Doing something you love and having friends like Jeff and Strickland and all then to do
it with.
So that's right.
Wish you guys nothing but the best tonight and your hunts and Jeff, make sure you get
the truck where it needs to be at the end of the hunt.
Hey, I walked last night.
I'm going to walk again.
You never know Ashley might go down.
Oh, it's always fun to give you a hard time, brother.
I love you.
Thanks guys for sitting down here for just a few minutes and joining me and we sure appreciate
your good luck tonight.
Thank you.
Well, guys, we have got a dynamic duo for this little section here.
I mean, you ain't going to miss Mr. Walt Costco here.
He's got this four X Floyd shirt and it's like lime green.
Looks like a Hawaiian shirt.
It is got dogs treat all over it.
One made got four X Floyd all over it.
Big boy.
All right, we got him and we got Mr. Hunter Gartow.
Yep.
That's it.
All right.
Give me a little bit about you, Hunter.
Where are you from?
What are you doing down here?
I'm from Ringe, Georgia.
I come down here just to hang out.
You hunting?
We're going to pleasure hunt tonight.
Man, you're the second or third person said they're just going to pleasure hunt tonight.
What about you, Walt?
Yeah, I'm Walt Costco.
I'm from Shell City, Missouri.
I'm here representing four X Floyd and bet the farm.
We got a bunch of pups here today.
We've got 30 pups or so.
I've sold a bunch of them already.
I know they're high price, but they're selling like firecrackers.
Okay.
So, give me a little bit more on four X Floyd.
Tell me about him.
How'd you get him?
Just give me the scoop on him.
Scoop on four X Floyd.
Bought him from Lane Denny at Just Ween.
We went and picked him out and Terry Bennett and I and my son, Jud Costco.
We bought four pups that day and four X Floyd, he was the puppy that I got.
Terry ended up with three more of them.
Me and Terry went half interest on the dog.
Terry's been in the business for 40 years breeding dogs.
I thought, well, if I'm going to do this right, Terry's got a black book of breeders that's
hell three foot deep and mine's about two inches deep.
So I thought it'd be better if I had him on my side.
And next thing you know, heck, we're hunting Floyd in the hunts.
And we sent a little story on his name.
Everybody's like, has he really won four world championships?
I said, no.
I said, but UKC says he hasn't.
Behind that is when we sent the paperwork in on Floyd, named him four X world champion
Floyd and it was during the pandemic.
And they didn't catch the name and it went through the system and man, boom, boom, boom,
main night champion overnight.
And they couldn't do anything about it.
And lo and behold, his name's four X world champion Floyd.
But you know what?
The dog is a reproducing fool.
It doesn't matter what it is we bring him to.
In fact, I like to find a chihuahua to bring him to just to prove a point.
Right.
They got to name it four X chichi or something like that.
I was wondering where the name came from.
Okay.
So give me the four X.
What's behind the four X?
I kind of know the back story, but our listeners might not.
The four X came from, of course he's off of Rackham Willie and Rackham Williams, a two
time world champion dog.
And they put it on their two X world champion Rackham Willie and of course, Insane Emmy
Lane Denny's dog.
She's a two time world champion also.
And he puts on their two X world champion Insane Emmy and F two plus two.
What is that?
That's four, baby.
That's four.
So we got it on.
We got it down.
Yeah.
So that's how you got four X bet the farm.
That's right.
All right.
Give me the scoop on farm or bet, whatever you call him.
We call him bit.
He's just a, he's a coon dog.
He's just a coon dog.
He just goes and does his thing, gets treated and good about having the coons.
Okay.
So I'm guessing he's off of Floyd.
Oh yeah.
Is that, is that what all you guys are hunting and stuff off Floyd?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
Well, to be honest, uh, four X Floyd, he got not for Floyd, but four X bet the farm.
He got, uh, he got started right after the Norman, the norm, uh, hunt against four X
Floyd and, uh, airplane.
And uh, in fact, during the hunt in Missouri against norm, uh, a good friend of mine, Adam
Murray, he was there to watch the hunt and everything and kind of be my judge against
the norm.
You know, it was an impossible hunt to win with, with his rules, but Hey, it was all
fun.
But, uh, about halfway through the hunt, uh, norm, we had to change spots to go hunting
and, uh, we're going through my little town of shell city, Missouri.
And uh, uh, Adam's like, Hey, I need to pick up that pup.
And I went to get the pup and boy, uh, I was driving my hunting Honda.
I drive a little car to the woods.
I don't care.
I get on gas and I don't care what everybody thinks, but, uh, it'll turn.
He jumped out of the damn car and took off a tick off and old Norman's like, Oh, you're
going to hunt that.
That's a little junk white dog.
You know, and we were chasing him down in the town of shell city and Adam Murray took
him in after that and really, really poured it on him.
And this don't turn them to be what he is.
And uh, it's all been a little bit history since then.
Right.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So tell me Tyler, little bit about the other dogs you've got in your kennel.
Cause you got some good hunter.
I'm sorry.
I've screwed that up twice.
Hunter, tell me about the other dogs you have in your kennel.
Cause you've got some big names in there.
Yeah.
Well, I got a good partner, uh, trip Duke out of Alabama and, uh, Ronnie Davis handles
for trip.
Ronnie road, Ronnie road on grand.
On grand baby.
Me and trip, we own a Buster Buster beat that together.
He's six year old Walker dog.
And that's his name Buster beat that.
Buster beat that.
And um, he just been good to me.
Then me and Walt, we got to talking at autumn Oaks and he come to me and he said, Hey, what
you want to do?
And I said, well, if you want me to partner up, would you partner up on bet?
And it's just been, I've had bet now.
How long?
A couple months.
A couple months and, uh, first night down there, what'd he do?
First night down there, we treat nine Coons with him.
Really?
He'd every been to Georgia in his life and he just, how old is he?
Uh, 17 months.
No, he'll be two years old.
February the 25th.
Gotcha.
Now that I hear through the rumor mill that you've won this hunt before, uh, one overall
high scoring dog.
Yes.
Gotcha.
I scored 1,975 plus points in two nights.
That's impressive.
100 Saturday night and a 775 Friday night.
All right.
So what dog were you hunting then?
Uh, B and T's big train, uh, me and Trey Yother out of North Carolina owned them together.
Gotcha.
The weekend after that took them hunting.
Um, and he drowned in the lake.
Oh no.
So that's terrible.
He wasn't, he was the first competition hunting he ever been to was here.
And he won it.
Yep.
Well, I come into final four, I come in fourth place.
Gotcha.
And then first place, uh, Saturday night and, um, I forgot fourth place Friday.
If you have fourth place Friday and first place Saturday.
Okay.
Gotcha.
Well, the little rumor that I heard, I guess wasn't a hundred percent Trubis close.
