tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54720386987046891052012-01-17T11:44:11.201-05:00Observations and remarks from a former SAR handler, current AKC events participant, puppy rescuer, and longtime dogwatcher on training your dog's nose to work with you.Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.comBlogger591100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-82302315467172399102012-01-17T11:23:00.002-05:002012-01-17T11:42:37.618-05:00

We're working again! Now the toddler is old enough to scout along and take an interest. He may be a serious mantracker by the time he's old enough to do it for real; he likes to range ahead and find the articles before the dog does.Dustin didn't forget much while he was working a track every month or two, at least. He still prefers to work on oak leaves rather than grass and still hates to

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-70107288504069874392011-07-14T12:13:00.002-04:002011-07-14T12:22:37.512-04:00

I've been working on Dustin's broad jump lately, as one of the Graduate Novice and Open exercises, partly because it's good for both our fitness levels and partly because he finds jumping to be fun. I like to be a couple of exercises ahead of our actual titles, so we'll go into the Novice ring pretty soon with some Open exercises already in progress. Besides, the broad jump is in the yard, nice

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-54602858625475553572011-07-06T11:03:00.002-04:002011-07-06T11:14:31.254-04:00

This morning I laid and ran a short track for Dustin -- it's getting too hot too early to do much work, but he had an eighty-pace track (plus bonus stretch) with several turns and a couple of different surfaces. I walked on a low balance beam for part, for instance, which gave him no particular problem. Some of the grass was short enough to be nearly bare earth, some quite tall, as the neighbor

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-12088037225406066062011-06-30T13:51:00.005-04:002011-06-30T14:53:19.963-04:00

Thanks to the German Shepherd Dog Club of Atlanta and its Versatility program (not to be confused with the AKC Versatile Companion Dog titles), I'm feeling motivated to get off the couch and work the dog now and again.This copy is slightly out-of-date, I think. The copy for this year included the optional titles in Obedience. This turns Obedience into the great spot to get points, it looks like

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-73545959875149854762011-06-27T13:19:00.002-04:002011-06-27T13:33:19.735-04:00

Today's tracks for Bruce and Dustin were about three hours old -- which I hadn't intended, but I was researching stud dogs. We worked in fairly hot sun for most of both tracks, and the garbage truck came through at the end of the first.Dustin worked his track well from a flag with no article beside it, indulged in only a little dinking around, and did something interesting. Apparently at some

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-45147533180981782562011-06-23T13:01:00.002-04:002011-06-23T13:05:02.522-04:00

Hey, loyal readers! There is now a website for Sun Treader puppy training. It includes links to several other information sources, including Glendhenmere Kennels, the West Kentucky and Atlanta German Shepherd Dog clubs, and an informative article on dog breeding. On the Contact page is a link to Dekalb County Animal Services with a picture of one of their adoptable puppies. Enjoy!

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-16180612651138526382011-06-20T14:08:00.003-04:002011-06-20T14:22:41.378-04:00

We're getting back to our instinct outlets at last!Dustin's run a couple of 75-pace tracks lately, one with four articles, one with just one at the end. He's doing them well, and I think we're ready to start doing longer work at last. His concentration is better. He's also finally getting over his pine-needle hangup.After Sunny died, the last place he smelled her away from home was at a local

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-62223436909707349552011-06-07T14:28:00.003-04:002011-06-07T14:40:15.507-04:00

Dustin and I went to work sheep for the first time in months and the second time in a couple of years -- poor dog. We used to go several times a week.This time we went to a different farm with a different variety of sheep, smaller than we were used to and much, much faster. They wouldn't let Dustin work in his usual method, which resembles something out of the movie Babe, cuddling up to them

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-45420743657829598412011-05-04T14:10:00.003-04:002011-05-04T14:21:05.025-04:00

I posted a dog-training ad on Craigslist yesterday and made the mistake of browsing what else shows up in pet-related pages. And when I say mistake, I mean HUGE mistake.Mother German Shepherd and her eleven puppies, $300 for all, must go now. Purebred this. Mixed that. Mixed this mixed with mixed that. "Ever occur to you to get her spayed, idiot?" posted elsewhere. Nine week old puppy needs

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-83786865961463983492011-04-14T15:09:00.003-04:002011-04-14T15:13:47.558-04:00

Recently I visited a couple of friends whose dogs herd, show, and other such splendid activities. Their dogs looked amazing, and both friends insisted that I should try what they were doing – feeding their dogs nothing but raw meat.I have four dogs. Three of them look fine: the old-as-dirt rescue McCoy, the ten-year-old rescue Tasha, and Bruce, the mutt from under the junk heap who is now two.

