The Best Hunt I Ever Had

So, I suppose I cannot just write, “It was the best hunt I ever had,” and leave it at that. Not many readers would be interested in such a hunt report.
   
In Hounds and Hunting Through the Ages, Joseph B. Thomas wrote, “It is surprising how few people can give an accurate account of a hunt or the kind of season they had. In order to do this, one must have some comparative point of a view, a good eye for a country, and know the five essential fundamentals to be remembered in describing a hunt—the point, the distance, the pace, whether the line of country covered was good or bad, and whether the quarry was accounted for.”

It was a five-mile point, 15 miles were covered in just short of two hours, the line of country was very good except through the wash bottoms of Box Elder Creek, and the quarry was accounted for in front of the entire field. This brief account does not do it justice either. The problem is: there are not any adequate words to describe it—you just had to have been there.

Beginning Nov. 15, the Arapahoe Hunt (Colo.) hosted our annual week of hunting, now dubbed the Arapahoe Hunt Rende-zvous. The Fort Carson Hounds (Colo.) hunted the first day, followed by Caza Ladron (N.M.), and then the Arapahoe hounds on our home territory.

On the fourth day, Nov. 18, we hunted a combined pack from all three hunts. We met on the lawn south of the Arapahoe kennels, as 111⁄2 couple of Walker Foxhounds from Caza Ladron were mixed with 71⁄2 couple of Walker Foxhounds from Fort Carson Hounds, and 111⁄2 couple of English Foxhounds from the Arapahoe Hunt.

A field of 95 followed, with 10 various staff. Dr. G. Marvin Beeman hunted the hounds with the help of his staff and others who were invited to ride up with the staff. This made for quite a spectacle.

Hounds were put into cover just west of the driveway and, shortly thereafter, trailed a cold line toward the south. After losing scent, they again worked a cold line, which took us east toward Box Elder Creek. The pace was a working trot, which was uneventful for this wide-open country of rolling hills. Nearing the creek, a coyote was capped by Field Master Mike Wilfey (also a Jt.-MFH of the Arapahoe).

The field was quickly away on a four-mile point when the coyote checked at a barbed-wire fence at an old corral area. The field split to take fences and gates, which are intertwined around this old corral. As a result, many of the field were left behind as the coyote ran north along th fence for a mile.

Suddenly, old Charlie looped back around, right into the midst of the now spread-out pack of hounds. He emerged on the south side of hounds, with five hounds in close pursuit and the remainder of the pack now reversing to catch up. The field was strung out along the fence line, just as the quarry and hounds reversed on the same line, giving all the most spectacular view.

I stopped as the coyote was just 10 feet in front of us, with the lead hound, Arapahoe Ivan, just five feet off of his brush. Seeing only a whip, with the huntsman coming up behind and the first-flight field master stuck back in the corral’s tangle of jumps, and the second-flight field master up ahead trying to reverse everyone safely back through the tangle gate, we remained smack in the middle of the field as the coyote reversed his line.