What was the rumor you heard?
I heard you won the whole thing.
Oh no.
No, I mean the late round that night I went in, it was me, the Clifford dog, Jason Roberts
with a backwoods Quinn and, um, will Deloach with gin and juice.
Right.
Yeah.
Train went in there, struck, got treed, big old tree that you couldn't even, all three
of us couldn't wrap our hands around it.
Right.
It was huge.
And, um, they minus me on it, but it is what it is.
So I just cut back loose and he went over there and struck for a quarter and got treated
again and had a coon and Clifford coming there and got a piece of it and that's Clifford
won it.
Yeah.
Gotcha.
All right.
Well, one more thing while I got you on here, tell me a little bit about the booth you're
selling over there.
Who are you with and what are you guys selling over there?
Coon dog wear.
Uh, William BK, he owns it and we sell hoodies, shirts, hats, uh, jackets, chaps now.
Um, but yeah.
Everything just on Coon dog wear and you guys got a website, right?
Oh yeah.
Yep.
Coon dog wear.com.
Is that where they can go find you?
Yep.
All right guys.
Well, if you guys are listening to this.
Also bet the farm, he's banging on 500 Coons before he's five, before he's two years old.
He turns two, you know, February 25th.
We got seven left, seven left, seven left.
And he'll be part of the, the, the 500 club and the four X Floyd page.
Of course we got the 500 club, thousand thousand club and we got the hall of fame.
Are those on Facebook?
On Facebook.
Okay.
We got 4,200 people on our Facebook page, but I also got a hall of fame for the dog
that she's a 1500 Coons.
It's out of Floyd.
All them, all them dogs will be in hall of fame with a four X Floyd.
Okay.
So how I, I'm just now hearing about this.
So it's something you're doing on your own cause it's not through a registry.
Nobody's done it before.
Okay.
So how are you keeping track of that?
Who's to say that I didn't just mark down eight Coon tallies tonight?
You know, I've been asked that several times.
How are you going to make sure it's right?
You know, here it is.
If you lie about it, that's on you and everybody else can find out you're a liar.
Right.
You know what I mean?
Honesty is the best policy.
Yeah.
Honesty is the best policy.
And you know what?
It's the best way for me to recognize the dogs that are Floyd.
And you know, after I started this thing, boom, everybody's like, Oh, my, my, my pups
on 75, my pups on 175, my pups on this and that.
And it just blew up in our page.
Right.
And it's just, it's making it way, way cool.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
And I care a lot about, you know, the guys that buy pups off of me, I I'm helping promote
their puppies.
Right.
And I care.
Yeah.
And that's good.
I mean, that's what it takes.
And it seems like y'all are having a good time doing it.
You can't miss it anywhere you go.
Yeah.
And you know, I'm like, Oh, I'm a big old banner for X Floyd and, and all the moats,
you gave out hats and glasses and all kinds of stuff.
I mean, my kids are running around.
I lure the kids into my stand with cookies.
Yeah, I know.
It's like, it's like get their parents talk to them, you know, oh, they love the cookies
because the cookies have the four X Floyd on the cookies.
Don't they?
Well, they don't, but it looks like we're going to have to do it next year.
I thought that's what it had on it because I was so busy working the booth at automobiles
for kids walking around these four.
I'm like, where are you getting all this stuff?
They said four X Floyd and they were pumped up about it.
Yeah.
You know, it says it just shows.
I care.
Yeah.
That's fun, man.
Well, Walt Hunter, thank you too for sitting down with me, Hunter.
I'm sorry.
I botched your name twice.
You're good.
Stan corrected guys, but I appreciate you guys sitting down with us here on the Semper
Dog and podcast.
Best of luck to you and your future endeavors with the four X squad and who raw, who raw
baby.
My daddy's Marine.
I'm proud of y'all.
Well, Tom, thank you for his service.
We appreciate him.
So thanks gentlemen.
All right, brother, man.
Why don't you tell our audience who you are, where you're from, what you're doing down
here at Grand American.
Hey, what's going on everybody?
My name is Cyrus Woodard, AKA Woody Entertainment on YouTube or Dark Horse Candidate on Instagram.
I'm up in Cleveland County, North Carolina, and I'm here at Grand American because it's
just my passion and love, you know, dogs and.
Absolutely.
So, okay.
So tell me about this dog we got sitting right here next to us right now.
We've got a little red bone female sitting here.
Correct.
So we have Brandine and I named her Brandy.
I named all my hounds off the Simpsons characters.
I did not know that.
Yep.
So my first was Cletus.
Okay.
Right.
So I named the Simpsons and then you got Brandy and that's Cletus's wife slash sister.
And then she was a redhead, you know, on the Simpsons.
Brandy was a redhead.
I haven't even watched the Simpsons.
And then she's a red bone.
So it makes sense.
And then my gas gone blue, bleating gums Murphy, you know, the saxophone guy.
Right.
Okay.
Yep.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So tell me a little about Brandy.
And if you raise it from a pup, is she hunting this weekend?
What are you going on with her?
So she is going to be pleasure hunting.
I'm not really a big competition guy.
Okay.
Um, but I had her since she was a puppy.
I actually picked her up from a Walker days, like three years ago.
Gotcha.
Yeah.
And I, and I showed how to, you know, develop her and you know, in my way.
So ever since she was a pup, is she turning out for you?
She pleases me.
That's all I care about.
That's all that's all that matters.
That's right.
Okay.
Now you mentioned earlier something about the gas cones.
Tell us a little bit more about that breed.
I don't know very many people that run those gas cones.
No, a lot of people don't.
They just think it's a regular a blue tick would actually, it's actually not actually
quite bigger, more houndy.
Okay.
You know, like droop more droop to them, a really cold nose, uh, dogs.
Technically they were really in the Midwest.
People use them for mountain lions and bears for their cold tracking ability.
Okay.
Um, old school ball mouth dogs, um, French lineage.
Okay.
Oh, I, so I didn't know that, but it makes it gas cone.
I guess that's a French.
Yep.
French lineage.
Um, but you can use them for whatever, you know, I used, uh, Cletus and Murphy at the
time that I had them, uh, for Coon and they were, you know, good dogs.
Took them a little while, but I love an old school ball mouth dog.
What's their style.
They just kind of slow pick around on the track, not really blowing through the country.
Right.
Exactly.
As soon as you cut them, they put their nose down.
And that's how I like it.
Cause I don't want a dog to, as soon as you clip the lead, they run a mile before they
put their nose down.
You'll miss three, four, probably 10 Coons.
Right.
And just by running when you could, you know, just stick your nose to the ground and you
could pick them up as you go.
Absolutely.
So, so you really are enjoying more of the pleasure style going out and just you and the
dogs.
I mean, just, yeah, it's, it's therapy.
