NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/625084
JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2016 • NEBRASKAland 45 C alin Ortiz had hunted rabbits before. But never with beagles. So last winter, on a hunt organized by his Lincoln Shooting Stars 4-H Club, the look on his face the first time Bella struck a rabbit's trail and let out a series of bellowing yips and yelps and howls, was about as predictable as sunrise. "What the …?" the 7 th grader's face said. "It was very, very loud," Ortiz said. "And strange." That first bawl didn't come as soon as Shane Krause, who led the hunt at Wagon Train Lake State Recreation Area near Hickman, would have expected. After rendezvousing in the parking lot, Krause, his daughter, Emma, 4-H coach Rachel Carlson, Ortiz and Kolton Davis, another first- timer behind beagles, headed through a grassland recently cleared of eastern red cedars and other invasive trees. Bella sniffed her way around one of the many piles of trees left behind, seemingly perfect rabbit cover, but said nothing. In the adjacent wooded draw, she zigged and zagged and burrowed her way through the thickest cover, letting out a few yips, but not enough to signal a trail. The hunters and mentors shadowed the dog, some in the woods and some on the edge, waiting patiently for a bunny to bolt, but Bella found none. So the hunt moved back out to the tree piles. She said nothing at the second tree pile, but lit up on the third. Tail wagging, she crawled atop the tangled mess of limbs and trunks and then into them as far as she could, trying to pinpoint the source of the rabbit scent wafting out of the tangle. The joy of hunting bunnies with beagles is the chase. When spooked from whatever cover they are hiding in, a rabbit will run from the dogs, but not wanting to leave its home range, almost always circles back to from whence it came. In the midst of the chase, hunters are treated to the intermittent bursts of bellowing from the dog, announcing it has picked up a scent trail it may have briefly lost. There was no chase at this tree pile. When Bella got too close for comfort nd 4-H Story and photos by Eric Fowler Emma Krause smiles as she watches the beagle named Bella root around a wood pile for a bunny. Wagon Train SRA/WMA Wagon Train is a 315-acre watershed impoundment with 746 acres of land. This area offers electrical camp pads, primitive camping, boating, fishing, picnicking and a swimming beach.