Our track today was in a place I'm familiar with, but have not tracked through. Sometimes, we need to do a "motivatonal" and more of a fun and successful track with our dogs. Constant difficult tracks and stress can become demoralizing for them. I decided to put some special treats in some places that I felt would reward her, or encourge her through any tough places.And tracks, especially urban tracks, are not always done perfectly. So much comes into play, the long aging, things happen while you're gone, weather, etc. So I hope to show in these pictures, and in some of the previous ones, how the dogs (particularly with Trust) handle and problems.
In the above picture, the orange line is the track, the broken blue line is where she went while tracking along...only the dog knows (often) what pulled them over to a specific area...
We were tracking in very high winds today. This was a plastic article, that I felt may blow away, so put a small rock on top of it. She flipped it up, as there was a treat underneath it. This is the same track leg as the first photo, which is the second leg of her track, and her first article.
I knew she had missed the other treats I had left on this track. She also seemed drawn to a few "odd" places. As we went up the hill and were moving towards the open area where trails begin, I think I figured it out. A vehicle was parked, and most likely, they had a dog they were taking for a walk on the trails. I expected it had likely picked up the treats, perhaps 'visited' a few places, before moving away.....but who knows?!!! She moved out into the grassy area and made a right turn onto her third leg.
Trust has found her second article, another plastic one, and indicated by sitting. In training, I use many different types of articles that would not be used in a tracking trial. The orange line indicates a road crossing, working up the edge of the grass/gravel road, towards the paved area.
Here we are moving from the gravel road onto the paved parking area. Again, the blue broken line shows where she was pulled off the track by "something", but goes quickly back on the track again. We had strong, swirling winds in this area.
Trust has taken her MOT (moment of truth) turn on the hard surface pretty much dead-on.
And she heads right to her metal article at the edge of the pavement, before changing to grass.
A short stint over the grass and across a sandy area before turning onto grass again. We move up the grass, and then out onto the paved drive and across it.
She heads off at the correct location, into pine needles covering the ground under pine trees.There is a little walkway through it, which she turned and began to follow, but quickly indicated loss of scent, and turned back in under the trees.
This is where she has to find the track again, and works around the trees back to the track.
There were two more legs after coming out of the pines. Once again, we hit strong, swirling wind. The orange arrow shows the track ending pointing to the article. Trust had come around from the right, and working with the wind curved around past the article. She could smell it was close, circled around and back to it.
Here, she happily indicates the article, directly in front of her. Working at the UTDX level is very grueling work. It is super interesting, seeing what the dog(s) can do, and trying to understand it all. But everything 'has to align' for a dog to pass in a trial at this level. As of this date, I believe there are still only twelve dogs that have earned all four tracking titles, giving them the designation of Tracking Champion. That is across Canada! It is an amazing achievement for a dog and handler.
This is where she has to find the track again, and works around the trees back to the track.
There were two more legs after coming out of the pines. Once again, we hit strong, swirling wind. The orange arrow shows the track ending pointing to the article. Trust had come around from the right, and working with the wind curved around past the article. She could smell it was close, circled around and back to it.
Here, she happily indicates the article, directly in front of her. Working at the UTDX level is very grueling work. It is super interesting, seeing what the dog(s) can do, and trying to understand it all. But everything 'has to align' for a dog to pass in a trial at this level. As of this date, I believe there are still only twelve dogs that have earned all four tracking titles, giving them the designation of Tracking Champion. That is across Canada! It is an amazing achievement for a dog and handler.
