An English country girl in California: Across the wide prairie with the Grand Canyon Hounds and the Paradise Valley Beagles

Two and a half hours after I had left the house at 5am, our Jeep was bouncing over railtracks that ran across the prairie in a dead-straight line from horizon to horizon. Behind us were juniper trees and a pair of elk with magnificent antlers, ahead was acre after thousand acre of grassland. All it needed was a posse of cowboys riding down a train – and I was delighted to hear that such a occurrence is not just a fantasy. The train that runs from Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon is regularly held up by a posse of cowboys who charge into action with pistols cocked. Apparently, however, they're unusually friendly and don’t steal all the passengers’ jewellery. I would love to know what those guys put on their passports.

The real Wild West

But the members of the Grand Canyon Hounds were here in pursuit of coyote, not plunder. Crossing a cattle grid (or guard), our convoy of three horse trailers, which included visitors from the Red Rock Hounds of Reno, Nevada, pulled over and stopped at the side of the track on a featureless plain, the horizon broken only by the bulk of San Francisco mountain some 40 miles to the south-east. No sign of human habitation was visible beyond the dirt road and single fence stretching over the horizon, and the wind whistled from the east, belying the bright sunshine. The pasture we were going to hunt is 80,000 acres in size, or 125 square miles, more than the entirety of my hunt country at home and just one holding of the Babbitt Ranches, one of the most historic operations in the area. Founded in 1886, it is still run in the old way, with cowboys working the herds on horseback and living in bunk houses, but with an eye for business and environmental practices that is entirely modern. The Grand Canyon Hounds have reason to be grateful to them, with at least two thirds of the hunt country being Babbitt land. It's a hard, dry country, freezing in winter and baking in summer, with little water and sparse grazing, but the vastness of the rolling grassland is intoxicating – the knowledge that one could gallop uninterrupted for hundreds of miles makes one want to do just that.

The finest view in America?

Unfortunately, the coyote had other ideas. We set off westwards across the plain, passing clumps of juniper bushes, a couple of curious cows (cattle out here enjoy several acres per beast), and herds of antelope, but no coyote were in evidence. The antelope gave us fleeting hope as, according to Paul Delaney MFH, coyote like nothing better than collapsing after a long day’s roaming the prairie and watching the local herds. ‘We have television, they have antelope,’ he explained, entirely seriously.

Me and Paul Delaney ready for the off

The lack of action was in no way due to huntsman Peter Wilson and his excellent pack of hounds. Dogs and bitches are kenneled together in their state-of-the-art kennels just outside Flagstaff and, as a consequence, are happy and willing to work together. In the old saying, one could have thrown a blanket over them. They’re a mixed crew, with long-eared Penn-Marydel from the eastern seaboard, where Peter grew up, together with American and Walker hounds. The latter is descended from the English foxhound, but developed in its own right in the 1800s after a stolen dog was crossed with a foxhound. Now, they are a tenacious and energetic addition to the pack. To combat difficult scenting conditions, there are a couple of gazehound crosses, too, which add a vital extra weapon on hot days. The whole pack is impressively biddable – the previous evening, admiring them in kennel, a single word from Peter was enough to move the whole pack into the neighbouring yard – and they were equally responsive to his quiet commands in the field.

Finding a sunny corner in the yard

Can we go hunting now?

Mounting up.

A tad difficult to see (and take, hence the wonky horizon),

but this shows hounds working hard!

Turning south, we crossed what Paul calls the Sargasso Sea, and it certainly is wide. The holy grail of hunting here is to get a run across this patch, as the footing is excellent and free of most of the stones and treeroots that make this land more tricky to cross than a grassy field, but sadly, hounds weren’t running this time. We opened the throttle anyway for a blissful gallop, to the relief of humans and horses alike. My grey Percheron x Thoroughbred Cinco was extremely pleased to work off some excess energy – he had been champing at the bit since we set off. I had been warned that he was capable of putting in an impressive buck, usually accompanied by a squeal, so I had been on my guard, but I was in luck - he behaved beautifully. (Unless, of course, it was simply my superlative equestrian skills? ahem.)

The brilliant Cinco

Peter leads his merry band to a watering place

After a stop to let the hounds quench their thirst at a ‘tank’, or large pool, we were rewarded for our patience with a brief but exhilarating run that proved Cinco’s worth beyond doubt. Beginning at the top of a small rise, we charged through a patch of juniper across rocky ground that would have had every English rider slowing to a walk and picking their way. None of that here – we took it at full gallop, horses’ ears pricked and their feet unerringly choosing exactly the right path. They all have rubber pads under their shoes, with convex bubbles in the centre to get rid of compacted snow in winter and studs on the shoes themselves, but they hardly need them. It reminded me of Irish horses knowing exactly how to cope with double banks – the person on top just has to hang on and marvel at the brilliance of the equine expert beneath them. Leaving the stones behind, we increased our speed even more across the grass and I turned to Crispin, Peter’s brother, thundering beside me.

