And Bob said

"Some dogs get more self reward from the track itself. It's just a rewarding behavior to them.
One of my GSDs started skipping bait early. It didn't bother me simply because he was still putting his nose in every foot print. If he would have been missing footsteps all together I would wonder why.
Pushing the dog to fast? Bait is to high value to concentrate on the track itself? Bait is to low level value and the dog ignores it for the track? That's not a bad thing as long as the dog keeps a deep nose."

I get this. And what Katie said. Kinda. Keeping a deep nose in every FS. But I keep circling back to self-rewarding and how that's doing what the dog wants, in what to me is an ob exercise. And how skipping food seems like insufficient attention to the track itself. And .... And ..... Maybe my brain is a maze filled with dead ends.

Maybe Bob and Katie will comment again.

My original statement, that Connie had just quoted, was geared at to beginning dog just starting to do tracks.

My later experience with 2 of my dogs that were more advanced after a couple of months of tracking....were more like Bob stated...skipping bait, especially with my female. She has extreme hunt drive & really loves to track for the self reward of the hunt.

Thanks, Anne. I also found a couple of blogs this afternoon about the importance of beginners (not non-beginners) not leaving bait.

So I get that you are saying what others said.

I get what you're saying, too.

It kind of doesn't answer my question about self-rewarding and an ob exercise, but I don't know how to phrase it any more.

I do appreciate the input, and the fact that we have a training thread! And about something that I think lots of us do, too.

I'll try again to re-formulate my question(s).

Skipping bait can be good or bad. It's entirely what causes it. Drive for the track itself or poor training.
I'm also a believer that FST is about obedience. I came from SAR with one of my present dogs. He was trained in live search, cadaver, water work and article search. Not to undermine the work that goes into a good SAR dog but this particular dog took to it like a fish to water. He was a natural with his nose and was finding me in the woods at 12 wks old. That uses every method of scent the dog can use. Air scent,crushed vegetation, wind direction, human scent, etc.
In sport FST the dog is required to put it's nose in every single track. That happens with control. The dogs are required to make 90 degree turns on the track. That requires control through training. The dog looses points if it back tracks. "CONTROL" through training.
Most any dog can be "taught" to follow a track for a few hundred paces, even a 1000 paces through training. The dog that is capable of man tracking for mile after mile or even finding the lone scent in a woods after a half hour of finding nothing has to have a natural desire to do so.
Starting with FST can be a benefit to real world tracking. Starting with real world tracking/trailing/etc and then going to a formal FST type tracking can be a real PIA.......Trust me!

this is so helpfull!

And it does make sense to me what you guys say about skiping baits being good or bad dependingon the case.

With Harley, skiping baits is normal as he is so focus on the hunt. Harley track for his toy

The little that Dexter track, I know that if he does skip baits I moved on too fast for him. Dexter track for his meal.

I did the basic in the same way for both dogs as it was explain in a older thread.

I have no intention of competing, just to have fun.

 Quote: Bob Scott

... I'm also a believer that FST is about obedience.

And me.


I'm still hung up on ob not meaning that self-rewarding versus taught exercise is OK.

I get why some dogs do it, etc. But to me, an ob exercise is done the way we (the trainers) teach it.

Is there another one where it's fine if self-rewarding is OK even if it means the exercise as we teach it is modified to achieve it?

To me self-rewarding means unreliable. Can't have that in SAR, right?

I did teach it as an obedience exercise completely right from the beginning. Its just that she was a natural tracker & didn't NEED the bait in every FS, but she was still TAUGHT to check each FS. Even if I did put it in every FS..she didn't always bother to eat it. She was more intent on the hunt not eating the food. And this is a dog with very high food drive. I used to track early am, before they were fed....didn't matter to her. She'd eat a piece here & there. I didn't care if she got every piece that I put down....she checked EVERY FS EVERY time she tracked. That was where the OB came into it. She was happy to do any kind of tracks over all kinds of terrain with or without bait. She just loves the hunt.

I never saw THAT same kind of SERIOUSLY intense natural hunt drive in any of the other 3 w/l GSDs that I have had. She would have made a nice SAR dog if that had been my interest.

FST has to be taught as an OB exercise...because if you are going to compete the mechanics have to be perfect to score well. But there can be some wiggle room in how it progresses depending on the dog. I was far more exact in my OB with the other dogs...as they did not have the same self gratification in tracking that she did. One really liked to track, but not like she did & the other it was strictly an OB exercise.

I think that you have to consider the individual dogs motivation & work with that. Yes, it's an OB exercise...but it is more then that with some dogs.JMO

To be clear River is a beginning tracker and I'm a beginning track layer. River is 11 months this May so we've got plenty of time to do the basics and then move on to harder stuff with a trainer/mentor.

My experience with my dog is very similar to Anne's last post.

Because my first tracking experience came with a dog that had a high drive for it, it almost seems akin to bitework in my estimation. It seems that the actual act (tracking, biting) is self-gratifying, and the OB is layered over it, in order to demonstrate to those judging that the dog is under the handler's control, regardless of the state of drive that it is in. In order to build the OB on top of the behavior, it pretty much has to be taught as an OB exercise, but if the dog enjoys it, the act itself becomes part of the dog's reward for solid obedience.

This, of course, is only my opinion.