The Coyote and the Hound

Dogs are our best friend, but very few ever had the freedom of Elmer Fudd, the red bone hound. He is a ranch dog like no other, truly a hound of hounds. I would say he’s my dog, but really he is his own dog. I am just his bud that he lives with that provides food, water, and access to his bed through a dog door, when he feels like it. He often chooses to sleep outside hanging with the horses, his other friends who somehow have learned to love him, after making a game out of him chasing them. Sometimes he even herds them to me when he knows I am trying to find them in the woods to go for a ride, although he started out doing the opposite. But even that isn’t his favorite game. His favorite game is to race cars down our remote dirt road driveway as they leave, reaching speeds up to 30mph. It terrifies anyone new coming to the ranch for the first time thinking that he is running away, but everyone used to him has fun racing him out of the driveway. He always gives up as soon as he reaches the neighbor's driveway to head home, sometimes bringing the neighbor dog back for a date at the food bowl. He is in love with her, but fortunately their date never progresses beside him bringing her inside to the food dish.

He has many other friends of the forest as well. Easy enough to make with a variety of wildlife around. He has a coyote that comes and plays with him in the yard. When told to go get her because we didn’t want coyotes around the house, he stared back then pranced off with her playing and came back a few hours later looking like he just had the best play date of his life. He has a mutual agreement with a bull moose that hangs out in our pond in the front yard throughout the summer to show that they don’t like each other but each will hesitantly ignore the other. They will swim together in opposite ends of the pond occasionally making noises at each other to show how much they don’t like the other being there. He also has his primary nemesis: the porcupine. Through trial and error, he has learned that he doesn’t want to touch them, even the small ones, but boy does he like to follow and bark at them.

Still, nothing compares to one of the strangest encounters he has given me with another coyote. Out horseback riding as we often do, we heard the strangest yipping and howling from a coyote at a nearby hill, like it was very angry at us for intruding on her valley. We figured we must be near her den. Elmer bayed back at her with his very distinctive hound dog bay. We called him back and continued on our ride, trying to hurry out of the valley and let her be, figuring she must have a den nearby that was causing her to be so protective and acting so strange.

About a mile or so later, we hear it again from some nearby trees. We realized this coyote was following us! It followed us for miles and miles yipping the whole time! Clearly, it was not guarding a den or it would have stayed to protect it. We all had a great laugh and thought about our “Howlie Homie” that went on our entire ride with us until we were about back to where we first saw her. We mostly thought about how that was such a once in a lifetime experience, or so we thought.

Throughout that summer, we saw her time and time again, but only when Elmer Fudd was with us on a ride. The days he didn’t come, there was no sign of her, even with other dogs accompanying us. Anytime he was with us, she would yip and complain until he went and chased her barking. They would play around the hills and she would go back to yipping and complaining the moment he quit. The only time I felt she might be trying to lure him was when we saw a cougar go into a field and disappear within the crops, then she went to the field trying to get Elmer to come get her, but he knew the cougar was there, and we called him back. I still to this day wonder if the cougar was also her pal, if they hunted together, or if she was even aware that the cougar went into the field before her. This strange behavior of hers went on all last summer.

We had all sorts of stories about what she was complaining to him about. Did he owe her child support for abandoned puppies? Did he take her on a nice date then not come see her again? What was her obsession with him? She didn’t seem to care about any of the other male dogs my friends would bring along on rides, just Elmer Fudd. We were convinced they had some sort of romance, but we never saw any reddish hound coyote pups around. We had camped in the area for years before, and he always went off messing with any nearby animals throughout the night, sometimes as friends, sometimes as foes. We still have no idea what his relationship with this coyote was.

Lots of dogs will give you some crazy adventures and stories, but none compare to this wild beast I call my hound dog, Elmer Fudd. He is a wild animal that lives in my house and chooses to listen to me despite being fully capable of surviving on his own. He is truly a free animal that lives his life unleashed.