we’ll take up a collection and buy you a set of those dollar store reading glasses, so you can hit a rabbit.
I was feeling a little cocky since I had killed with a single shot, the first running rabbit of the morning, only a half hour or so ago.
Funny, how fate likes to hand you your head in situations like that.
We had been standing there, in a relatively clean area chatting for about five minutes when the rabbit broke right next to us.
Bam! Bam!
Rye and I were treated to rapidly receding sound of dogs in hot pursuit.
“What kind of reading glasses did you say We needed?”

You know, nobody like a smart butt. The morning hunt saw us get four rabbits in six races. The combined pack did well together. They are pretty well matched in size and speed, if not age. They run the gamut from Lucy’s not quite two to the grand ol dame of Cuz’s pack, Judy who is eleven. The two fastest dogs are Kate and Cuz’s Lady.
Kate still has a tendency to over run the scent but she has pretty well quit trying to out smart the rabbit and cutting it off in it’s loop.

Brag killed two that morning while Rye got one right before lunch for a total bag of four rabbits for six races

We broke out the boxes for a lunch of Vienna’s and such. We needn’t have bothered. Plunker was one of our guests and had brought a bag of sausage made in Roanoke, Alabama. The one thing we haven’t had this year is Souse meat. It’s not like the sausage was any better than the head cheese for a healthy heart.
The girls were pretty tuckered and after eating the Vienna’s that we gave them in favor of the susage took a quick nap.


After lunch, we took a loong walk that yielded not a single race or even a jump. Djmed decided that he may as well get into his bosses good graces and cut out to work awhile. He was barely out of sight (later we found out he battled a mud puddle in his big two wheel drive truck for bit before getting out) when Lucy sounded and the pack took off on a hot track.
I heard something and turned to listen to Mystery still in a thick area below me calling for help. Help that was now in the next bottom. I told Plunker that Mystery had a rabbit and he took a position about 15 yards over. It was so thick, I could barely catch glimpses of his orange through the scrub.
The shot startled me.

It was Plunker killing the first rabbit of a three rabbit, four race afternoon. The rest of the pack had brought it back in fast circle. He said it was mostly in self defense since he didn’t think he could get out of the way as the rabbit barreled down the slope.
We called the rest of the dogs over and they soon had Mystery’s rabbit in flight. This race lasted an hour in the thick racing around before the dogs lost it after it crossed into a relatively clear area where the pines had been thinned.

The last two races were quick ones. Cuz killed one when he was three quarters of the way through his loop. Brag jumped it and both Plunker and I saw it but couldn’t get a shot as it angled away through the relatively clean planted pines.

The last one came after Lucy suddenly opened up hot. She charged down the trail with the rest of the pack in tow, before the chase broke down as the pack milled around.
Turned out that Lucy had hit a hot track and took off down the back trail. We got Lady back to the start and soon the race was back on.
The rabbit had crossed onto the thinned out area and I crossed a ditch, taking a stand where I could watch down the slope. He came down a depression in front of me, presenting a easy moving shot. Still took two though.
Sigh

Final score
We got 7
Brag 2
Rimfire 2 though you know I don’t keep up with such
Rye 1
Cuz 1
Plunker 1
Djmed well, we got seven anyway