Do you hunt by yourself mostly or who do you hunt with?
Yeah, mostly by myself, but I do try to travel the best that I can, you know, to hunt with
other people.
But you know, I still want to have my dog has his own independence.
That's right.
Well, you're doing a good job with the man.
I've followed you along for a little bit on what you had going on there.
So especially when Brandine was coming up, you had her training her and doing her stuff.
You definitely got your own style for sure.
Oh yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
I try to combine my, uh, my grandfather's style with a little bit of my own.
Right.
So if anybody wants to go online and find you, where can they find you at?
Uh, they could find me on Instagram, which is dark horse candidate with an underscore,
or you just look at my videos.
Um, Woody entertainment, Woody entertainment guys.
Well, you heard it here first on the separate dog and podcast.
We got Cyrus Woodard down here, grand American, South Carolina, hunting them red bones and
gas cones and doing his own thing.
Now I appreciate it.
Thank you so much.
Absolutely brother, man.
We'll see you.
All right.
God bless.
We're getting ready to hear a, the most familiar voice in all of coon hunting.
He has gone to the dogs this weekend, Mr. Steve Fielder.
How are you old buddy?
Uh, emphasis on the old Brian.
Hey, I'm doing great.
Better than I deserve.
That's for sure.
Yeah, man.
I'm so glad to get you over here for just a few minutes.
You have been over at the full cry booth this weekend and I tell you what, you guys have
just been swamped.
You killing it over there.
Well, you know, uh, I've been around this thing a long time and I know a lot of people
and I, and that's one thing I'm very grateful for.
That's been the greatest accomplishment of my life is the people that I've been able
to meet over the years.
You know, your, your fiance, Nikki, I met when she was in a stroller at Otter Moaks.
So that gives you an idea of how, how old I am.
But yeah, we, I just wanted to come down this weekend and introduce, uh, the doobies to
as many people as I could because they're great people.
They're doing, I think a great job.
Absolutely.
Resurrecting full crime magazine.
Yeah.
And it's been a tradition for so many years to everybody near and dear to my heart as
a kid, you know, full crime.
So anyway, it's just been fun.
Just, you know, meet and greet.
Yeah.
So I know this is the 60th anniversary of the grand American and how many of these have
you made it to?
Is it like Otter Moaks where you have a standing record?
Well, my record, due to the fact that I kind of bounced around with the different registries,
sometimes that took me away.
But the grand American has been one that it seemed no matter who I was with at the time,
uh, Harry Ott, for instance, is the kind of the local guy with the, with the association
that runs all this.
And he's here in Orangeburg and he's kind of the go-to guy.
I mean, Harry's been here forever.
And people look up to him.
Of course, David McKee being, you know, the president of the association and all, he's
the honcho, but Harry is the guy.
Okay.
You want anything done?
You want to do it?
And Harry told me years ago, and I don't say this bragging, but he said, Steve, I don't
care who you with.
You're always welcome at the grand American.
So I, you know, I kind of took that to heart and even when I was with UKC and this was
an AKC event, I came and I had a booth and they were glad for me to be here with Cunhaun
Bloodlines magazine and, and same thing with PKC and then AKC.
So I've, grand Americans just been, if you live in the Southeast at first, you got to
start your year off at the grand American.
Yeah.
It's just how you kick it off.
Yeah.
It's just like the ball fall in New York city.
Yeah.
It's what you do.
Absolutely.
So I know you got your Gone to the Dogs hat on.
Have you been selling any books over there?
Oh yeah.
Had, you know, been pleasantly surprised this weekend.
Have sold quite a few, had to crack open a new box just while ago.
Yeah.
I'm not a reader, but I have a Gone to the Dogs book and it sits on my shelf and I enjoy
it.
So I encourage anybody out there to go do more.
Well, you'd be like that guy says, I know what's in every book and every library in
the world.
What's that?
Words.
That's a fact, Jack.
So you know, that's a fact.
Anyway, but I was a reader, always was a reader.
I'm old school.
Yeah.
So, but they're still out there.
They are.
Is your dog fever down here this weekend?
He's here, man.
Did you put him in the train contest?
Mark did yesterday.
How'd he do?
Hey, you know what?
In the first round, he narrowly missed, but he decided he wanted to go in ball mouth mode
for a short span.
So Mark says, I know he can do better than that.
So he reentered him and I believe I could be wrong, but I believe it was 72 or 73 barks
in 30 seconds.
Now that's getting up.
It is.
But the last dog was right behind him and beat him by a couple barks.
Cause if I, now my memory might do me a misservice here, but I believe he won the train contest
last year.
Right?
He won it last year.
He was just a year old at that time.
He had a big time down here.
He ended up being high score and plot male.
I get that.
It's the bone in that calls behind you.
Yeah.
We must have Phil Robertson.
Now that's part of the fun, part of the fun of doing these live shows.
You never know what's going to be in the background.
Mr. Steve, thank you so much.
I don't want to keep you very long, but we, we did have to have you on here.
It's a pleasure.
And I just want to say, I want to publicly wish you the best with your new Semper dog
and they thank you podcast.
We need more.
I, you know, guys say, well, you know, is that competition?
Heck no.
It's not competition.
We need to be talking about the sport as much as we can.
The more positive avenues that we can explore out there.
Right.
Absolutely.
I was talking to Jason earlier over there at full crime and he said the same thing.
He said, a rising time, rising tide lifts all ships.
And I was like, that's a pretty good quote.
Pretty close.
I'll close with this.
I told the guy the other day, my role now, you know, I had all those great years of involvement.
I'm the cheerleader, cheerleader for guys like you, the younger generation, the new
hunters that are coming in, keep this thing ball rolling.
There's been a lot of sweating tears and a lot of years, but it's a great sport.
And it needs to go on forever.
Yep.
I agree.
I'm all for it.
I'm like grandpa sitting in the stand at the little league game.
I'm rooting for Johnny to steal home.
Well you might be like grandpa sitting in the stands, but I'm like the old boy on the
court looking up to make sure you're sitting there.
I want to see you at all these events.
I'll be here as long as I can.
All right, Steve.
Well, we appreciate you brother.
Thank you so much.
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Alright we are back with Hunter.
You just heard from him and Walt, but Hunter has a special guest he wants to get on here
and he is going to tell us a little bit about his dog.
What's your name little man?
Truett.
Truett?
How old are you Truett?
5.
You're 5?
What are you doing down here?
Are you hunting coon dogs?
Say yes sir.
What's your dog's name?
Bet.
So you're hunting the Bet the Farm Dog.
Do you know how to strike your dog?
Say yes sir.
Show me how you do it.
How do you strike him?
Tell him.
Bet struck.
What's your favorite part to say?
What comes next after he strikes?
He gets on to what?
