Trained by a Hound Dog is the autobiography, and True Life Story of Ed Vance, an acclaimed hunter that hunted mountain lions, and bears, in the mountains and forests of California, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, and Montana for 25 years. Featured in Bow Hunters Digest 1st. edition, Los Angeles Times West Magazine (1967), Saga Magazine (1968), Western Outdoors Magazine (1968), Bow & Arrow Magazine (1971), Bow & Arrow Magazine (1973), Western Outdoors News (1968 – 1973), and Bear Hunting Magazine (September/October 2019). Ed Vance risked everything to follow his dreams, and without knowing it, chiseled a name for himself and for his dogs in the history of these places, and during the 1970's Ed was instrumental in starting and participated in Montana's first Mountain Lion research program. The bond between the hunter and his hounds was one of deep trust and reliance, in a time when the changing landscape threatened to take it all. Trained by a Hound Dog recounts the legends of the hunt, in the authentic voice of the man who was there, told as if the reader were sitting with him around a campfire. The true stories he tells of his hounds and the lions and bears they caught in some of the country's toughest terrain and conditions are a glimpse into an era of Western History that has faded from view. Ed's total income came from guiding hunters on, no-catch/no-pay trophy hunts.

"The old time way of hunting and peoples' views of country living was changing. Like it or not, it was coming. The old lion hunters that once roamed these hills, hunters like Jay Bruce, Charlie Leadshaw, or Howard Bilton, and others are now gone. All that's left of this, is knowing there was a time when they were here, and at that time there was only one way to get it done, and that was the hard way. Today they are only a part of history, a history that unfortunately cannot be duplicated."

Ed Vance, Trained by a Hound Dog