More random notes….

The value of having someone video you and your dog tracking can not be over stated. Many things I tell you will be far more obvious if you are able to hear me, and see the situation while you are NOT trying to handle your dog. There are a lot of us around, put your phone on video and hand it to someone! (And I do expect everyone in class to be willing to video. Please don’t tell me you suck at video—that just means you need more practice)

If you are the videographer, please video in landscape (horizontal) view, and make sure you keep both the dog and the handler in the frame. I’m usually positioned behind and a bit off to the side, so next to me is a good place to be.

After someone videos, go back and watch it, and then watch it again at half speed. The audio feed will be weird, so listen and watch first, and then go back and really look for what I saw that you (understandably) missed In the field.

Line length. Why is it that all of us, as trainers, are always trying to make our learner team look like the pro? I want Fletch to look like Seren on sheep—who cares that he’s had 4 lessons and she’s had 100? My point….the less experienced your dog, the closer to the dog you should be. Absolute beginner, still doing straight tracks? Your knees should almost touch your dog’s tail. The more line you give, the further off the track the dog can be—and nothing good comes of that. You want to keep the dog limited so as to assure they smell, look for, and quickly find, the next food drop. Searching a 2 foot diameter circle isn’t teaching him to eat and look straight ahead for the next cookie! That said, don’t try to ‘steer’ the dog—keep your hands still, and your body close to the dog’s butt. It’ll work, I promise!

If you are an advanced beginner, defined as making a turn, you can either snap 2, 6’ leads together, or use a 10’ lead. When YOU get to the turn flag (which is always 5 paces before the turn), you can stand still and let lead out so the dog can search without interference from you. Don’t just let go though…let him take it from you, and when you see any acknowledgment of the new leg, GO!!!! If he veers off, stand still….until you see another Acknowledgment …and then go again. And on that first leg? PLEASE, don’t let that line out. Stay within 3-5 feet of your dog’s butt. Once you two have negotiated the turn, move back up to that 3-5 foot place until he finds the glove.

If you are intermediate to advanced (2+ turns to TDX work) there really isn’t a reason to be more than 10 feet back. Do I train being further back as a skill? Yes…on long straight legs, I’ll let the dog take line and get a full 40 feet out….and then I’ll walk back up the line, working on MY skill of walking up without interfering with the dog (they shouldn’t change their behavior, look at you, etc). I rarely practice at 20 feet, I find it a challenging distance. It’s a bigger error than I want the dog to make….so I don’t want to practice those sorts of errors. Dogs often put us on the turn—so 40 ft of line becomes a 40 foot overshoot. 6 ft of line becomes a 6 ft overshoot. I’d rather my dog learned to notice loss of scent at 6 feet…..track recovery is much more likely!

At 10 feet, with an advanced dog, I can wait for LOS, let my dog search, supporting him as he searches, and I have plenty of line to let out when he shows me tracking behavior. How much do I let out before I step out? Once he’s gone 2-3 body lengths with a straight spine in a clearly new direction I will begin to follow, slowly but not so slowly as to impede his progress. As I follow I’ll gradually grab ahold of the line, increasing tension, which is my (non verbal) way of saying “are you on it?” If he responds by digging in, I let him take me down the leg….if he casts off and searches again, i support the search, remembering where he showed me it might be. Some dogs turn, commit, cast off, check, and then go back and take it. It’s up to you to know if that’s your dog’s style, and work with it. Sometimes he will make a mistake….and that’s ok. That’s why we train….and we all make mistakes. I don’t know why humans do, and thus I don’t know why dogs do. They do. It’s ok.

Starts. Fact: the track is at the start. Your dog doesn’t need 20 feet of line to find the track—it’s right there. Yes, you have to let the line out before you leave the flag….so why would anyone leave the flag unless the dog was clearly going, straight spine, in an appropriate direction (and if you don’t know what that means, read the rules). Two things happen when you leave the flag: 1. The test starts, and 2. If you step away early, you may have just made recovery harder for your dog. Think about this….you’re in a hurry, dog curves off in a direction, you follow for 10 feet. You are now 10 feet down a line that is 90 degrees from the track…so now, to recover, the dog has to find the track (which is 10++‘ away), straighten out, and convince you this time he means it. Much, much easier to just stay at the flag, patiently, until you see tracking behavior.

Tracklaying. Yup, I pushed some envelopes this past week, and that might be the new norm. A couple of points: Double line ups are really helpful. As you are walking down one leg, be glancing in the next direction so you can see potential line ups moving on the horizon. Shorten or lengthen a leg a few yards to get a good line up. Are there none? How about ground markers? What about a back sight (a double line up behind the direction of the next leg)? If you have a good double line up moving forward, and a double back sight…you can precisely locate the turn, and from there can walk to a specific tree, or bush , or whatever. Another point: we all loose tracks. To quote MaryAnn, “If you’ve never lost a track, you haven’t laid very many.” It’s going to happen, and it’s going to happen the rest of your life (hopefully rarely). Now….if you lost a track and you didn’t make a map…shame on you. All tracks, even straight ones, should have maps. Even if it’s just to get you in the habit, and so you can start finding symbols that work for you. If your tracklayer misplaces your track, please be kind. If they lost your track and they don’t have a map…..let er rip!

A word on double line ups: You should use them all. The. time. There are, IMHO, 2 types of double line ups—“hard” double line ups—clear, obvious when you come back to the field, minimally effected by changes in light (tallest tree and lone pine; mailbox and barn door, etc). When I plan to use flags, I will use ‘soft’ line ups—ones I probably can’t find again, but I can use while laying the track to make sure I walk in a straight line. If your line curves, you have no way of knowing if your dog is correct or incorrect. So line up on a clump of grass and a tree, use that to put the leg in, and use your flag to mark the track. Now you KNOW the track is exactly along that line.

Flags: NOTHING should happen at any flag except the start flag. The start flag will (initially) have food, and eventually an article. If you are training with me, there should NEVER, EVER, EVER, EVER be a turn, or an article, at a flag. 5 paces should separate the flag from the turn or article. Dogs DO notice flags, and our goal is to make them non-predictive. If your beginner dog is ’just going to the second flag,’ that’s not a flag issue, it’s a handling issue. Don’t let them move forward if their head is up and they are eyeing the flag. Period. The goal isn’t to get to the glove, the goal is to find the treats on the ground that lead to the glove. So please, use flags in your own training, and leave the blind tracks for class.

And, if you’ve read this far, MERRY CHRISTMAS! See you all again on both sides of the New Year!