NW3 Trial

The site is a nice elementary school in Carson, WA. It was supposed to be a 2:30 drive, but turned into 3:00 with construction. I got a good parking spot. There was a bit of a challenge because the school was double-booked between a million soccer people and us. So flexibility was the game of the day.

Exterior - 2:30, 1-3 hides:
From the start line in the doorway, Gimme turned right to a chair in the corner. She detailed and quickly alerted. From there we checked the whole area, some things twice.  I was just sure there had to be a hide in the table and chairs.  While she was interested in different spots, she never detailed anything so I called Finish with 14 seconds to spare.

The one thing I hate about NW3 is not-knowing if you passed a search until the end of the day. Based on Gimme's behavior, I was reasonably certain we got exteriors.

Vehicles - 2:30, 1-3 hides:
This search was supposed to run right after exterior, but it had to be moved because the soccer people kept parking in the middle of the search area. Trying to keep them out would be a full time job, so they moved the vehicles into a courtyard with gates. This is basically what it looked like.

Gimme went up the left (outside the blue car) in her usual dash. She went around the back of the red car then turned at the back bumper and went up to alert on the front license plate. From there we went around the blue car on the outside, crossed over between them to go around the gray car. When we got back to the middle she showed a bit of interest in the pink-dotted area of the blue car. She didn't settle down on anything and was really willing to move on. We went around it a couple of times and she was giving me "hopeful alerts". Those are the ones where she is hoping to con me out of a cookie even though there's nothing there. I didn't want to talk her into an alert where there wasn't anything, so I called "finish" on a wing and a prayer, hoping I was right. We ended with 11 seconds to spare and the judge gave us "pronounced". In hindsight, there was obviously scent from the hide on the front bumper of teh red car drifting onto the front of the blue car.

At almost 3p.m., we still hadn't done interiors or containers. We were about 25 minutes out from interiors (it'd been running 8 minutes per dog since 10a.m.) and they'd just started containers.  They got a late start waiting for competitors to get through construction.  I got a lot of practice on patience. Fortunately Gimme and I like our own company...

These were really busy search areas, so all you get for a picture is a long panoramic strip of combined stills.  I took them in a counter-clockwise sweep, which starts at the right end of the strip.  You'll have to use your imagination.  It was challenging with all the chairs upended on the tables, it would be soooo easy to hit one and send a bunch crashing to the floor.

Interior 1 - 2:30, 0-3 hides:

Gimme dashed around the room and quickly found a hide under the edge of a chair. I belabored far too long and called "finish" just as the timer called "time", exactly 0.42 over time. Gimme did a great job. It is really hard for me to call finish, especially when there is only one hide - if you note my times in all our 1 hide searches, I wait right up to the end, but did better with 2 hide searches.

Interior 2 - 2:30, 0-3 hides:

There were two hides. The first was in a red clothes hamper at the right end of the room; Gimme got to it quickly. Then she searched around and found an inaccessible hide inside the white cabinet at the far end of the room. I even managed to call "alert" before she pawed the door. She did a little more searching and then went to the door, so I called "finish". We had 24 seconds to spare. See what I mean about doing better with a two hide search?

Interior 3 - 2:30, 0-3 hides:

I decided if she'd found a hide and wasn't actively detailing when I got the "30 seconds" warning - then I would call finish. Gimme found the only hide really quickly, on the wheel of a rolling podium. Then we scanned the room. When the timer called the warning, I called "finish" with 28 seconds to spare. Yay for me. It's always "Yay" for Gimme.

Containers - 2:30, 1-3 hides:
Gimme got to the start line easily, looked out at the search area and froze. She saw all the reflections and didn't know what to do. We had one other time when she was concerned about a gym floor and the reflection, but then she was able to search. This time she couldn't get past it. The lights were verrrrry bright and the floor was the shiniest I've ever seen. Plus the floor was a rather dark wood, which would tend to recede visually. I think she just couldn't tell where the floor was. This picture doesn't do justice to the visual impact, but if you look you can see how the reflections seem to float above the wood.

I encouraged her to walk with me and she did, but was slow and uncertain. I pointed at boxes, saying "check it" and she would lower her nose to them, but I never heard her breathe in. She wasn't searching. I called "finish" (with 1 second to spare) when it became apparent she couldn't work in this environment. I didn't even notice whether the timer gave a 30 second warning. The judge gave me a nice comment for how I worked with Gimme.

Some people think it's the slick floor (as did the judge), but I know better. When we had the experience before, they routed people through the gym to save time going from vehicles to exterior. The lights were off and all we had to see by was the light from both open doors. Gimme went through the area with no issue, so clearly she wasn't bothered by slickness. Yet later, when it was set up for the container search and all the lights were on, she froze. It wasn't as shiny/reflective as it was at Carson, so she was able to work through it.

I asked the certifying official if we could go into the gym for some training after the trial was done and she said we could. The lights are motion-sensor activated, so when we first went in the room only 2 lights came on and Gimme was fine. As we moved around, more and more lights came on and she got more and more concerned. So I'm certain I'm right in my assessment - it's a visual issue. I tend to think it's related to brain changes from her seizures, but maybe not. I gave her treats for moving around, but she only loosened up and moved naturally when I gave her all my treats, rapid fire, so we were able to end on a good note.

Overall I thought it was a good trial. This is the first time we've gotten through a trial with no faults. I learned a lot, but I'd still rather be dumber and more successful...