Nosework (6/28)

We did pretty much the same exercise as the week before, hides in puzzles, though the "entrances" were changed.

Interior 1 video - Some of the apparent weirdness in the video is when Dorothy is trying to move hides, so we visit the same puzzles again in the same search. By changing it, this search becomes an endurance exercise, though 5+ minutes is hardly endurance by Gimme's standards. She quickly scans the whole area and then goes right to work. Dorothy recognizes this as a valid strategy, the other instructor doesn't. Gimme gets thrown off in the second puzzle when she notices my hand moving toward the treat bag while she was checking out lingering odor - though she quickly goes back to work and finds source. In the bathroom puzzle, the hide is on the lower door hinge and Gimme is the only one to have sourced it from in front of the door, every other dog went behind the door. She does a nice job with the other searches. Interestingly after getting caught up in lingering odor on the red cart and then going to the ladder, she was the fastest dog to find source on the red cart. It was a very nice search. 

Interior 2 (no video) - Dorothy moved all the hides from the puzzles to the perimeter of the room.  After the first search the dogs expected to find the hides in the puzzles, so when they came in for the second search it was very different from what they expected.  All the other handlers kept their dogs on leash so they could manage their work and I noticed the dogs wanted to go to the puzzles, which was both a distraction and frustrating. I chose to avoid possible frustration, so I turned Gimme loose to search off leash.  I think I got better results. Yes, she did check out the puzzles, but only briefly. Then on her own she scanned around the perimeter finding all five hides in sequence. She was a minute or more faster than the other dogs. I'm sure Dorothy doubted my wisdom at the beginning, but then complimented how well it worked for Gimme. Unfortunately, while Dorothy did a great job watching us through the viewfinder, she forgot to push the record button. It was really a lovely search - too bad we don't have a video.

Gimme did a nice job, as always.