Hi Folks,

I've had a problem with my dogs tracking for a while now in that the starts have been a bit of a fight. The dog is desperate to get down the track and kinda shoots off at the start (onto the scent pad). She will take a decent scent but the start looks messy. She is fast in the track as well but that's less of a problem right now as she tracks really well and does not miss anything (I WILL be looking to slow her down later, but one problem at a time).

I've been working on the starts to calm her, including more OB on the way to the track and using a lot of pressure at the start (which I know is a problem but I don't know how else to deal with it). Problem is that the pressure is adding another issue now. When the dog gets to the scent pad, if I have had to use pressure just before, she will lay down at the pad while taking in scent, then move of on the track in the normal way.

This dog has always had extreme drive for tracking and I've not been able to bring it down enough that I could compete (procedure would be a problem, even thought I have a routine of doing the procedure, except the judge, she is too interested in getting to the track).

I've been told (by someone who's seen the dog in action) that I have to use a lot of pressure to keep the dog correct, but the problem is that I don't have any real experience in putting pressure on a dog in tracking and it seems that I've gone a bit too far in this particular case where the dog will lay down at the start. The dog still has huge drive for the track at this point so I was thinking maybe I've just confused matters and the dog is unsure what to do?

When he takes the dog the dog performs well enough at the start so I know a large part of this this is a handler issue, I suppose I'm looking for other ideas that I can keep under my hat and try to resolve this in the best way for the dog.

Any Ideas?

Cheers

J

Hey John, I had problems with my dog dragging me and flying down the track at one point too, especially at the start. I got some good tips here and what I found to work for us was going back to the very start and doing nothing but scent pads. The only pressure I used was putting him in a down before we got to the pad and ignoring him. I did 3 scent pads at a time and after a while you could see he was much more calm and would stay right in the scent pad. When I started laying tracks again I would lay 3 tracks about 20yards long and I tried different lengths on my step and different widths also. It made a big difference. These are the things I learned here on the forum. Since then I got Tracking from the Beginning by Gary Patterson here at Leerburg. He explains the three short tracks and how to use them and lays out a step by step plan for training by using your tracks to teach the dog to solve it for himself, no force.

Hmm...
I have this same problem with my little knucklehead.

Not to mention, despite not having eaten for 24 hours prior to a track, she STILL doesn't pay any attention to the food on the track.

She goes from footstep to footstep, and she touches every single piece of food with her nose, but she doesn't eat it. She's too excited, and doesn't want to stop to swallow.

Andy is very food motivated so for me it helped to find something he wasnt too crazy for. While most people try things like tripe or liver I ended up with kibble. But the scent pads alone seemed to be the most help.

Danke is just strange.
She loves to eat, and around the house is quite the chow-hound.

BUT if she is on the training or tracking field, she could care less.

It's like she has this whole other work drive that cancels out any food drive. Out there she works for her tug or her ball.

Lol, their all different in one or another way. Thats what is the most fun for me, finding the answer and watching him respond.