On that tree don't he?
And then what do you say?
Tree my what?
Tree my dog.
Say tree my dog.
Tree my dog.
Tree his dog.
Guys this is what it's all about.
Getting the youth into here.
Getting them on.
Getting them into these dogs and doing these hunts and having a good time doing it and
teaching them the ropes and getting them out here in this environment and hanging out with
everybody.
Little Truett I'll forgive you for earlier we won't tell everybody what you did.
Did you have fun?
Did you think that was funny?
Uh huh.
I see how it is.
We'll get you taken care of buddy.
Well like I said thank you guys for coming out here.
Truett you want to say hi to your mama or anybody?
Tell your mama hey.
Hey mama.
Tell her you love her.
Hey tell them.
Alright.
Alright well thanks for coming out here buddy we're glad to have you.
You guys have fun today okay?
Say yes sir.
Yes sir.
See you guys.
Alright we're here.
Yeah.
You ready?
Let's roll.
You don't have a chance because you're not going to get a chance.
You're going to get a chance.
Let's roll.
I heard somebody say hello.
Was that somebody walking behind me?
Yeah they didn't say hi to you.
I don't know who he is but.
I have no idea.
Oh guys well we are sitting down here with Mr. Daniel Felker of the Cunhaun Confidentials.
You got it right too I'm proud of you.
I tell you what I try.
I don't always get it right.
You get mispronounced a whole lot.
Well you know we do our best over here at Semper Doggen.
So you're a local down here.
Absolutely.
So what is it about Grand American coming down here to your town that you enjoy the
most?
Oh man dude I got like a long history with this place.
I've only missed since 1993 I think I've missed maybe two Grand Americans.
But you know growing up my coon club, the coon club I'm in, we give them a shout out,
Whitmire Coon Hunters Association.
We used to run the kitchen back there and we did it for years and years and now we quit
doing that so now as part of our coon club we help disperse out and do certain things.
So we help.
Ok so give yourself a plug for Cunhaun Confidentials.
Tell the listeners at Semper Doggen what you guys have going on over at your podcast.
Ok well this is a little unique.
We like to cut up, we have fun, but we like to look for all the creepy and crazy and weird
coon hunting stories that people have had and just kind of look for them all over the
United States.
We're always tracking them down, trying to track them down and I think we've got about
four to record going into 2024.
Probably start that recording Monday I think.
Ok so I got you nailed down here for just a few minutes.
Give me a story that has some South Carolina mystique.
As far as coon hunting goes I can't, I don't have a whole lot of…
Just give me a story, something local to hear.
Well something if you're getting down here you're going to get into the legend of the
Lizard Man.
The Lizard Man?
Yeah, yeah it happened at Skapor Swamp back in the 80's.
It was like a real phenomenon that happened and that was being reported and the cool thing
about that was the sheriff actually took it serious and investigated it and it was like
a thing that was in that part of…
That would be down here.
I don't know exactly how far that is from Orangeburg but the legend of the Lizard Man.
So what were they saying about it?
Was this Lizard Man out around the swamps or what was going on?
Yeah kind of.
It started off with there was a young black dude who was fixing a flat.
I think he was fixing a flat, that's kind of hard to remember now just off the top of
my head.
And he had a run in with this creature and it freaked him out and he went and he reported
it and all this other stuff and around the same time there was a farmer that was like…
He reported seeing a creature like that.
Now it's debatable.
Was he describing a Lizard Lizard Man or where is it like a Bigfoot type creature?
Okay Bigfoot.
Let's go into Bigfoot for a second.
Yeah.
Okay first off, believer or non-believer?
Me?
Believer.
He believes.
I'm a believer.
Okay so you had Autumn Oaks and recorded with my father-in-law about his Bigfoot experience.
Yep.
Whatever come of that, what do you think of that one?
What's your personal opinion on that?
Oh yeah, personally yeah.
Get out of here Josh McHaleus, don't interrupt my podcast.
I didn't know he was here.
They brought enough joy dog food with them.
It's like 15 tons over there.
Okay so about his story with the Bigfoot.
So to fill people in just real quick down and dirty, my father-in-law had this track
in his driveway whenever it was snow on the ground.
Looked to be an oversized foot in about what, six to eight foot distances between the strides.
Yeah those were about six foot strides.
Between the strides in a straight line.
They took a mold of it.
They had some people come down and as far as they know, it's a Bigfoot track.
Yep, I believe it.
What about that story sticks out to you?
They were all in a straight line.
That's kind of one of the things from like different tracks or that people have seen
or be tracking is in a situation like that is they all seem to be going like one in like
a tightrope one foot in front of the other and not like a left and a right like we would
staggered.
Right.
So when I seen that picture that I can't remember her name.
Was her name Becky?
Yep Becky.
When I seen the picture she showed them to me at Winter Classic last year and I was like
that's not fake.
That's kind of like, I don't say it's common but this just come from like listening to
different podcasts and seeing different pictures on certain pages and stuff like that and I
was like okay but then he said it was like six foot strides and he took it serious himself.
Yeah he did.
I mean they had a daggone mold made out of it.
They like froze it.
They scooped, cut around the snow, scooped it up, froze it, made a mold.
I mean it's a whole deal.
Now I can't say, I don't know how I feel about it.
And that's my own father-in-law but it leaves you wondering.
Yeah once you get into it you'll start getting into the debate.
If you like really like start listening to podcasts you'll find out real quick in the
Bigfoot community it'll be split.
Is it flesh and blood or is there something spiritual about it?
I've never even heard that deal.
Could it be something of a remnant of the Nephilim in the book of Genesis?
And dude I don't even want to get started on that because I like to go deep and I could
go deep on that but I lean toward that as I'm a very spiritual minded person and there
just seems to be certain things about the legend of Bigfoot or some of the stories that
kind of make me just think hmm it might be something spiritual aspect but then there
also is that part of me that says could the government be knowing about this and breeding
and making hybrids of these things and.
It's a different perspective.
Oh yeah we go down all the rabbit trails but not on our podcast but going into just looking
into the subject on my own.
Now you know we kind of try to steer it back toward hound hunting and coon hunting and
stuff like that.
So speaking of coon hunting you got a dog entered in this event this week?
Man no.
Why not?
I work this thing.
It's 7 o'clock like before all y'all get in I'm here.
We're like making sure.
See my job is and Ryan wherever he's at.
He's up behind you.
He's looking over your shoulder.
He's one of the co.
Let me see I can see him in his glasses.
Okay.
So he's one of the co-hosts and Dustin is I think he's working over in the barn this
year and we've seen him earlier.
But we get up here at 7 right before 7 o'clock every morning before the vendors get here
everything we set up and we ready to go.
Like my job is patrolling that dog lot out there.
No bulldogs no guns.
