YADKIN RIVER COON HOUND HISTORY 

This is my favorite page. I wanted to take the time to dedicate this page not only to the Yadkin River Blood Line, but to the man who introduced it to my life, Gary Weller. Gary and I meet through a mutual friend that I worked with, Mike McDonald. Now, Mike doesn’t coon hunt, but is friends with Gary’s son, Doug. Mike told me about Gary one day at work and gave me his number, I called Gary and it wasn’t long until I was in the woods with this man and a Yadkin River Dog named GG (GG was named for another infamous coon hunter – Gordon Gilroy). Little did I know that this was going to be the first night I feel in love with the Yadkin River Blood Line - especially this dog. GG is going to get it done and with fashion, the way she works a hard track simply makes a person stand there in the dark in awe, and when she’s treed, she’s treed period. GG has since been sold to one of our good friends in Michigan, Bill Jenerou and look out boys, Bill is going to put her in the hunts. I can’t wait to hear how she does. This is just one of few Yadkin River Dogs that I have personally hunted behind. Gary has hunted behind many more, and I could ramble on, but I’m going to let Gary take over and give all the readers a little history of the Yadkin River Blood Line. Feel free to email us and if there is something that you would like to post.

(By Gary Weller)   

This site is dedicated to the strain of treeing walker dogs know as Yadkin River. The purpose of the site is to help those interested in this stock of dogs to keep in touch with others of the same interest and therefore keep the bloodline alive into the future.

This site by no means takes any credit for the breeding or success of Yadkin River dogs. Our intent is to simply offer a site that will help those interested in this line to keep in touch. Hunting stories, pictures, dogs at stud and pups for sale are welcome.(Again, feel free to email us and we will be happy to post for you.)

The first known dog to carry the Yadkin River name was a female named Yadkin River Jane, a daughter of Finley River Chief. The Yadkin River dogs also trace their heritage back to the Sailor or Hershberger dogs of the 1960’s. Many people including Jim (Wildman) Meeks who has bred and hunted this stock of dogs for over 40 years will tell you that Wrights Sue owned by A J Wright was a major contributor to the success of the Yadkin River dogs. Sue was a daughter of House’s Bawlie. Sue when mated with Stan’s Sailor Jr. produced Brack’s Blaze the sire of Yadkin River Tom and Wright’s Pistol Pete the sired Yadkin River Jeff. Without these two sons of Sue the Yadkin River story no doubt would be very different. Pistol Pete was bred to Kyle’s Rozzell a daughter of Yadkin River Tom and from this mating came Yadkin River Jeff  who was the sire of Yadkin Tar Rattler, Yadkin River Crowder, Yadkin River Champ and many more very fine hounds.  

Jimmy Meeks has kept this bloodline alive with dogs like Yadkin River Tom back in the early 70’s then Yadkin River Jeff in the 80’s then Yadkin River Champ in the 90’s and now with Yadkin River Curt in 2010. Yadkin Tar Rattler was sired by Jeff  and his dam was Tarheel Peggy. Rattler was one of the most sought after stud dogs of the late 80’s and his son Nocturnal Nailor became one of the top stud dogs of all time. Mention the name Yadkin River Champ to most anyone that coon hunts and they’ll instantly know what dog you're talking about. Champ (a son of Jeff) achieved the status of a great hound not because he was a highly publicized hunt winner or because he held some other title. The fact is he was never entered in a competition hunt in his life and he wasn’t promoted very much in the magazines, yet his reputation as a great hound and reproducer spread across the country and today he can be found in many pedigrees. Champ sired 1,287 pups, not bad for a non-titled dog. Yadkin River Crowder another son of Jeff was known as one of the all-time greatest and loudest tree-dogs to ever live. Crowder was mated with a daughter of Champ and produced Rock River Sackett who reproduced a son called Sackett Jr. Sackett Jr. took his place in history as one of the greatest reproducers of all-time in any breed. The Yadkin River dogs continue to be some of the finest treeing walkers in the world. This line of hounds are well known for being loud hard stay-put tree dogs that also have the ability to drive a track. Not every pup born with Yadkin River blood will become a good or great coondog but the percentages are very high that many Yadkin River blooded pups like many of their ancestors before them will have the tracking and treeing abilities it takes to satisfy their owners. 

Yadkin River Tom                                                            Yadkin River Jeff

Yadkin River Cruizer                                            Yadkin River Champ

Old Sackett                                                         Yadkin River Crowder                                   Yadkin River Kate

Yadkin River GG