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-91498451799203933412011-04-07T16:05:00.003-04:002011-04-07T16:09:16.005-04:00

The dogs have become big fans of sniffing birch, anise, and clove. Last night I worked the boys on not just sitting in the general vicinity but actually poking the scent source. Three iterations each, three pieces of cheese each.This morning Bruce brought his ball in and dropped it instead of bringing it to me for a cookie. "Where's your ball, Bruce?" I asked. He disappeared.I asked again.

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-52052403958739944412011-03-29T16:13:00.002-04:002011-03-29T16:29:35.566-04:00

Dog News had an article, and I chased down the website after being prompted by a friend, so here it is: National Association of Canine Scent Work, inventors of the sport of K9 Nose Work.It's an interesting sort of thing: training scent detection without having to use cadaver, which is icky and often requires some legal reason to have it, or drugs, which require a DEA certificate of some kind (

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-9586573336455960402011-02-11T22:23:00.008-05:002011-02-11T22:57:43.440-05:00

I have been asked several times since moving here, "Are you going to have puppies? Where can I get a shepherd like that?" I have a few business cards from Dustin's breeder, who has only bred one litter since, and a few from a pleasant local breeder who has his cousins. I send people to the Atlanta German Shepherd Dog Club.At the meeting the other night, held at the Atlanta Humane Society, I

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-27420728877880364782011-02-07T16:02:00.006-05:002011-02-07T16:28:37.506-05:00

Quite a long time ago I read a philosopher's paper which I do not remember well. I think it was Dennett, and I think it was on decision-making, but what I do remember vividly is that he wrote about throwing two tennis balls for his Labrador. The dog would race back and forth between the two for quite some time, then choose one apparently at random when he was tired enough.Now, what is

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-56805699341243070612010-12-14T13:02:00.005-05:002010-12-14T13:20:44.028-05:00

Tracking has been irregular lately. I'm trying to get the most possible good out of the fewest and shortest possible work sessions, generally between prying the rugrat off my leg. Luckily the rugrat likes watching the dogs do stuff outdoors while he sits in his stroller, and tracking makes a happy change from ball-chasing.Today was hard-ground cold, which is somewhat unusual down here, so I

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-68961568496601877872010-07-27T10:58:00.003-04:002010-07-27T11:17:11.435-04:00

The full text of the Puppy Uniform Protection and Safety Act, Senate form, is available at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SN03424:@@@P. Enjoy. It's an exercise for logicians. I mean, the exercise parts seem reasonable though unenforceable, seeing as we don't have enough USDA employees to inspect our slaughterhouses, never mind trying to determine the appropriate amount of exercise

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-14190168088801034912010-05-04T14:33:00.003-04:002010-05-04T14:39:52.514-04:00

I've been off getting published, and so have not been posting much. Sorry! I'm also doing a quick typo check of the second edition of The German Shepherd Dog Handbook by Dr. Mary Belle Brazil-Adelman, which is coming out for general purchase soon.I've also stopped tracking with Bruce for the moment, and am letting him do a little general maturing. He is, very gradually, rediscovering object

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-54400181145517609262010-04-22T11:58:00.002-04:002010-04-22T12:41:54.506-04:00

By remarkable coincidence, I received an email from AKC's Companion Animal Recovery program with a story on their support of canine SAR. The relevant part:The K9 Alert team is now 15 dogs strong and includes handlers and volunteers who specialize in a wide variety of essential SAR categories such as wilderness search and survival, collapsed structure search, swift water safety, confined space

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-68664816118373532392010-04-20T10:46:00.004-04:002010-04-20T11:00:32.761-04:00

Quite a few breeds have a show-work dichotomy. Within that, most breeders will still set aside some puppies as being for the purpose they’re bred for and others as pets In general, if someone just wants a pet to hang out with, they’re best off getting a show-line pet-quality pup. If they’re looking for a dog to jog alongside the mountain bike or hike the Appalachian Trail, then a working-line

