February 27, 2009

I have not been able to post for several days.

I met with Donna and Ben on Monday in Pinole for a training session and to have his dog, Bodie, tested. He is a really nice dog. A nice herding mix. I brought Mercury and all three dogs, Dino, Annubis and Bodie did a training with him in the park.

We set a track with Annubis at the beginning and then, at the end, we ran Dino through it. We have been working on corners and I have been teaching him about positive and negative indications. I have taught him to come and sit in front of me for a negative and to stand and bark facing the direction of the scent.

Donna said that I need to anchor Dino at the corner and have Dino check the direction of the wind and then show me what direction by facing in that direction, giving me his indication and then heading in that direction.

At the end, I ran Dot through a track with Dino's scent and cat food. I walked Dino through three tracks and then put him back into the truck. Then went back to put down the cat food on that scent. I then brought Dot out to run the tracks. She was pretty into it. I am doing her on a straight as the first track, and then doing curves in the last two.

Yesterday morning I ran Dino through a 38 hour old track that I had put down with Dot in a neighborhood in SL. It was straightaways and corners. I anchored him at each corner and had him tell me what direction, had him stand and bark. He even gave me negative indications on some spots that he found didn't have scent.

On one corner, he was sure the scent was in a specific area. I let him go because, actually the scent was across the street so he could have been picking up some scent. He went about two houses and then backtracked and started looking again. He picked it up across the street and went in the right direction. I guess I do need to let him work those things through. I can let him go down the direction he feels firmly about and then let him figure it out. Who knows? He could be smelling the scent, and then it diminishes and disappears and then he figures it out. This will get better with more experience.

Last night I laid another track with Scout in another neighborhood in SL. Some straightaways and lots of corners. I will get it to another 38 hours and work Dino on that for a few tracks. We should have another training on this Monday.