Okay, my dog has a good foundation tracking and has done well. We haven't tracked since early last fall due to personal stuff and weather. At that point his intensity was waning, and as we return to tracking now it's the same. It is my feeling maybe it's been too easy for him and he's bored. He drags me to the scent pad, but often loses intensity. He's solid on articles, but seems to be just searching for food instead of actually tracking. I've eliminated alot of the food with the intentions of making him have to track to the articles for his reward. Should I consider adding a little pressure to make him understand he's not out here just to find his reward in a way that's easy for him? He's not overly sensitive, and I'm not talking hard corrections. Also, when he shows me he's tracking do I praise or just be quiet and let him track? If there's a way without adding pressure I'd prefer it.

Sue

Sue
ont feed for 24 hours and put the food at the end of the track.
Sooner or later(adter trained ) your going to have to tell him its a job not play. This means correction on the track. I use two collars and two leads. Flat or dead ring choke for the actual tracking, along with a prong for correction when he looks up or gets distracted.
The praise when tracking depends on the dog. If it distracts the dog dont do it. Otherwise I tell them good dog now and then in a soft voice, to help mark the correction when they do wrong.
I also use there favorite toy at the end of the track.

Ron

Sue
ont feed for 24 hours and put the food at the end of the track.
Sooner or later(adter trained ) your going to have to tell him its a job not play. This means correction on the track. I use two collars and two leads. Flat or dead ring choke for the actual tracking, along with a prong for correction when he looks up or gets distracted.
The praise when tracking depends on the dog. If it distracts the dog dont do it. Otherwise I tell them good dog now and then in a soft voice, to help mark the correction when they do wrong.
I also use there favorite toy at the end of the track.

Ron

Sue, A few questions??
What type of dog?
What type of lines does he come from?
How old is your dog??
When you say a solid foundation, just what do you mean?
What's the longest track this dog has worked?
What does he do on track with distractions around him.
How does he handle terrain changes?

The big Question is, what type of Tracking Dogs were his parents??

What does it take to motivate this dog when doing OB?
How young was he whan you started his OB and how much was he worked in OB?

I know these may be mundane questions to a lot of the board members but we need a base line to start trying to solve Sue's concern. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I would suggest working with some one that can see how the dog responds in person.

In general if you are going to put pressure on a dog, hou must have a plan how the pressure is going to come off. In general praise is good if it does not effect the dog's concentration, and if in fact that stimuli is positive for the dog.

Tracking is a touchy feely thing for many dogs. The are plenty of good training methods, but you must understand how total application of any good method. The best way is to work with some one that has experience V rating with several different dogs.

Butch,

3 1/2 yo GSD male, Father was FH do w/ V scores. Don't know about dam. Gary Koerbelbach, Queck Krotteck grandson..linebred Gildo,Umsa,Caro Allerswald. Has tracked since a puppy, has good food drive, does OB for ball/rope, good focus in OB. Currently checks out leaves, rocks, etc to see if they're articles, and since we'd done quite a bit of tracking in plowed fields I'm thinking he's decided it's easier to be visual. I often do multiple tracks around 150-200 paces each. Last time near the end of the track he saw the next flag and bolted toward it. I had him on pinch (he's a large male, I just started using it only on rare occasion so I don't have to try to muscle him) on a 2nd line. I let him hit the pinch, brought him back on the track, and he went to the next article with focus. It is my opinion he needs now to learn this is work, not play. I regret not having this worked out before we quit last season, but life issues prevented that. I realize live help is best...just hoping for some insight with folks familiar with this kind of thing until I can do that. We're in a schutzhund deprived area, I work weekends, so immediately traveling for help is not feasible for me.

Sue

Do you mean by being visual, he can see the footprints in the dirt? If so, I'd recommend finding a place to lay tracks where the visual cues will be minimal to nonexistent, or if that's not an option, try blindfolding him, so he has to use his nose.

Yes, but now we are back to grass, so he is trying just to trail and hunt. I don't allow progress when his nose is up and he's not tracking, so there are interruptions in the track, and as I said, he is showing me he's using his eyes by checking out things he thinks could be articles that are 6" or so off the track. I'm doing alot of thinking about this *S* I've considered him only getting his meal at the end of the track. I'm hoping having food reward at articles (more than just a few) will prevent him from rushing to the end of the track. Am I figuring this right?

Sue

Here is what I would try:

Lay a short, straight track, maybe 50-75 paces. Put food drops randomly every 5-10 paces, making certain that the food is in a footstep. You might even put a piece of food down and step right on it, so that food is pressed down into the footstep.

If he does well with this, do the same thing, with a slightly longer track, with a turn in it. Make sure that the food drops are closer together near the turn.

Trailing and hunting works; it will get him where he wants to go. Make certain that he's only looking for food in the footsteps. You might try a different type of food for this; something he really likes but hasn't had for a while. Use tiny pieces so he has to hunt for them in the footstep.

I'm not a tracking pro, so anyone else please feel free to step in and point out where my thinking could be in error.

Thanks for all the help so far. I put an FH on my SchH3 bitch, and have tracked other dogs, and this one has shown excellent ability. I just get the impression he's not sure it's worth his time or effort to do this, and I'm ready to use some pressure if that's what he needs. However, I don't want to make a mistake and go backwards *G*. Planning to do his SchH1 end of May. Something better than a 70 in tracking would sure be nice LOL.

Sue