Supposed to be nothing new like that the vendors here like paid spots for.
Right.
Stuff like that.
Okay.
So it's just patrolling.
Yeah so this is like one of the biggest events that I go to so there's got to be a lot of
hands on deck a lot of help and you know we couldn't do it without you guys.
Absolutely.
Alright give me one more story.
I want to hear something about I heard you over talking earlier you heard some noises
like 1 30 in the morning when you were coon hunting.
Give me that story.
Okay this is kind of a long tune because it's a long story man because it's like it built
up to a certain region in our neck of the woods.
Okay.
So it was it wasn't at 1 30 it was like maybe midnight.
That's close enough.
So it was on a Monday night I was hunting and we live like right in the middle of the
Sumter National Forest so there's a lot of game management land and there's certain
areas where it kind of gets close towards the town the town of Whitmire like kind of
outskirt of the roads and we're talking like a small one red light town.
So I had already turned my female loose and off behind me way over directly to my right
I heard a lot of just like talking and I knew the road and some of the people that live
on that paved road and I was like they'd be an awful loud over there on a Monday night
to be just cutting up like I'm surprised the law hadn't been called right.
So then a little bit later I hear just like loud talking again but it's a little bit closer
and I was like that's weird.
So my dog gets treed and she's on the opposite side of this gravel road and behind me people
gonna think I'm crazy but I really don't care.
I thought it was so loud it was loud I was already standing up already had my gun on
my back because I was getting ready to go into the woods to my dog but she shut up and
she actually moved she moved about a hundred yards and fell tree I think the coon bailed
out and she bailed out with it and because she was like hot you know what I'm saying.
So anyway she shuts up and while she shuts up and I'm listening directly behind me I
hear this really loud it's like and I'm talking about it is freaking loud and it's like and
the first thing that came to my mind if anybody wants to know what it sounds like just go
to the podcast Sasquatch Chronicles and listen to their opening music and you will hear small
clips of what's called as the Sierra sounds that was recorded.
I want to say either I don't remember which doctor if it was I can't remember their name
I don't want to throw one out it's either like Meldrum or something like that I don't
remember which one recorded it but it sounded a lot like that.
So I'd world around took my gun off my shoulder and it's standing in between me and it and
it was really loud and it was a language and but see everything had already been playing
in my mind because another person that told me some stuff that they went on a YouTube
channel and talked about called Dark Waters and it was Nick Gilliland.
Oh yeah yeah yeah.
He ran the nightlife.
Coonhuntin channel.
Yes so he went on there he had already reached out to me earlier when we started doing the
podcast and to be honest if you ever hear this I kind of want to apologize and I wanted
him to come on the show and apologize because I thought he was BSing me a little bit.
Nick's a good dude he's not going to BS you.
I'm like this dude is telling me about something in my own backyard that I'm like I've never
ran into anything but then I started putting things together that I had been seeing over
the past six seven years while hunting odd things like two pine trees that were probably
how big around would you say that is?
I'd say four inches.
Okay were probably eight to ten feet apart in the middle of the woods.
Now the pines before you dropped off into the oaks but they were about four inches around
and they were bent over into an arch and hooked limb to limb.
Really?
Yeah and I thought my wife just happened to be with she never goes but she was with me
that night and we walked up and I was like look at this doesn't this look odd?
I was like what done this?
I was like didn't no wind do this look at all the rest of these pine trees wind don't
do that.
Right.
And so it was just and I just kind of filed it in my head but when Nick Gilliland told
me this stuff and then he told me where he was at I was probably about four miles away
straight line from where I'm pretty sure he was hunting at when he had what he talked
to Dark Waters about.
Right.
So.
Interesting.
Yep.
Alright well Mr. Daniel thank you for sitting down and chatting with us for just a little
bit today.
Yep.
Guys like I said he runs Coonhound Confidentials podcast go over there wherever you get your
guys check him out it's a good little deal a bunch of guys cutting up having a good time
telling some stories you're going to hear more stuff like that if you're into that kind
of stuff these are your guys to talk to.
Absolutely if you got any stories reach out to us we want to hear them.
They want to hear them guys so well thank you for sitting down talking with us Daniel
and we'll be seeing you around this weekend.
Alright man.
Thanks brother.
We are sitting down Mr. Brian Smith hailing out of the big state of Indiana who's your
boy down here in South Carolina.
Brian how are you today man?
I'm good sir how are you?
I'm wonderful.
Tell me a little bit about your hunt last night I know you're down here hunting that
little Abbey female.
It started out great we pulled back in the lane and turned the dogs loose and she struck
for a hundred slammed a tree sitting pretty good shape and one dog blew through the country
and got in pretty deep and she was by herself and at a minute thirty six had a dog cover
but I had that dog shut out on the strike walk in there threw a light in the tree she
had a coon I'm sitting 225 plus within just literally minutes into this hunt I'm thinking
this is gonna go good pulled her off that tree we recast the dogs she went down in there
struck another track come treat on a big old dentry and the other dogs kind of blew the
country and things were going pretty well and till they weren't.
They weren't happened.
