I agree with your assessment of Silverback, but your description of his beginnings sound nothing like what luvmybulldogs described, as he wasn't started and you stated, "Yet still, on his first "look" at 16 mos, Silverback actually ran passed the other dog and jumped up on the other handler wanting to "play". That wasn't the implication I got for luvmybulldogs with his statement of:
Quote Originally Posted by luvmybulldogs
.... you have 2 hounds that you've waited on until these hound is over 3 years old. Now you stick hound A and hound B together and they crank right up....
Maybe my defintion of "crank right up" is different. At the end of the day, one has to know their dogs and do what is best for their yard accordingly. Like I said, with my definition of "crank right up", on my yard, that scenario would nave led me to extract them from my program. Although I must admit, for my yard, all of this would have bee started well before the age of 3 as well.