I live in VA as well and I've hunted with dogs, though I've never been a member of a club. VAbowman, I hunted Ivor (Southhampton) for years and had hunt clubs put there dogs in on all the property around us, and through ours, and 6 packs of dogs running deer every which direction is a circus to behold. Add in the truck hunters trying to race the dogs to the end of the woodlotand you havea comedy right out of stereotype Hollywood. Most clubs in that area I dealt with are what I would refer to as "slob hunters". Breaking laws, speeding, hunting on public roads, threatening, tresspassing, the whole gamit. It was stupid. We had hundreds of acres we kept posted and stand hunted out of, but I'd be lying if I said the sound of a pack hounds heading your way didn't get your heart racing. It's a fun relaxing way of hunting, similar to small game hunting in my mind. After 6 weeks of intense bowhunting/BP, and after the rut, I don't mind relaxing and letting the dogs work and set up on escape routes. I think the answer to most problems is that clubs need to stop using the long legged "running type" hounds and use beagles. I've hunted with friends that had 3 or 4 beagles and we'd push small patches of woods/briars on Fort Pickett and private land and we never had problems keeping track of the dogs. They walked slowly, trailing the deer and the deer moved slowly in front of them, similar to a man drive, feeding as they go. Often I saw a deer looking back and waiting until the dog got within 50 yards before moving on, as if it were a game. Yes it's not an intense, chessgame, of move/countermove, but it does take strategy and can be intense and fun. My ego is not so strongly tied to how I hunt that I can't sit back and enjoy a chorus of random chaos for an evening of fun. I don't make a practice of it; in fact I now live and hunt in the section of the State that doesn't allow dog hunting, except for coons and bear. Yes it does stink when you have a buck patterned and you are in the perfect setuponly to have someone exercising their dogs before season come throughyour hunting area. BTW, it's been my experience thatdeer stillmove through an areaeven after dogs have run through. Understand, one of the tricks used most often by bucks is to circle back around on their own track and bed down, or to hold tight and let dogs run by. So, in my experience, I've found that dog hunting (on neighboring property), enlivens the mid-morning/mid-evening hunt but doesn't do much to change the evening stands, unless the buck happens to be killed, but that doesn't happen as much as you'd think.

My problem with the "anti-dog" crowd is that you are joining the whole "anti-hunting" crowd and helping them give hunting in general a black-eye. We should police our own ranks through education and peer pressure, but inviting legislative interference could be inviting the fox into the hen house, so to speak.

On a related note how many of you bird/rabbit hunters do it the old fashion, manual way? or do you use dogs?