Bruce Gabrielson's Hound History
Bruce Gabrielson has been an active hunter, trapper, and a field trial Beagler since the early 1950s. His uncle had raised and competed Beagles beginning in the 1940s, but it wasn’t till 1953, on the drive back from a rabbit hunt with his Beagle that he really became involved in the sport. His parents pulled into a gas station where a handler was buying gas. They got to talking about hunting Beagles, and first thing you know Bruce was a member competing in field trials at the Willamette Valley Beagle Club.
A few years later, Willamette Valley combined with Southwest Washington Beagle Club to form Daybreak Beagle Club in Southern Washington, a club still highly active today. Bruce and his parents became charters member of Daybreak, and Bruce spent many weekends at the club running his hounds and entering events. It was during these years that he started spending many a night fox hunting with Loyd Littrell, another Beagler who also raised foxhounds.
By the time Bruce reached high school, he had also started coon hunting, and by then had a kennel full of hounds. He called his kennel Tikiline Beagles after his first Beagle, Tiki.
Bruce and his family then moved to Southern California in 1964 where they joined Orange Empire Beagle Club and eventually San Fernando Valley Beagle Club. Through the 1970s and 1980s, Bruce competed both Beagles and coonhounds throughout the United States. parents, Carl and Helen, were voted in as Life Members of San Fernando Valley Beagle Club in the 1970s. Bruce still owns part of the grounds for the SFVBC in Perris, California, where the club holds its licensed trials.
In 1982, Bruce and his wife Kim and family moved to Southern Maryland were he joined the Southern Maryland Beagle Club and the Patapsco Ridge Beagle Club, competing hounds primarily in Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, and Pennsylvania.
Bruce built his first starting pen while still in California, and then built new ones when he moved to Maryland. He retired from his full time professional work in 2011 and spends many days starting pups, working hounds, or keeping his starting pen in super condition. He also spends time at the local trials in Maryland, Virginia, or Pennsylvania. He has a a number of good field champions and all age dogs to play with when he wants, plus he also still raises coonhounds, but now he has switched to Treeing Walker Hounds, which he can run in the evenings through the bottomlands around his home.
Bruce’s professional field was computer security. In 1993, Bruce put a web site on the Internet for his Beagles. This was likely the Internet’s first Beagle oriented site. He has written numerous articles in the past for Hounds and Hunting, National Beagling News, Beagles Unlimited, and Brace Beagling News magazines. He has also written several books, plus been a sportswriter for a major newspaper. He is also a member or two different sports hall of fames and owns a surfboard company.
Dr. Bruce Gabrielson owns two different types of Beagles: Brace field trial Beagles as well as hunting/gundog Beagles, but he only competes the Brace type in field trials. Bruce does hunt when he has time and he starts and trains many brace and gundog Beagles.