NW380 Developing your Trial IQ - Reading the Nosework Dog

Week to Week Reading Your Dog Topics (all new for Feb 2020):

Week 1:

• The Basics of the search sequence
• Reading the Single Hide Search in a larger search area
• Reading the elevation of odor

Week 2:

• Multiple hide searches and transitiioning in and out of odor
• Recognizing the number of scent cones in order to clear an area

Week 3:

• Distractions, both intentional and environmental!

Week 4:

• Blank Areas - understanding YOUR dog's specific behavior
• Blank Exteriors, Vehicles, Containers... prepping for those new NW3 searches!

Weeks 5 & 6: Advanced Concepts

• Converging odor
• Pooling odor
• Inaccessible beahvior
• Elevated hides
• Large areas, little odor

Some of the other topics we will cover....

The Anatomy of a Nosework Trial

• Organizational Comparison (NACSW, UKC, SDDA, AKC)
• Starting your dog on a new odor
• What to know before your first trial
• Parking Lot Etiquette
• Walkthrough strategies
• The Judges and a Judge's Perspective
• Awards Ceremony (NACSW)

Being Prepared

• Being mentally prepared
• Understanding your level requirements
• Understanding your dog’s strengths and weaknesses
• Crafting your trial strategy

Knowing Your Dog

• Search styles
• Arousal and drive
• Observation is the key

The Anatomy of a Search

• Recognizing parts of the search
• The Change of Behavior, what is it and how to see it?
• Calling alert at the right time
• Calling Finish correctly (when necessary)

Observing Your Dog

• Slow motion analysis
• Handler self narration
• Single hide searches
• Multiple hide searches
• Elevation

KEY READING YOUR DOG DETAILS WE WILL COVER:

• Can you tell if your dog is at source?
• Critter or Odor?
• Pee sniffing!! When to move along... how to handle!
• Containers.... distraction or odor??
• Blank Rooms!!
• Blank Areas.... Vehicles, Exteriors, Containers!!
• Has you dog cleared an area of odor so you can feel confident to move along?

Stages of a Search

Part of reading our dogs is understanding what we are looking at. Once we can recognize the stages of a search, we can start to recognize the changes of behavior that the dog is exhibiting. Seeing the Changes of Behavior is a key start to learning to read our dogs. Initially, we may only be able to see the Alert. Eventually, we learn to see a Change of Behavior…. and ultimately we learn to understand the entire behavior chain.

Searching itself is just a behavior chain. There is a start and an end. In this case the cue to search begins the chain and the Alert ends the chain. However, there are many steps in between. A savvy handler has the ability to read these steps and to understand what he or she is seeing. This is a skill like any other and is a critical skill in learning how to handle in the sport of Nosework.

In order to be able to read our dogs, we need to first know how to analyze a search. At first we may not be able to read our dogs in real time. This is normal! It’s completely normal and is one of the first Stages of Competence. However, we have a super tool at our disposal…. Video. The power of video is that we are able to review the search over and over and in slow motion if necessary. Once we learn how to read our dogs on video, we start the process of learning how to read our dogs in real time.

Let’s start this by breaking apart and analyzing a search.

In this example, we will use a very cool search done by Gacek. Gacek is a relatively advanced dog. In this video, Gacek does a beautiful search of two vehicles. There are two hides on the hot vehicle and none on the second vehicle. What is very interesting about this search is that the odor is pooling over by the wall and over the cold vehicle. Gacek works this search off leash. Off leash searches are tremendous for teaching us how to read our dogs because the handler is minimized in the equation.

First let’s watch the video in its entirety.

What did you see? Could you tell when Gacek was in odor? Could you tell when he was at source?

Now let’s watch the video narrated in its entirety.

Did you see the stages?

1. He is cued to search
2. He explores the edges of the scent cloud
3. He determines the directionality of the scent
4. He follows the scent to the vicinity of source
5. He narrows down the scent to source
6. He alerts

All of these stages can be seen as Gacek sources the first hide (the inaccessible hide on the passenger side fender) and a subset of them can be identified as he sources the second hide on the front license plate.

If we can learn to see these stages as they happen when our dogs are searching, we can make better and more successful calls in competition.