Titles Achieved to date...

Monumental A to Z High On Liberty
NW1, RATI, RATN, RATO, NW2, L1I, RATS, L1E, L1C, L1V, L2C, L2I, L2E, RATM, R-FE/N, PKD-TL, PKD-N, ADPL1, ADPL2, TD, UWP, ADPL3, NTD, TKN, L2V, ADPL4, SDS-N, ADPL5, ADPCH, ADP1(2), ADPL1(GC), ADPL2(2), ADPL2(GC), VPN, AP, UWPCH, ADPL3(2), ADPL3(GC), NC, NI, NE, SCN, SIN, SEN, CZ8B, NV, NN, ADPL4(2), ADPL4(GC), ADPGCH, ADPL5(2), RATCH, CZ8S, AI, TKI, AV, AE, AC, AN, R-FE/X NW3-V, NW3-E, SI, RN, R-FE/NS, CZ8G, SC, SV, SE, SN, SEA, SBN, SWN, SIA, SCA, ADP-1(Th), ADP-2(Th), ADP-3(Th), ADP-4(Th), ADP-5(Th), and ADP-CH(Th)... 81 and counting...

Monday, February 2, 2015

Nosework (6/7)

Gimme did great in class.  

We started with a blind exterior search.  She went from the startline directly across 35 feet to where the first hide was, she had it very quickly.  Then she moved over to find the second hide in a rack of PVC...  there were 9 racks.  This hide was inaccessible, but she identified its tube very quickly and demanded payment.  Then as we were moving about the area, she went to the space between the front 4 and the back 5 racks and tried to source it again.  I knew it was channeling because she was in exactly the spot where she'd found it before - just at the other end.  I let her check it out and after a bit she came out, went back to where she'd found it before, then just moved on.  I wouldn't have spent the time at it during a trial, but I thought it was valuable learning for her.  From there we started working the perimeter, when she made a bee line for another area across from us and quickly sourced and indicated another spot.  I am too slow to say "finish" - hope it doesn't cost us a Q some day.

Our next search was an interior.  They had set four hides and only showed us two.  There was also odor coming from the little refrigerator where they store odor, because the co-instructor was preparing the odors right there on the counter and we were told if they indicated it to pay there.  So we had the potential for five hides.  The point of the exercise was to show how there can be "invisible" hides, in this case an inaccessible hide at threshold.  Every dog who found it, got it later when they came back to it from the other direction.

Gimme did a good job and found all of them, even the invisible one.  It took her six minutes, but much of her time was spent licking her leg after getting paid with peanut butter.  And I wasted an inordinate amount of time in the bathroom with her.  She was all over the sink, the little trash can, a small shelf and the side of the toilet - going back and forth, but not settling anywhere.  After too long at this, I realized the scenario seemed eerily familiar.  It was very much the same as what happened in the hide we missed for the interior element trial.  Odor tends to drift toward plumbing and/or cold things like porcelain.  Just like in the trial, I'd gotten stuck standing watching her and was literally exactly between her and the hide.  When I realized the similarity, I moved and within 10 seconds she indicated source.  Too bad I didn't do it a minute sooner, eh.  But, at least I did catch myself...

Out of six teams, Gimme and Apollo (a deaf, white APBT) were the only ones to get all five hides.  Apollo was quite a bit faster, but then his handler is younger and faster and he doesn't waste 2 minutes getting rewarded.  No matter how you slice it though - Gimme is cuter...

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