Well we I'd made a couple more dentries it just seemed like I couldn't get anything on
the outside it was pretty wet and there wasn't any real good tracks and I don't know if she
was just going through there checking trees or what but I mean she made a couple legitimate
dens and I'm still sitting in pretty good shape we had a we'd spent about an hour and
hour and 40 minutes I reckon in there and she was sitting with 225 plus Cole Ramey's
dog was sitting even sitting at zero and the man from George's dog was sitting with 175
minus he had he took some minus so he's sitting with 175 in the hole and I'm sitting in pretty
good shape with about 20 minutes left to go in this hunt and we had to get the dogs caught
called timeout with about 20 minutes left we went to another spot turned the dogs loose
and the man from George's dog went back to the road was standing at the truck my dog
actually crossed the road and she wasn't doing anything I don't know what was going on she
was just standing at the road or standing on the other side of the road and like off
the ditch there just standing there she wasn't going anywhere wasn't doing anything so the
guide told us he said listen I've got a I got a hot bucket down here you got y'all can
if you get these dogs caught I got a hot bucket and I know better with my dog I know better
she's she she don't she's not the kind of dog you can just walk over and catch but she
wasn't doing anything so I thought well she's right here I can get her caught so we all
called timeout Cole got his dog caught the man from Georgia got his dog caught and as
soon as I went over Abby was within eyesight of me and when I went over to leash her up
she just turned around and she just booked you know that amazes me because I know how
much time you spend with her and she rides in the truck and stays in the house and you
are with her all the time yes sir that amazes me you can't catch her like yes sir now if
she has a if she has a training collar on I don't have to tone her shock or nothing
if she's got a training collar on and she knows those problems are on her neck and I
call her she come a flying but if she don't if she don't have that on she then got your
number she's gone she's gone she already knows what she's gone and as soon as I tried
to catch her now to give you all a little background history on this three night well
it's been middle of the week last week Tuesday night I guess it was she was I hunt her and
I also run her on a treadmill and I put her on a treadmill I think it was Tuesday night
or Wednesday night I put her on a treadmill and I could tell it she was off a little bit
in her front left and I didn't really think a whole lot about it I kind of cut her cut
her treadmill time a little bit and the next day Sherrilyn called me at work and she said
hey she said you need to call the vet and have Abby looked at she said she's she's
three legged she's not wanting to walk on this front left leg at all so I called my
vet my vet got me in I took her in dropped her off did x-rays did everything nothing
was broken but she was really sore on her toe right behind her toenail and like super
sore so my vet gave me some antibiotics and some pain meds and stuff and last couple days
she seemed like she's been okay so last night you know when when she was standing there
at the truck I thought maybe she was hurt you know or whatever and I thought well I'll
just go get her caught well she she got in the country and got about I don't know 400
450 something like that she got struck and I was trying to get her caught and I got the
time running on me you know and I'm trying to get her caught and I thought there was
a couple times I thought she was just gonna come treat in there well she ended up quitting
whatever that was she was messing around with and she got through the country about 900
and I popped out the back of this woods and there was this big giant field that looked
like they'd cut pine trees and it was all rutted up and it was thick and she was on
the other side of that and I couldn't I couldn't even get across it so I didn't I wouldn't
even try to get across it so I come back I called Cole and and I talked to him on the
phone and and he's like hey let's talk to the guy and see if there's a road over there
so I came back to the truck and I asked the guy if there was a if there was a road over
there and he looked at my garment he's like yeah I can get you close so we drove down
around and he did get me closer but by the time she actually got treed the hunt was pretty
I was I was done at that point and so I got into her shined a tree she had a coon and
she did a good job on that it was a cypher swamp water about knee-deep I mean I there
just there was no dry ground in there and so she did a really good job I was aggravated
I couldn't get her caught I was I was heartbroken I got scratched because I was sitting in a
I sit in a good position and it was a big gut punch it really was but she had she she
treated coon in some really bad conditions and she there's no quit and and her heart
she's got more heart than I think about any dog I've ever hunted so I was proud of her
even though I didn't win I was proud of her right so I know you're down here hunting with
the Dalton gang tell us a little bit more about them dogs you guys brought down here
this weekend we brought six dogs down here and unfortunately nobody had any luck last
night we've got a we got a dog called snag which Tyler Benedict's hunting and there's
Rickless over here showing his best side yeah we're gonna get him back on here we're gonna
snag Oxidine get him in here too if you don't walk away right y'all hold up we're about
done here but we got snag he's a four-year-old dogs placed in the top 100 of the UKC world
twice he's got about 19,000 PKC money pretty nice dog and then we got rock hide hide and
snag her both Willie pups we got the Dixie chick which Tyler or Philip King handles her
and did I leave anybody out I don't know I don't think so I don't think so I don't think
I've got her bite covered right on all right buddy well you got something tonight we are
all right good deal all right best of luck to you yes sir whole gang so thanks for sitting
down with us hey I appreciate you having me thanks right thank you Bryce
all right all right all right we are sitting here with one of the best UKC judges I've
had in a cast flanky and I'm not saying that just because you're sitting here in front
of me but I've been told just several times we are sitting here Mr. Kyle Oaks how are
you brother good buddy how are you I am great guys I drew out with Kyle last year down here
at this event in Grand American he was my judge and I was pleasantly surprised to have
somebody who knew the rules who knew how to lead a cast who knew how to handle the situation
and filled out the scorecard right it was nice good cast it was a great cast it was
a great but anyways Kyle I want to get you on here because you are getting ready to do
your own podcast and I just want to give you a little time here to tell the world about
it you know I'm just trying to promote everybody that's doing something good for the sport
oh yeah throw me the pitch hey we're gonna start a coon hunting media we're gonna kind
of just looking for another partner to roll in with but uh kind of we're gonna look at
live events also not as much as like Joy Dolf who does but some of the smaller stuff like
stuff like 300r pro classics 400r pro classics 500r shootouts right stuff like that some
people don't see live and not the big events you know what I mean right some of the smaller
smaller dogs that people can't afford the big entries but also get their spotlight yeah
that's a good idea I haven't heard of anybody doing that yet and I actually didn't know
that I thought you were just doing the podcast thing but I think that's a pretty good business
model yeah we're kind of brainstorming on that right now yeah absolutely that's good
because there are a lot of guys who don't aren't able to go to the bigger hunts where
all this stuff is broadcasted but they've got nice dogs oh yeah they do good dog work
they just ain't got the money to really to back it exactly family and it takes somebody
to back in a lot of these big dogs a lot of them yeah but for you guys to come out there
and give them the spotlight yeah I think people that'll go a long way they'll appreciate it
we're hoping so are you hunting rip down here this weekend yes sir tell me a little bit
about him well he's a blue tick I know don't shoot me down real quick but he is out of
a racket rig crash and a red stick and out of Louisiana so I mean he's a nice hound because
I saw you just did a couple weeks ago the UK seed pro slam pro slam yeah the first era
pro slam yeah we rolled in second only it I mean that's a heck of a ride for the first
pro slam I mean in history yeah I mean you're there you're scratched in nice I liked it
it was a fun event first one we ever well first one they ever done and we got an entry
filled in like three minutes I mean I remember pulling over on the side of the road hitting
the emergency flashers and getting the entry because it was filled like that really but
it was a fun event we all treat a lot of Coons and a lot of nice dogs but yeah he treated
