Embrace Technology but Don't Rely on It
Another excerpt from Cat Dog Chronicles pondering the importance of tracking technology in our modern hound hunting pursuits.
If I didn’t have GPS tracking collars for my dogs, I wouldn’t be able to hunt the way I do.
I don’t think most modern hound hunters would either and that’s just the truth.
We are extremely spoiled these days, and while that’s largely to our benefit, sometimes I feel like it is also to our detriment.
It’s always incredibly humbling to speak with old-timers who never had such technology available yet still found great success hunting with hounds. I just can’t wrap my mind around how they did it.
I remember one time when I accidentally turned Coulee loose without turning on her tracking collar—it wasn’t a big deal because she didn’t go far and came back to the truck on her own, but when I realized that it wasn’t powered on my stomach sank thinking about what would’ve happened had she gotten out of pocket.
I would’ve had no way to see where she was and no way to communicate with her. I would’ve been forced to do things the old-fashioned way.
But was I prepared to? That, I do not know.
I recognize that I am way too reliant on technology when I’m in the woods. On one hand, I know I use all my gadgets as crutches to keep from getting lost and keep from losing my dogs. But on the other hand, I can’t imagine a scenario when I would turn my dogs loose without GPS collars strapped to them.
In many ways, it reminds me of when I was in elementary school learning how to do mathematics longhand without a calculator. I remember one time hearing a kid in class ask the teacher, “Why do we need to do it by hand since we’ll always have calculators?”
Of course, the teacher explained that there may be times when we won’t have calculators, and learning how to do it longhand would come in handy.
As much as I hate to admit it, she was right—there have been times when I didn’t have a calculator, and those early math lessons made my brain hurt slightly less when it came to doing some figurin’.
And the same applies to my hunting technology—I know there will be times when my gear won’t work as expected and I’m forced to do things the old-fashioned way.
This is one of those haunting subjects that when it creeps into my mind, I’m in for a sleepless night.
Other than equipment failure, one of the best arguments I’ve heard for trying to get away from being so reliant on technology, is that when you’re staring at the screen of a GPS, it takes away from the experience of you and your dog interacting with the natural world.
The more time I spend hunting with my dogs, the more comfortable I get peeling myself away from my GPS tracker, and every time I do, I must admit it’s a totally different experience.
Even just leaving the GPS in my truck and sitting on my tailgate for ten minutes listening to Whiskey and Coulee work a track is almost therapeutic.
Trying to figure out how far away they are and what they’re doing just by listening to their voices gives me an endorphin rush.
There have also been times when I have challenged myself to walk into a tree simply by following the sound of the dogs without looking at my GPS, and while that may sound very trivial to more experienced hunters, I feel like my navigation skills improve every time I do that.
I love my technology but certainly recognize that doing things the old-fashioned way is a fading art form but one we shouldn’t let die completely.
forward, I look forward to learning more about how hound hunters did things back in the day so I can combine their methods with my modern technology. I’ve never claimed to be a purist or traditionalist or anything like that, but I still want to find ways to learn from the past as much as I can so I can be prepared if and when my fancy tracking technology takes a dump.
If you’ve been enjoying these excerpts from my new book, Cat Dog Chronicles, it’s available now on Amazon and I would love it if you’d go and purchase it and leave a review. Come on, don’t make me beg.
In my next dispatch, I’ll share some insights I’ve found around one of the biggest things that has held me back from taking my hunting to the next level. It’s another one of those mind game things, so stay tuned and subscribe to the newsletter if you haven’t already.
Until next time,
Niklas