More NW Match

Here is more detailed information about the match:

Vehicle: 1 hide - 50 seconds.  
Exterior: 2 hides - 1:06.  
Interior: 2 rooms & 3 hides - 1:06 and :17 seconds.  


At the converging odor seminar, a friend showed me a big timer that she wears on her wrist and starts at the beginning of each search, so she knows at a glance how much time she has left.  It has a big face and she wears it with the dial on the inside of her wrist so she can glance at it.  It'll be a really handy tool when you get to NW3 (where she is) and have time limits in which you have to call "finished" or "clear".  And now I'm seeing a use for it here.  I got the info from her and need to find my notes and order one.

I also noticed how incredibly sloppy my line handling is with this shorter line.  You know I'm going to nip that in the bud.  Using the much longer line forces me to handle it well.

Today we set up the food distraction exercise again - twelve bags, 2 rows of six.  Eight with food distractions, three blank and one with odor.  I didn't plan it that way, but where I set it up, there were two large dogs behind a fence about fifty feet away.  They started barking their heads off the moment I got Gimme out of the car and never stopped until I'd packed up and left.  We did three quick searches and Gimme did very well.  She was clearly distracted the first time and had a little difficulty sticking the odor bag, but after that paid less and less attention to the barkers.  So while that wasn't the goal for our exercise... it was a nice side benefit and I was quite pleased with how well she did.  Sometime soon we'll do that again and on purpose.

Again she was most distracted by the rice krispie treats.  She paid no attention to the dog biscuits and very little attention to the cooked chicken.  I got a slice of bread from a friend (since I no longer eat wheat), will toast and butter it and use that for a distraction.  Gimme has always had a fondness for bread of any kind.  I'll probably buy her an order of McDonald's french fries too; another favorite. I can get some saltine crackers when I'm at my parents' this weekend.

BTW we are working on a cute trick for my parents.  Its a variation of ring toss... where I'll toss and Gimme will "catch" the ring on her nose.  I made a very soft and light ring with a wrapped fleece cover.  She's already catching on to how advantageous it is for Miss Gimme to carry the ring on her nose.  She really will do almost anything for food, doncha know...