My husband is a felon, and therefore cannot own or use a gun, even for hunting. We are currently saving up for an RV, and once we have that we'll save up to buy a few acres in Tennessee (we currently live in Texas, but I'm originally from Ohio). Our plan then is to live in the RV on our land in TN while we build our own house together. We plan to both work part time to have some money, and also have time to work on building the house together. We figure we shouldn't need to work full time since we plan on trying to live off the land as much as possible- using solar panels for solar energy, possibly also utilizing water and/or wind as renewable resources as well, growing our own fruit and vegetable gardens, harvesting plants and herbs from the land, as well as, of course, hunting game. We decided that my husband will be in charge of doing the hunting and I'll be in charge of training dog(s) for him to use to help him hunt, as well as helping out with the skinning, gutting, prepping, and cooking. I'm already a professional dog trainer who has trained 2 of my own dogs, as well as going to clients' houses to help them train their dogs since 2015, and I have been employed full time as dog trainer at a dog training, boarding, daycare, and grooming facility for over the past 3 years.
So, since my husband won't be able to use a gun to hunt for us, he'll be using a bow and arrow as well as traps, snares, and a slingshot. I can't seem to find a good answer to this online, so I thought I'd try asking here. I'm trying to figure out what breed(s) would be best to use to aid him in hunting with a bow and arrow. He's told me that he'll need a dog to help him close the distance between him and the game or to actually catch the game for him, so it sounds like a typical gun dog/flushing dog probably wouldn't be best? I was thinking maybe a beagle since they are supposed to good at finding bunnies and circling them to keep them close and in a small area or maybe a sighthound because I think they were bred to catch small game like rabbits? Or maybe some sort of treeing dog? But he also needs to be able to track larger game like deer as well, so I'm not sure. Personally, I'm generally not a fan of scenthounds, but since we're gonna be building indoor/outdoor kennels on our land, I suppose I'll be open to them if they actually turn out to be the best option. It just probably won't be a house dog as well. I'm new to training dogs for hunting, so would love some advice from someone who has used a specific breed or breeds for hunting with a bow and arrow before. Thanks in advance!