two Coons by himself another round and got us in the finals right well tell me a little
about your cast last night how'd that go for you we ain't gonna go there but anyways we
draw cypress swamps out of Bamberg and right off the rip we didn't get a bark for like
30 minutes and I'm hunting a call he's cold or nose I'm like if I don't get a bark for
30 minutes something hang on go good we finally all got struck dog treat a slick there another
dog treat a slick and we went up dogs are trying out of here and we called timeout he
said we got a lot better spot it's like good deal we go there and I got in there about
seven hundred striped me for a hundred everybody else strike strikes and they go in there two
dogs tree of slick so they're almost out backwards at this point and we still ain't heard nothing
I'm like point eight still trucking there daytree a circle tree and come to end the
cast about six minutes left luckily at that time rip rolled over tree way deep he covered
about three and a half miles I was hoping he had a coon I had to 25 penny big dentry
so that end of the night dead cast and the night dead cast well you hunting again tonight
you're gonna try to get a night I'm gonna try get again tonight have you already drawn
out you know where you're going no we don't know we're going yet but I am cast 46 limited
at 430 so we should be pretty close you didn't pull out a judge card today we got our cast
yet oh that's right I get my card at 430 gotcha yesterday and I saw you had that judge card
packing around and barely we'll probably get her again hopefully yeah so rip did you get
him qualified for TOC this coming year oh yeah yeah we got 13 wins last year on him
and was hoping to get him grand before he turned two but before he turned three and
we had a good run at Grand American winter classic and we was running the Parina race
with him and he got diagnosed with heartworms so he got laid up for four months solid and
we finally whipped him out and got him rolling again and got him grand got him tournament
champions so awesome hoping to probably roll into 10 mile throughout my back door oh yeah
that's another one than pro slam isn't it that's where the pro slam was yeah yeah that's
what I have in the TOC zones this year gotcha so alright I haven't even looked at it yet
to see where they were at yet but that'll work if you're right in your back door oh
yeah I'm excited I got drive far that's right you know every once in a while it's nice to
have something close to home yeah I mean I like traveling and everything I do too but
seeing everybody good hunting better hunting but when you got to take off work you just
slip 45 minutes away from home and hunt his own makes it nice now you told me something
yesterday you're thinking about moving I'm not moving north for just for better coon
hunting strictly coon hunting I mean that is some passion and dedication I mean it is
got it's in my blood I mean competition coon and I'll be honest I love coon hunting but
if it wasn't for competition hunting I would not be as dedicated as I am I mean I'd hunt
once a week twice a week maybe but it ain't gonna be no seven nights a week right but
yeah I'm moving north hoping mid Indiana awesome man well you'll be kind of close to me up
there somewhere so we'll have to get hooked up and definitely we'll have to show you how
a walker dog trees a coon he didn't show mine I tree one I'm just messing with you oh man
it's all in good fun buddy thank you for sitting down with us today we appreciate it good luck
tonight thank you good best luck to the coon hunting media that's it can't not meeting
can they find you on Facebook where they can't find you yeah we'll be on Facebook and we're
gonna hopefully release here in the next hopefully within the next month and we'll be all over
Facebook Apple Spotify YouTube awesome well guys go out there give him a give him a listen
it's gonna be good if I mean if he puts as much time into this podcast and stuff as he
puts into knowing the rules y'all are in for a treat we hope so that's right buddy thank
you so much thank you
all right we're gonna turn this into the hunter show round number three he done recruited
another person oh all right give me your name where you're from why you're here Benjamin
Marshall Benjamin Marshall where you're from 30 talking coon house is our brand that's
what we do that's what we love we love to hear a good coon dog we love for that joker
to be accurate and we don't like no trash do we hunt them no we do not all right well
give me give me the spill I don't know I never met you tell me about it what I do my granddaddy
been out here he's been doing this probably 50 years coon hunting my great-grandfather's
coon honey and I train my own dogs I start them from the ground up I don't make grand
night champions night champions my own I don't let nobody work my dog okay Hunter can tell
you that perfect um I got a night champion female up here she run like a six-year-old
puppy but she's not really and uh oh yeah yeah awesome yeah you hunting tonight we're
gonna roll it one more time it's gonna be her last go give her the like give her one
more go right now and they go Woody Woody entertainment oh we done had Woody on here
earlier we done had him on here yeah see I see what what do you know that's the new school
man what do you know came up behind me that's good man yeah awesome side so other than grand
American where else you run to you're on the circuit UK CPKC uh I hunt everywhere I hunt
everywhere everywhere this guy get me to go I go and if they somebody say they got a coon
dog I go finish them off there you go all right what's what's your favorite accomplishment
what's what's best thing you've done um I just me for me man it's all about the dog
I like making a finished product and um that's something that I've always done I something
I'm big on me and my grandfather we've always had coon dogs I whole life English Walker
plot whatever you could think how to mall huh I had them all man okay one other question
South Carolina right here where's the best thing to go eat where am I gonna go I'm hungry
chest I like a good buffet with some good fried chicken or some fried fish and we in
there well which one are we going to where is that around here one down the street and
it's a buffet down the street well what's it called what's the name of it I ain't from
here I'm from Augusta Georgia oh yeah I'm from Georgia gotcha I'm sorry I thought you
was from around here they brought the Georgia boy up here man Georgia Bulldogs you a Bulldog
fan I'm a Clemson man Clemson man all right brother man well thanks for sitting down appreciate
y'all yeah we appreciate you good luck tonight yes sir thank you
all right guys well we are getting ready to round out our trip here at the Grand American
2024 and I wanted to bring our next guest on here just real quick just because I never
met him until yesterday but I've talked to him for a little bit this weekend of last
two days and kind of kind of got to know him a little bit and I've really enjoyed talking
to him and hanging out him that's mr. Jason Dewey with full cry Jason how are you brother
I'm doing great man how are you I'm great I'm really good you wore out I am I spent
a long two days we've been doing a lot of recordings a lot of talking a lot of networking
it's been good and I see you guys been over there getting it dude it's been crazy on
honestly it's been really cool because I mean I was amazed at how many people didn't know
that we had picked up full cry right you know surprised it's still in it's been really
good meeting a lot of these guys you know I know who they are I know their dogs you
know I've met them through the internet you know Facebook and whatever it's been nice
putting faces to names for sure yeah so it gates the guys don't on their our listeners
don't know who you are where you're from so you work for W. I'm supply yep you have now
acquired the full crime magazine yes sir and I believe if I had to put a guess on it you
probably win the award for furthest distance traveled if we don't they're gonna be my neighbor
because we're only about I don't know 60 miles from the coast when we flew from one ocean
to the other so yeah it was a trip hailing out of Oregon and ended up in South Carolina
you can't you can't go any more extreme on either end no we flew in Charleston and there's
a Charleston Oregon it's funny like we could have literally just drove 40 miles and then
jumped a plane and made it coast to coast how far of a flight was that like six hours
that's not terrible no it's not that bad really it's better than driving for sure we drove
to Heartland classic back in 2014 that was like 36 hours in Wisconsin yeah and Oaks that
we drove that for W1 year and that was I don't want to do that again no I wouldn't either
it's rough yeah well just give us a little quick snippet here of full crime what you
guys have going on you guys are rejuvenating this magazine that's been around for forever
so for our listeners who don't know what full cry is give them the quick updated version
of what you guys have going on well it's been around and in publication since February in
1939 and it's been the world's leading tree dog publication was you know the shtick and
when cnh publishing closed down earlier this year I got a good phone call from our buddy
