I have been struggling with this issue for the past 2 years, and sadly I have not been able to get anywhere.

I have an advanced scent exercise for which I need to train . The dog has to take a human scent from a piece of cloth and go check out a line up of other pieces of cloth and pick a cloth from the line up which has the same scent as the one it got in the first place.

This is not a scent I can imprint the dog on (like narcotics or explosives). The sample scent will be from a random person each time.

The key to solving this problem is for the dog to first understand that remembering the scent given to it first is the key to solving the problem at hand.

I dont know how to teach the dog the concept of remembering.

I have been struggling for a long time to teach this and it drives me up the wall.


Unlike tracking, there is no continous scent trail from the point where I give the scent and send the dog away for the search. So the dog has to remember the sample scent.


I can see my dogs making mistakes which clearly tells me that it does not remember the scent.

Lots and lots of people in the Crufts obedience do this exercise. It is called Class C - Scent discrimination (judge's scent with decoy ) . Sadly , I am not able to get any information.

I want to know how to train this exercise using the clicker method. Using the clicker/marker method is essential as my dogs have a foundation of clicker training.

PLEASE HELP!!!

Here is a video of the dog performing the exercise at crufts

Please start watching from 15:16 onwards

Crufts class C scent

http://www.clickertraining.com/node/1121

CLICK N SNIFF - CLICKER TRAINING FOR SCENT DISCRIMINATION

Another book is "Clicker Training for Obedience" by Morgan Spector

Edited by David Winners (04/07/2013 01:19 PM)
Edit reason: eta

Become an instant expert in "clicker train scent discrimination"

We'll assume that posting a link to Google is meant to be humorous.

Absolutely! Lots of great info there with some very nice videos.

What about using a visual clue like a piece of brightly colored paper that you can fold smaller and smaller until you remove it altogether? It would give the dog more to work with and possibly help him come to understand that the scent he smells corresponds with the scent that has the paper next to it. Eventually it'd be phased out and ideally the dog would have started to rely more heavily on the smell and not the visual clue since the visual clue was starting to not be as noticeable.

Does the dog have to retrieve the scented article? If so then tie down any distraction scent the dog isn't supposed to retrieve.
Start with just the one scented item (untied) and add (at a distance) another distraction article. Slowly put it closer to the required scent.
Add more distraction scents in a similar way.

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