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-84041346391176489762010-04-08T10:01:00.003-04:002010-04-08T10:26:13.223-04:00

Two posts ago, I talked about training your dog to associate an open crate door with the idea of going straight to you. Once he has been taught that basic concept, it's time to start the real work: developing his skills.So far, he's been working in simple settings. He comes to you across grass and in a famliar and low-distraction building. Now you step it up a little at a time. You cross a

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-59310903055834062202010-04-08T09:23:00.002-04:002010-04-08T09:28:42.527-04:00

A few posts ago, I wrote about using marble cake for giving yourself a visual parallel for how scent can be drawn by a passing vehicle or deer, especially in tall grass or on a still day. It would have been a much better post with a picture, but at the time I didn't have one.Here you go. The original "scent" was laid in an S shape, which was then cut perpendicularly a number of times. When

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-66816766967101514152010-03-30T13:38:00.003-04:002010-03-30T13:54:41.063-04:00

In my last post I talked about the need for training to keep a show dog (this includes obedience dogs!) safe in a world where not everyone is sympathetic to crating practices. Whether the person releasing the catch is an animal-rights activist or a child looking for a playmate doesn't matter to the health and well-being of your dog! Today we look at the first stage in training your dog to find

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-3251497773538202622010-03-26T15:53:00.003-04:002010-03-26T16:04:35.294-04:00

Recently I received yet another alert that suspected animal-rights advocates had been coming to dog shows and letting the dogs out of their crates. Apparently some people believe that the dogs should have the right to run loose, eat dangerous stuff off the ground, and get hit by cars instead of being shown. Alternately, they just might believe that drinking spilled antifreeze or getting hit by

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-38109421278583899662010-03-03T16:11:00.001-05:002010-03-03T16:17:14.737-05:00

White Collar on USA.I admit it. It’s an addiction.This past episode, though, was also food for thought as a dog person. I’ve had a canine partner – not just a pet, or a buddy, though she was both, but an actual working partner. The sort of dog who’d consider working with someone else, maybe, if she really liked and respected that person. The sort of dog where I’d have to really like and

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-3914994461928317402010-02-16T13:44:00.002-05:002010-02-16T14:12:53.340-05:00

"Don't they cheat and learn to track by sight?"We finally had snow this weekend, so Dustin and Bruce each had two snow tracks before everything melted. That certainly isn't enough to teach them to track by sight, but I certainly learned a lot by watching them. Dustin worked well, and I saw him have an "Aha" moment at the turns when he could see what was happening. The second day, his turns

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-8045775298011036762010-02-15T10:29:00.002-05:002010-02-15T11:26:46.297-05:00

We own a tail-chasing dog.Tasha spins on certain occasions, such as when her preferred person comes home and is mobbed by all and sundry instead of focusing exclusively on her. She spins when she wants her dinner prepared. She spins when she wishes to leave her boarding kennel, which leads to injuries when she's there for more than a couple of days.However, the dinner preparation starts to look

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-33255556286283945832010-01-19T11:47:00.003-05:002010-01-19T12:05:51.665-05:00

After actual months between tracking sessions, I finally got up, settled the baby in the stroller with the brakes locked so he could watch from above while we worked, and worked a couple of tracks. With luck, it'll happen again tomorrow. We'll be fair-weather trackers for some time, though. While I can find baby clothes to keep a little one warm, I cannot find any to keep him dry.Each of the

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-65736169320471463132009-12-07T13:03:00.002-05:002009-12-07T13:15:33.513-05:00

Today's lesson in scent theory is a little different. If you have never made a marble cake, step one for this lesson is "Buy a cake mix for marble cake" and step two is "Follow the directions until you have one cake pan of pale batter and one bowl of dark." Take up a small ladle and use it to drizzle a trail which starts thin and ends with a good blob. The thin start is your starting point and

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-20672689227445987492009-12-07T13:01:00.003-05:002009-12-07T13:03:35.435-05:00

Puppy training may not be what everyone else watches this video for, but it's what stood out to me. See all that food? See how early this little rugrat starts her training? And yet she still has a unique personality.The Video

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-17200990928445080412009-12-03T14:41:00.004-05:002009-12-03T14:58:19.371-05:00