‘Is there anything in life better than this?’ I called.

‘Not to my knowledge!’ he shouted back.

The scent petered out soon after that, and the rest of the morning was spent casting fruitlessly, but it didn’t matter. There is always a joy in being on horseback and watching a good pack of hounds work well together, noses down, sterns waving, refusing to give up, and I would never grow tired of gazing at this landscape. For much of the day, at first just a streak on the northern horizon but growing ever clearer as the ground rose beneath us, the North Rim of the Grand Canyon was visible. Stretching on and on in both directions, the rocky cliffs plunged earthwards, even at this distance appearing impossibly huge. My photographs simply don’t do it justice – my naked eye could see far more than my trusty Canon reveals. The whole thing was a beguiling mass of juxtapositions – red coats, hounds, horses, English saddles, Wild West prairie, a natural wonder of the world and cowboy shenanigans, all mixed up together in the joy of the chase.

Crispin Wilson (left), brother of Peter

Amy of the Red Rock Hounds in Reno, Nevada

Lone hunter: England meets the Wild West

Hacking home after a blank but extremely enjoyable morning

The following day was an even more mixed-up jumble, when Amanda, Peter’s wife, took out her adorable Paradise Valley Beagles in pursuit of jackrabbits with an assorted group of followers that ranged from Karen Thurston (who has travelled the world with her daughter Rachel) on a neat grey Arab to Peter and Crispin in jeans on a couple of enormous grey youngsters. Amanda herself was extremely smart in the green coat of the beagler, with the PVB tartan (plaid) collar. Unlike beaglers in the UK, followers here are mounted, which makes it much easier to keep up with a quarry that leaps away like an arrow loosed from a string, jinking and darting before dropping to the floor and lying motionless in the hope that it has evaded its captures. Jackrabbits are rangier than hares, with longer ears and gangly, skinny legs, and we had seen several the day before - more, indeed, than coyote. The beagles were keen as mustard, bustling about and casting everywhere. They are such a happy and biddable bunch that they make one smile to see them.

Huntsman and master Amanda Wilson with her beagles

Setting off towards San Francisco mountain

With the San Francisco peak looming above us, the beagles cast among the sagebrush for some time without success, until a barrage of canine voices alerted us to a cottontail tearing up a rock-strewn slope through tough old juniper trees. It was a brief burst that got everyone’s blood going and must have woken up the jackrabbits, as several scurries ensued that saw the pack doing their best to keep up with two unusual additions to their number – a couple of elegant black lurchers. Dazzle in particular was extremely keen on her first time out, coursing the jackrabbits in magnificent style. Amanda spoke about the difficulties of hunting gazehounds and scenthounds together – the beagles were working very well, but when the quarry is only a few yards ahead, the lurchers do have an advantage. But I have no doubt this unusual partnership will flourish - aided and abetted by a couple of cheerful terriers.

Spot the odd one out in the pack

Dazzle waits for a glimpse of a jackrabbit as the beagles cast

We didn’t kill – that honour was reserved for the terriers, who caught a pack rat during breakfast afterwards – but it was a treat to watch the hounds working at such close quarters. For me, there was an extra thrill – at long last, I was galloping across the Wild West of America Western style! Although I worked on a ranch in Wyoming for two months last summer, riding there was one-behind-the-other and we rode English style, going into two-point/cross-country seat for cantering. Amanda had been very happy for me to change saddles - the attitude here is that anyone is welcome, however and whatever they're riding. So this was a longed-for chance to try Western style at speed, and I loved it. Cinco, too, felt more relaxed this way, without a hint of him being a 'beast with a bellyful of bedsprings' as the old cowboys put it, and I could have ridden all day. The best fun came when I rode upside of Jimmy Doyle, the modest, brilliant kennel-huntsman of the GCH who whips in to both packs. He hails from Scotland and came to the US after a spell at the Quorn in England’s hunting heartland, and is a fine, fearless horseman who is great fun to shadow, bouncing around the sagebrush on the lookout for jackrabbits. Cinco’s only fault is a very slow walk, which necessitates frequent jogs to catch up, and at one point this turned into a full-on gallop when Jimmy was a few lengths ahead of us and hounds spoke. Golly, does Cinco have power in those quarters!

Western style on Cinco!

This being America, we finished both days with a convivial breakfast around the trailers, and I thought again how easy and comfortable is the company of hunting people. Stories of long and fast runs on coyote abounded (typically, it seems that the country we had covered yesterday is usually some of the best – am I a jinx?). But I’ll be back next season, as sure as hounds were born to hunt, and perhaps be lucky enough to experience an epic run across the wide, rolling prairie of the Wild West.