I have question for weimaraner owners

I have an offer to take a weimaraner from a friend, the dog is 1 and 1/2 yrs old, is it too late for me to train this dog to track wounded deer? I have an excellent deer tracking dog now but I wouldn't mind having another, The dog is already trained to sit and such, they tell me she is very smart, she has no papers but, that's not real important to me because I wouldn't breed her anyway. Here's a pic of her

Few of them actually hunt.

Beautiful pup. Take her anyway.

Pretty dog. If you got extra space take her in. From what I've been told tracking is the easiest and most natural thing for a dog to learn.

I have limited experience compared to others, but I have noticed a few things while working my dog (Walker x DD). The key is finding a dog that WANTS to track or trail and one that has a nose good enough to follow a 24+ hour old track.

While training my dog, I noticed that my wife's lazy and worthless (apparently not as much as I thought)Chihuahua would eagerly follow a bloodline when given the chance. She could pick up a blood trail pretty quick if it was recent, but as it aged she had a much tougher time with it. While my dog could pick up a 24 hour old scent that had been rained on and go with it, the Chihuahua could barely stay on the same blood trail for 5 yards before she would start wandering off in a zig zag pattern searching for it because she lost it. She still had the drive and wanted to follow it, but her nose was holding her back.

Weimeraners <sp?> are a good sized dog so if your looking at getting her only to track game, make sure that the the dog has a good handle or area you'll be hunting is fairly open. Otherwise the dog might drag you through enough brush to make you swear of tracking/trailing for life. My 5 month old is sitting at 30lbs (runt) and he still manages to make it a little rough on me in the real thick stuff here in East Texas.

If you chose to take the dog and train her then great. If you don't, then train the one you have. The training is fun, simple for the most part, gives the dog a rewarding task, builds a bond between the handler and dog, and serves a purpose. I refuse to house/feed a dog who doesn't have a job or purpose, and by doing so I have found that most dogs are happier when they are working anyways.

That Chihuahua doesn't know how lucky she is that my wife doesn't mind feeding her.

Thanks for the replies, my dog I have now is a damn good tracker, and yes, she drags me through the thick stuff when she's on a trail lol. I'm gonna go ahead and get the dog, no matter what she'll at least have a good home.

I started training my dog on blood tracks at 3 yrs and he has picked it up fine.

good luck.

Nope not too late, I doubt it comes from any hunting line but I have one that came from back yard breeding and his nose is awesome. Quite a bit more sensitive than my DD. He took to tracking very easily at a young age and I wish I could have tried to take it further. Tracking big game is about all they do now in Germany and it is what they were originally breed for. Good luck and keep us posted.