I admit it -- there isn't a hard and fast definition of a "puppy mill." Some people want to define it as anyplace that one dog is bred to another, which is probably throwing the baby out with the bath. After all, a dog lover is a person who loves to live with dogs, and if nobody's making more, we won't be living with dogs for long. Now that I've lived with a feral-born pup for a while, that's

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-86429865402591534562009-12-02T15:39:00.006-05:002009-12-02T16:03:16.338-05:00

My friend over at The Endangered Owner brings a bit of underreported news to light regarding what an officer may consider grounds to pull over a dog owner here. The gist is, a woman and her daughter were pulled over for having a few Parson/Jack Russell Terriers visible in the back of the pickup truck under a camper top, and the officer was concerned for the dogs' well-being. Endangered uses the

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-78381846831507656102009-12-02T15:07:00.004-05:002009-12-02T15:14:05.437-05:00

Well, the good news is, I'm no longer trying to work out the logistics of tracking while pregnant. Bad news is, tracking with a baby in a sling, especially a baby who is outgrowing the sling at such an amazing rate, is still a logistical puzzle and a half. However, there are a few nice linkies in the blogroll to keep everyone happy, and I can get back to obedience work anytime I can get a

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-85555618900361674042009-09-28T12:02:00.008-04:002009-09-28T12:27:05.214-04:00

Have you heard the blue-green algae alerts yet? In case you haven't, read warnings for duck-hunters who use dogs. This stuff isn't good for the people or the ducks, either -- in fact, I'd worry about eating a duck who'd been dabbling in this stuff. Environmentalists aren't just tree-hugging fanatics. They're also people who like to take their dogs and children swimming, or who are keen to breathe

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-56979524961629731732009-09-10T09:00:00.003-04:002009-09-10T09:41:59.021-04:00

I have tracked with the boys lately. Honest! Not a lot, though.Dustin is well-indoctrinated by now. He knows the routine of finding the article and downing on it, and if we end up taking off a week or three for any reason it doesn't really faze him much. I'm beginning to vary the distance between articles, which gets his nose down a lot more solidly. If he can count on a set distance, he

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-7277519909630311742009-08-26T08:59:00.003-04:002009-08-26T09:08:39.882-04:00

Ted Kennedy has died.Now, this may seem like an odd thing to post to a dog-blog, but among other things, Kennedy was a fan of the Portuguese Water Dog. This isn't the sort of item that generally goes into the biographies of our senators except in passing, though perhaps it should -- I'd like to know whether I'm voting for a whippet person, or a cocker person, or perhaps a boa-constrictor person

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-57719435581803120852009-08-18T09:52:00.004-04:002009-08-18T10:01:22.839-04:00

George Booth of The New Yorker has a fairly famous cartoon with the caption I've just used as a title. A frazzled male writer sits on the porch of a weathered beachside house, typewriter before him, blank page fed into typewriter, as his wife offers advice. Several dogs loaf on the floor around him.Clearly I write about dogs. In fact, two semi-fictional works about Sunny are now accepted. One

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-58311965639327294322009-08-18T08:31:00.002-04:002009-08-18T08:50:09.754-04:00

Some dog breeds are known for learning by watching others of their type. Border collies, for instance, have been trained for generations by getting plonked into the sheep fields to work with older border collies. Quite a few of the herding breeds are trained for the job with instructions that start off, "Well, you put your new dog out there with your old dog..." which makes life difficult if

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-62689023293774428172009-08-17T12:14:00.003-04:002009-08-17T12:24:06.161-04:00

Some people claim that dogs have a higher social intelligence for reading people than people themselves do. It isn't usually phrased this way, of course. Usually people say, "Well, my dog didn't like him, so I don't want him around," or words to that effect. I've known some dogs who were pretty indiscriminate -- throw a toy a few times, or feed them, and you're in -- but there have been some

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-30627530986310036122009-07-30T12:36:00.003-04:002009-07-30T13:02:57.951-04:00

Our parvovirus victim Bruce is recovering well. He's still isolated from his sister, as the virus is supposed to be extremely thick in his stool right now, and so he's still living on a concrete surface which is regularly washed down with bleach-water. If there's one thing we DON'T need, it's a nice rich layer of parvovirus on our property.I'm still feeding him boiled chicken and rice, this batch

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-90108804636527760272009-07-22T15:48:00.001-04:002009-07-22T15:49:41.193-04:00

Wolves, dogs, close enough. If you're keeping tabs on wildlife and outdoor living, you probably have heard about the wolf hunts in Alaska.

