Seren tracking

 Surry P&R. Short grass, 53degrees, 15mph gusty wind, 45% humidity. Track laid at8:25 & aged 65 min. This is an excellent location for training road obstacles (2 lane paved road with almost no traffic), so I decided we should finally take advantage of it. See google earth photo for details, but did some paralleling of the road, crossing it, bouncing of it, etc. In addition to fabric start & leather end articles, I put a metal one on leg 2 & a plastic one on leg 5. Food drops 30 yds after 1st turn, 10 yds after intermediate articles, immediately after road crossings, at 25 & 70 yds on leg 3, & at 15 yds on last leg. Realizing that this track was only an hour old, I was pretty impressed with Seren’s performance here. Start & all articles excellent. At 2nd turn (the ‘bounce off’ one) after she lost the scent she checked into the road a few feet, didn’t find it, then checked left along the edge of the road, then caught the scent to the left going away from t...

 Taylor Park. Short grass. Sunny Seren did 4 start tracks of increasing age. All of my training tracks start with 10 scuff steps. #1 laid @ 8:50&aged 2 hr. 1st leg 65 yd, food at 30, to right turn, then 50 yd to end. 46 degrees, 38% humidity, 11 mph gusty wind. This was nicely done. Both articles good. Started in wrong direction (the direction at which we approached the start flag) but corrected onto the track after a couple steps. The occasional wind gusts would blow her downwind a couple feet off the track but she quickly corrected  #2 laid @8:55& aged 3 hr. 1st leg 75yd with food at 25, to left turn. Scuffed out of turn. 2nd leg 60yd, food at 20. 51 degrees, 37% humidity, 9mph with gusts. Seren didn’t show loss of scent at the turn until about 2 feet beyond it. Checked right first, then turned to the left & quickly picked up 2nd leg. Start & articles good #3 laid @9:00 & aged 4hr. When laying the track I alternated 5 scuff steps or a food drop every 10 y...

 Crump Park. Short grass, sunny. Track laid @8:05 & aged 2 hours. 45 degrees, 5mph, 54% humidity when run.  Track 1 had some tire ruts in it about 2/3 of the way down. Track 2 had a lot of frozen goose poop. Both had multiple human & dog cross tracks.I thought the park would be sparsely populated in the early morning cold, but I was wrong. Seren had a good start on #1 but struggled a bit a short way down the track. Got back on the track on her own. Very interested in the tire ruts - didn’t try to follow them, but stopped & sniffed for a long time, to the point I reminded her to get back to work. No difficulty at the turn. #2 seemed easier for her in spite of all the goose droppings. Again no issue with the turn. All 4 article indications were good. I’m not sure she got any of the food drops, as most of the (off lead) dogs who ran over her tracks were Labradors😂 I’ll try to use a quieter area for the 2,3,4,5 hour old exercise. Dylan did a 15min. old 2 turn track wi...

 link:  https://youtu.be/NRycnLPY3L8?feature=shared

 Tracking class at Judi’s. Track laid by Anne, at 8:05 & aged 4hr 5 min. Sunny, breezy, 37 degrees, 38% humidity when run. Multiple cover changes (grass, harvested soybean, snow, ice, woods, dirt ‘road’). Food after cover changes & other challenges. Two intermediate articles. Seren’s start & up to beyond 1st turn did not inspire confidence in handler who had just sent in 3 entries. However, once she got beyond 1st turn things looked pretty good. Definitely indicated all articles, but didn’t really want to lie down, Next session we will do some 2hr start tracks, then on to 3hr, then 4hr. (separate sessions) Dylan did a 20 min old (meant for it to be 15 min) 2 turn track at 12:55. S5, W5, F, W5, S5…. Turns scuffed 5 in & 5 out with food every 2 scuffs. 40 degrees, 41% humidity, 8mph wind, sunny. Used portion of hay field with no snow or ice. I used a start article for the first time & in retrospect should have used a food drop after the initial scuffing as he was ...

 Courthouse Park. Short grass & frozen goose poop. Sunny, 19degrees, 11mph wind, 50% humidity. Track laid @9:15 & aged 1 hour Seren did a straight line article track using 10 articles of fabric, leather, plastic, or metal - article, 10 yd to food drop, 25yd to article, 10 yd to food drop, 25 yd to article, 10 to food, etc Seren did just fine with this, indications were excellent. Next time I do an article track I will try to include some changes of cover Dylan did a straight line track with slightly increased distance between food drops. S5,W12, F, W12, S5… for 200 yd. He was stellar, dead on the entire length of the track. Stopped in place a few times to look at traffic, then right back to it.   Conditions same as for Seren’s, but his was aged 15 min.

 Chamberlayne Elementary. Short grass & open woods. Track laid @8:30&aged 3hr. When track run, 43degrees, 7mph wind, 80% humidity. Overcast with light drizzle. This was a turns & articles in the woods track. See map & Google Earth photo. Good start, nice tight turns. Only flaw was I had to tell Seren to lie down at all articles except the end one. She didn’t even really indicate the metal one in the woods. I see an article track in our near future. Dylan did a 2 turn track, aged 15min, S5, W10,F, W10, S5…. Scuff 5 in & out of turns with food every 3. 38degrees, 4mph, 89% humidity. Overcast with very light drizzle Wow! There were some challenges for a beginner dog that I didn’t anticipate when plotting the track (bad trainer!), but nobody told Dylan that tracking on pine needles or near buildings or on contaminated grounds, or past pine cones (one of his favorite toys) was hard. He was stellar. Used novel end article & he downed on his own. I think he’s good ...