Finally....a track in rain....

Ah, but be careful what you wish for...problem is...this was the first heavy rain in nearly 3 months and how do you practice in 'all weather' when you have no control???! This track was laid just before thunderstorms and heavy downpours went through for nearly 2 hr. Everything was drenched, and I had no idea how Trust would do. Naturally, I expected the worst would be the hard surfaces....not! The toughest was the grass; much more than I had expected. Above is her first leg. She did not start well, was circling from the beginning and continued like this along the first leg. I felt she never got locked onto this track in the grass. Her corner was near the far fence and she did not indicate strongly. I did not think it was there, and she then just began searching all over the place. We were eventually heading in the right direction for the next three legs on grass, but turned out we were not really ever close to the actual track. She was obviously not able to pick it up very well, and I was not feeling good about the whole thing.

When we got to the first hard surface, she cut way down towards the building, then began working up, and circling around, on the paved area. I saw an article, and she actually circled around it three times before 'finding' it. She sure wasn't using her eyes and was working very hard to find it. I was pleased with this.

She has just found it, it was a plastic lid upside down and filled with water, which she began to lick.....interesting.....

She was right on here, cement with weeds growing through and then a brick area, to the final corner.

Again, you could see this article from the final corner, but she was working with her nose, and had moved left over a sandy area/grass before sharply turning to the article. You can see pooled water by the walkway here, it is just lightly raining at this time.

Trust is happy, she's found her glove and that's the end of 'that' track. It certainly was difficult and just what this heavy, heavy rain had done on the grass really has me stumped. Hopefully, on trial day, if there is rain, it will be nice and light, just enough to hold the scent down and not

completely obliterate the track!

Would love to know the story....

This old farmhouse must have an interesting story. We drove past it way out southwest of here yesterday, on a tracking location adventure. It had been pouring rain - which are the marks - took picture through windshield. Spotted it driving past and just had to turn around to take a better look. No-one could possibly be living here.....or could they? The grass is cut and there's a little, but well-tended flower garden in the front. There's a storage shed off to the side, with no windows, couldn't see the door...does someone live in that?! I would have loved to get out or drive in further, but didn't want to offend anyone, if indeed, anyone was there. I've been thinking about it ever since. Would love to know who lived (lives?) there and what happened. It was very sad, yet I was so drawn to it.

Jess and Storm retire today!

Carol, Jess and Storm. Today was their last visit at the nursing home, where they've been doing 'pet therapy' for six years. Jess came to us only a few months before she began her "job". Storm and Jess have been a great team, and have been very loved at the nursing home. Storm did three years of pet therapy when we lived near Orillia, where he passed his St. John Therapy dog test, along with Diva and Spook.

Jess and Storm are one month apart in age, and are both fifteen and a half years old now. They have certainly enjoyed their almost weekly visits for the past six years, making many friends and we will miss them. I am taking a 'holiday' and then will take turns with Tank and Trust.

An "Experimental" Track!

As I was beginning to lay the track.............am I nuts, or what?! Here comes another one...

This is almost the same track that Reese did yesterday; the same one I laid for Reese, but with two slight variations. The thoughts behind this track, are at the end of these five pictures. Above is the second hay bale, bad boy Blast had jumped up on the first one, this one he ignored. We are on the 2nd leg.

I changed the second corner, third leg, and the third corner, fourth leg on this track. Blast did seem to waiver around on each somewhat, but then the wind was also blowing from 37 to 50 km. at this time. So it was not really possible to accurately determine if the wind was causing this, or if he was picking up on our track from yesterday (which was walked 3x). Above, he is trying to go to the groundhog holes, which Reese did not! Good girl, bad boy scenario.

This is the leg where Reese was actually over on this side, and her track was on the left side of this bale; she got back over to it before reaching this bale. Blast's was laid where he is, further back, he was trying to go over to the left side. At this time, the strong winds were coming from the right. Who knows?!!!

They both completed this track in a similar fashion, and curious, that both had the "issue" on the same leg.

Blast retrieving his glove after the track. We did a few throws and tugged, until I remembered this was actually one my "good" gloves.
SO THIS WAS THE EXPERIMENT:

I had a debate with myself this morning, the nice thing about this, I always win...

The U.S. List had some recent posts about some dogs doing better on 'older' tracks than fresh tracks; I tend to agree. Also, for trials, tracks are plotted the day ahead of the test. This means there are usually 3 people walking the same track, the judge, the tracklayer, and the equipment person. And sometimes, they might change the plan part way through. So, you have a heavy laid track by different people on one day, the next day the plotted track is walked by the tracklayer.

Today was Blasts' turn to track, and out of curiosity, I decided to go back to Reese's track, re-walk it, making changes on two of the legs, and see how Blast did. Certainly not 'scientific' but I was curious. Also, conditions were very different. Taking this into mind, I still found it very interesting. Didn't really come up with much, he did ok on the track, but might be interesting to try another time when the conditions are pretty much the same. I wonder if anyone else has tried this.

This was the sky over our house - taken from the back deck - yesterday afternoon. At that time, I was sitting and watching the change come through, windy and windier...but no rain yet. Could hear thunder and then I saw 'rotation' in the clouds....

From the side deck - I had called David out to see, and said "perhaps we should be going inside"...a bit of an understatement...

From the deck looking south. We later found out we were under a tornado watch but nothing had been on the computer weather channel until AFTERWARDS! Luckily, it didn't happen here, but we got some mighty strong winds, a ton of rainfall (needed it!) and a brief hydro outage - enough to kill the modem again on the computer - even with the extra super-duper backup and protection we have on there.

Reese/Rosemary TD Training Track

Reese worked lovely on her track today, an odd-shaped "hat" track in hot and humid conditions before a storm came in. We barely finished when it began to pour - for all of 20 seconds! The field was quite lush, even though we've had such a long dry stretch of high heat and high humidity. It was aged 40 mins. and approx. 425 m. I know this field well, and put in a few little "test" areas for her and she did great!!!

Rosemary and Reese have just started out confidently on the first leg, after Reese did a little checking to each side in the first few feet. You can just see the directional flag near the first hay bale.

Reese went about 2' past the corner, checked to each side, and came back to clearly indicate the track direction. Rosemary was just waiting for Reese to pull forward and off she went. Nice corner.

The arrow marks the 2 pine trees I sighted for the second leg. Reese had a couple of deer crossings along this leg, as well as a spot just off the track where a deer had slept. She briefly checked them and kept on going. Rosemary is taking a look to see what has Reese's interest here.

After walking within a foot of one large bale, she has taken a left turn. The close bale was to see if she would critter at it - she ignored it - good girl, as she was more interested in the track!

The arrow marks the tree the track is heading towards. Just before the next corner is a triangular patch with 3 groundhog holes. Reese also ignored them!

They have just turned the corner and are both working really well. Reese moved a little to the right along here, but kept trying to get back on the track, until Rosemary went with her. This was a long leg, and then a short turn to the article.

Reese has found her glove, but is looking at the big chewie I had left inside (this had worked for my Jess)...but Reese wasn't too interested in it....was trying to find something 'different' that she may like to make that article more interesting to her.

Isn't Reese just sooo cute?! She is lying on her article, and making sure that Rosemary 'knows' it so she gets her treat.