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-75698349749108174362009-07-22T15:41:00.003-04:002009-07-22T15:48:21.665-04:00

Nearly everyone goes to look at the new litter of puppies, the rescue website, or the animal shelter's holdings with a notion in mind of what they want. Big, small; outgoing, reserved; color preference; male or female.Especially male or female.Right now, I have a surprising stash of male dogs -- three, which is three more than usual. They're good fellows, and very solicitous, and very

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-40557309466223045022009-07-21T13:45:00.004-04:002009-07-21T14:26:43.528-04:00

I've been told various solid facts about dogs and mirrors: dogs aren't visual enough to notice reflections, they don't understand reflections, they lose interest as soon as they realize they can't smell the other dog, and so on.Here's your solid fact from me: it depends on the dog.Tasha, our longcoat shepherd, will ride in the back of the car and look at us in the rearview. She likes to check in

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-1722589732941990622009-07-19T20:10:00.002-04:002009-07-19T20:21:28.198-04:00

Bruce is home! I now call him the solid-gold retriever. He's going to have to be all kinds of good boy now, but he's alive and he's eating a little, and he's very, very glad to see his people again.The scary part is now keeping him whole, healthy, and away from his sister for a bit. Apparently parvovirus stays in the system and is shed through fecal material for a good two weeks after the

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-78389828258477107012009-07-13T11:21:00.003-04:002009-07-13T11:34:09.964-04:00

Our puppy has parvo. More accurately, one of our puppies has parvovirus, and the other, to date, does not.They have had the same vaccines on the same days. They play together and go pretty much everywhere together. However, Bruce has been at the vet since Friday being stuffed full of antivomiting, antidiarrheal, antibiotic, and antiviral drugs along with everything else in a well-rounded IV drip,

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-84775049320546882892009-07-07T13:17:00.002-04:002009-07-07T13:25:31.007-04:00

Both dogs are still on baby-level tracks, though they're out to prove to me that they're ready for harder ones. I ran Dustin on an hour-and-a-half old track, two turns, fifteen paces between articles, at noon. Aside from some distraction to watch a pedestrian passing the yard, he did quite well. He is sharp-nosed enough to work it partially as a trailing problem, though, and was clearly working

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-40592634407620433932009-06-29T09:49:00.004-04:002009-06-29T10:04:45.785-04:00

How much does a dog forget? Some of that depends on the exercise, some on how often the command has been used before. It's been three weeks exactly since I last tracked with Bruce and Dustin, but we tried it this morning.Sometimes health concerns (in this case, a strained muscle in me) interfere, and sometimes weather (in this case, highs in the high 90s, which is Too Darned Hot) interferes. The

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-17230714785963935182009-06-28T11:11:00.003-04:002009-06-28T11:17:32.546-04:00

Lots of dogs have the instinct to trail after an interesting scent. Lots of dogs also have the instinct to push livestock from one place to another, or to retrieve. They still need practice, though, to follow their instincts well.Need proof? For a male dog, lifting his hind leg to pee -- marking territory and indicating his great stature (or faking it) -- is instinctive. The more alpha his

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-88698965924722395402009-06-24T08:29:00.002-04:002009-06-24T08:43:47.653-04:00

As your dog gets older, he may lose some of his sensory abilities. You're probably used to thinking of him as getting hard of hearing, or maybe a little blind, but the nose can weaken too. His olfactory powers may not be what they used to be, or, as the Lady and the Tramp line would have it, "You mean you don't smell as good as you used to?"This morning, we had a little evidence of this. I

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-70041537620899363932009-06-20T15:32:00.004-04:002009-06-20T16:01:19.370-04:00

There are researchers working on what animals know, how intelligent they are, and other such questions that are hard to measure in a laboratory. Some wonderful work has been done on primates. A few gray parrots have proven that linguistic abilities aren't the exclusive property of humans, and that they aren't just "parroting." Dogs -- well, we seem to feel as though we know them well enough. Some

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-15063319135837797742009-06-18T10:51:00.005-04:002009-06-18T11:58:03.981-04:00