in sheets yeah he says hey man full crack they're closed I'll bet you could get it I
said I don't I don't know like that's not my wheelhouse we do the podcast you know I'm
working full time at W we got four kids like it's well we have three at the time yeah I
actually I took it to buddy and he says no man it's just not in our business models you
know it's I said okay and my wife she says well if he doesn't want it why don't why don't
we buy it how hard can it be I said honey we got a baby coming like we had a baby in
the last six months we took I'm gonna say a month or two to get things kind of put together
we launched our first issue in October and we're bi-monthly so every two months and then
now we've got our second issue out the third she's been working on while we're here you
know trying to get it to the designer and get it ready but yeah we I guess the mission
of it it went from just keeping something alive to like growing it you know and we went
full color it's a hundred pages now I mean and I see it going up from there it has to
right we're getting so much good content from guys and it's just been I don't know it's
a labor of love but it's really cool because when it closed up it was like everybody's
grandpa died I mean like the outreach you know and everybody oh it's horrible it's been
around forever and I'll tell you that's the one thing we've heard since we've been here
was thank you for keeping it going thank you for bringing it back thank you for doing this
and really I mean it's humbling it really is humbling so it's been a really great trip
for us you know we've been flinging shirts and subscriptions and whatever but really
like the people coming through multi-generationally right you know and they're like oh I remember
grandpa's and it's it kind of gives you a bigger scale yeah look at things you know
because in the west coast like this event would blow people's mind we don't have this
out there right you get 300 people together at a field trial and you're having like a
big shimmy and you walk out here and it's like oh my god I know we went to dinner Thursday
night they announced the Purina winners and account or the Chamber of Commerce put on
dinner and all that and we were thinking man this has got to bring in a ton of money for
this area they got billboards I mean and in your world it's no big deal like you and I'm
sure a lot of your listeners like this is everyday living for the West Coasters this
is not and I don't know how many West Coasters would even come out here you know I wonder
like other than I mean obviously you're the far extreme and you you're probably like the
outlier in the group but I wonder like where the demographic stops like do they are they
coming from Missouri are they coming like where are they coming to get all the way to
South Carolina you'd be surprised because I know like I got buddies in California that
drive back every year for the trig nationals or you know you got guys that come out automobiles
obviously is the big one everybody talks about but this correct me if I'm wrong this seems
bigger it is so in my in my opinion I think this has more foot traffic than automobiles
because you're not just dealing with the coon hands where automobiles is primarily a coon
hand specific event right you've got guys coming here that are running deer dogs hog
dogs coon rabbit it is you've got all different types of hound hunters in here which is what
simple dogging is all about people who are always dogging in all types of hounds so we
really appreciate you bringing full cry back because you guys are kind of specific to the
tree dogs correct with full cry yep but you're kind of keeping it old school it's retro we're
bringing the retro to us I mean that's what kept it around I mean back in the day this
thing had 30,000 subscribers and when we took it over I mean it was obviously substantially
less than that but you know we've doubled our subscriber base in the last six months
that's amazing and it's been I mean this was a great trip for us we met a lot of our advertisers
you know and putting faces to names is nice for me yeah but it's I like the old school
I'm an old soul man right I want trucker hats and aviators I love it but I know that you
know listeners can go if they're a member of patreon through houndsman XP they're getting
a subscription to full cry included with that patreon membership that's how I get it I'm
a member of patreon right and I've been getting my bi-monthly subscriptions I've been thumbing
through them and I like what you got going on the the articles and columns you guys have
people writing for the pictures are great you know you mentioned our buddy Ben sheets
he's had a couple in there that are just solid yeah he does he really does but other than
patreon through houndsman XP where can these listeners go to and subscribe to full cry
how can they find you guys bet so you can find us at full cry mag.com and then we've
got our Facebook our Instagram all that but subscriptions swag you know we got like some
old retro coffee cups we got shirts and hats and stuff like that that's all at full cry
mag.com awesome all right buddy well I know you're busy you're packing up we're getting
ready to close down this event it's this event it has been great I've had a blast it's been
a good time and you know just thank you for sitting down and chatting with me this weekend
because I've spent several times just bouncing back and forth and right trying to get you
and fielder you know pulled away from people just to talk good luck with that one hey that
was a good move getting fielder in your booth by the way I'm telling you right now that
man right there I met him at Oaks well through houndsman XP yeah I came out and you know
and through the years like he's just became a good friend you know we talked family and
dogs a lot more than we talked business but it's been you know when those old guys take
you under their wing they want to see us do well they do you know Mark Zapp and there's
been several people that have really just they've flocked people to us because they
they know the value of this they were part of full cry in the heyday yeah you know and
trying to promote it and I mean I appreciate you having me on man we'd love to have more
we want this back to like heyday status yeah absolutely you know one thing fielder he cracked
me up earlier he's always got good one-liners you know oh yeah and he's sitting right there
in that chair we were recording a little episode here and he said uh you know I really feel
like I'm the I'm the cheerleader these days I'm that grandpa on the stand watching the
game I'll tell you what he's a great babysitter too Taylor because we got her six-month-old
baby here she decided she was coming with us and every time she looks at him she just
smiles with those eyes told him we're gonna have to bring her out to Florida yeah just
drop her off absolutely absolutely all right brother man well I'll let you get back to
it guys thank you so much for joining us here at Grand American 2024 it's been unreal hanging
out the guys from the fallen outdoors getting all these little clips for you guys it's been
wonderful thank you for the support at Semper dogg and make sure you guys go check out all
of our wonderful sponsors we couldn't do it without them Jason we couldn't do without
you man trying to bring stuff back you're part of the puzzle the whole thing's a puzzle
and you're a piece of it so thank you man appreciate it and I'd say if you guys are
really wanting to you know subscribe that's great but really we're looking for good content
because it is the best foot forward we can put it's not lost on social you know these
folk guys have been around for 50 years you got grandpa's old ones or dad you know what
I mean yeah absolutely so if you got something to say get a hold of us well guys that is
all I've got for you Grand American was an unreal time with unreal people I really just
thoroughly enjoyed the time that I got to spend with each and every person we had here
on the podcast I really appreciate them taking the time out of their days to sit down and
record a little bit for you guys you know they didn't have to do that none of these
guys were forced to do anything you know I just simply asked them if they'd like to be
on here to let them know you know we're trying to bring you guys the best content that we
can and I really appreciate them for it really appreciate UKC and all they did for this event
and the host clubs down there in Orangeburg South Carolina that put on such a great event
that we can go enjoy every year so once again thank you to everybody who was involved in
Grand American thank you to everybody who came onto the podcast with me I appreciate
you guys look forward to seeing you guys on the next one thank you to our sponsors Froggy
Bottom Outdoors never satisfied off-road we could not do it without them guys also check
out Hometown Heroes Outdoors you heard us on the Dog and Tuesday we're going to be doing
a section with them coming up every episode we're going to feature a Hometown Hero Outdoor
Hero of the Week so stay tuned for all that very excited for that stuff that's coming
forward and we hope to keep bringing you guys what you want to hear so until next time guys
keep dogging