There are a few deceptively simple rules of dog training. The one that seems to be easiest to unintentionally mess up is "Don't teach the dog something that isn't what you want her to do." Some of it is that you have an active little brain sitting beside your left foot, soaking up all sorts of information you don't even realize you're telegraphing. Some of it is that we're working on pretty

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-81854822226578190342009-06-17T13:40:00.003-04:002009-06-17T13:44:35.232-04:00

Absolutely everyone who writes about dogs or children seems to have something to say about the four-year-old boy who flushed a week-old puppy down the toilet. Okay. I’ll bite. I’ll say that while parents should keep an eye on their children and breeders should keep an eye on their puppies, nobody can possibly think of every possibility. For that matter, no adult can think of the range of

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-37695363554300417182009-06-08T10:32:00.007-04:002009-06-08T10:56:40.688-04:00

The chief reason some dogs, and some people, don't do scentwork well has nothing to do with the nose and everything to do with the brain. At some point, the dog has to learn and accept that his handler doesn't know everything so that he can demonstrate what is called "intelligent disobedience." Force-trained dogs are often not good at this because there's always been a penalty for disagreeing

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-41854721125318198402009-06-06T11:15:00.011-04:002009-06-08T11:00:17.273-04:00

We took the puppies to a pet-food shop, one of those nice places that lets you bring in non-people-eating dogs, yesterday. It was something of an adventure.Bruce is bold about new places and things. He happily browsed toys, smelled the smells, helped Wanda dig a stray cookie out from under a display, and was all kinds of confident -- except with new people.Wanda is a little shy about new places,

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-92047523562337060482009-05-30T08:27:00.002-04:002009-05-30T08:32:39.541-04:00

I laid two tracks at roughly 7:45 pm, one for Dustin and one for a puppy. I didn’t decide which puppy until later – the one I could get to lie down on hand signal/command with less fuss, which was Bruce, pictured.At 8:30 (the earliest I could expect to have track scent stronger than trail scent) I took Dustin out to work, and he happily found the starting article by the flag to lie down on it.

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-87060361449084764242009-05-29T16:27:00.003-04:002009-05-29T16:48:02.030-04:00

As I may have mentioned, a couple of months ago my spouse and I pulled a couple of half-Golden (or, since we know almost nothing of their mother, perhaps I should say Goldish rather than Golden) puppies out from under a pile of old fence at our new house. The world has not exactly been beating down our door to adopt them, though there have been a couple of nibbles. There are a lot of homeless

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-50908534423279752992009-05-27T13:40:00.003-04:002009-05-27T13:47:43.550-04:00

You may want to research a little of the science on canine perception if you like to know how things work before you start trying to do them. How well should you know the nose?There are several ordinary-language works on how your dog perceives the world. One of the better ones is Chapter 5 of Stephen Budiansky’s The Truth About Dogs. While other sections of the book, such as the pro-alpha stance

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-45073808162685396772009-05-27T12:07:00.007-04:002009-05-27T13:51:11.115-04:00

Dustin (above) has now been with me for about a year and a half. I don't work him nearly as hard as I worked Sunny; he doesn't demand it of me, for one thing. At this age, she was deploying on searches. He is still working on formal tracking at a pretty low level and air-scents more or less as he sees fit.One reason for this aside from his drive (and mine) being lower is that I have no current

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-68966954707086757742009-05-15T13:41:00.004-04:002009-05-15T14:04:52.573-04:00

"Training your dog's nose" may be an inaccurate title. The average dog knows how to use his nose just fine, just as readily and easily as you use your eyes. The trick is not in teaching his nose; it's teaching him a vocabulary.My last scenting dog, Sunny, started off with "Search" to find airborne scent and "Find another one." The latter was useful for tracking: find another thing with the

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5472038698704689105.post-48727161848922965772009-05-06T11:18:00.003-04:002009-05-06T11:34:45.259-04:00

Welcome to the new home of Sniffydog! I am moving away from sniffydog.today.com for a variety of reasons.At present, I am working a young German Shepherd Dog, Dustin, in AKC tracking. He is working himself in air scent while I research the military's Silent Scout training -- a post later on this subject, or possibly several. My past experience includes training another GSD in tracking,

Sniffydoghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05920202131267426528noreply@blogger.com0