The trinity of tracking
This is a long post. It started out being about tracking this weekend, and ended up being about how my philosophy about tracking continues to evolve and grow. So as I finished typing, I decided to add this 'conclusion' at the beginning of the post, instead of at the end. Tracking is one of those 'sports' that becomes a passion. And the longer I am at it, and the more dogs I train, the more I learn. I have now been tracking since 1990, and have trained nine of my own dogs, plus coached countless students over the years. The one thing I can tell people for sure, is never believe you know everything there is to know about tracking!
I hope you enjoy these ramblings. I used subtitles to try to break this up a bit. Watch for some photos and maps to be added over the next few days.
Back to tracking, and evaluating where I am at
I was out twice with Caden and River this week. I can't believe the temperatures - hovering between minus 10 and plus 1 C (0 Celsius = 32 F). I had a heads'up that I might meet a local Schutzhund trainer (and a very good one at that) for some tracking on Monday. So I decided I should go out to see if Caden remember his early SCH tracking lessons.
I am a fanatic about planning and goal setting, so as I was out on the weekend, I spent a lot of time thinking about how I got to where I am - and where am I going? To know how to train my dogs I need to have clear goals and timeframes.
Caden was 6 months old last July when I had the privelege of attending a Wallace Payne SCH seminar hosted by the Thunder Bay Schutzhund Club in northwestern Ontario. Check for the links to this club, and to Wallace Payne's website in the sidebar menu under 'Handy Links.'
I found Wallace Payne to be one of the best tracking clinicians I have ever worked with. To be honest, it was a very pleasant surprise to find out similar our view of tracking are.
I think that we are all guilty of become narrow-minded about our sport. I confess to spending many years being critical of SCH tracking and viewing it as harsh and 'stylish.' I was a bit of a tracking snob over the idea that CKC (or AKC) style tracking permitted a dog the freedom to explore scent in a more natural way. I also felt my method of training was far more motivational and less compulsion-based (i.e., force training).
Over the years however, I found I wanted a dog that was going to have more working drive. I don't say this in any way to criticize one dog I have worked with. We all know that dogs are a product of our training.
River is so confident on non-veg now! River learned to track the traditional way - on veg only. For her TDX, she learned to cross roads without really tracking on the road. One of the biggest challenges I had in urban tracking was to convince River that when we went from veg to a parking lot, she should not look up and run across. Now I am convinced she likes urban better than field tracking. It's interesting. She whines in parking lots the way my old dogs whined on gravel roads in the country.
My current UTDX-ready German Shepherd River is the best dog I have ever worked with, and that is very likely because I have fine-tuned my training and expectations and she has benefitted from that. She and I are such a team - and I like to use a completely loose line on her. She knows her job and works very hard at finding the track. In urban tracking it is nice to have a dog that will work this way. I am trying to keep River fresh, happy and confident in her tracking, and will be looking for some urban tests for her to try for the final level of tracking in Canada and hopefully a Tracking Championship.
Learning from mistakes
Dogs are our best teachers! I made some errors when I first trained River in urban tracking. I did not set the boundaries very clearly, thinking that in urban tracking a dog will probably go all over hell's half acre to find the scent, and I should let her do that. I accidentally allowed her to follow scent drift and parallel the primary track. She became frantic at times looking for the track. This made me realize I was doing something wrong. I emailed people I respect, to ask for advice. The people who really helped me were people with CT (Champion Tracker) dogs, who had been successful in one or more VST tests (a UTDX is comparable to the AKC VST test). The people who made the most sense to me said that even on a hard surface - keep her close to or on the primary track. Another great piece of advice was to lay tracks in big parking lots where she would not be pulled over to any veg edges.
Sure enough, I began to keep River in check. I worked with a friend and we experimented with putting a lot more articles on the track, to keep our dogs more track-focused. I spent more time laying long legs alternating with complex patterns in industrial parks full of buildings and parking lots. River seemed to be relieved that I was giving her more clarity. And over time, she became more and more confident - finally to the point of cheerful and cocky - on non-veg surfaces. When I saw this happen I gave her back more control and watched her bloom as an advanced tracking dog! Finally, we earned our UTD - and surprise - we were really READY.
The trinity of tracking
Last summer, the universe converged on three key tracking concepts for me.
The first was to read Steve Ripley's book Making Scents of the Urban Jungle where Steve emphasizes that we should NEVER follow our dog unless they are ON the track (in training, when we know where it goes). Steve will allow the dog to explore and think but will not follow unless the dog is right back ON the track. So knowing what your goal is, and training right is the first part of this trinity.
The second thing to happen for me was attending the Wallace Payne Schutzhund clinic, where Wallace showed how to start a dog the SCH way, by ensuring the dog is nose-down on each footstep - using praise and motivation - and building in minor "blocks" where you verbally or physically prevent your dog from every going off the primary track. So proper praise, motivation and correction (!) are also part of the trinity. Certainly there was a day when the word "correction" was never mentioned in the same sentence as 'tracking' but I hope you realize that by correction what we are really doing is SHAPING BEHAVIOUR.
Three is a magical number so I have a lot of faith in this "trinity of tracking." The third thing that happened was Caden. I purposefully chose Caden from his strong herding and working lines because I needed to learn more about working with drive. Jet and Ted have shown me what it is like to have dogs with a strong desire to work work work.
Jet was the first dog I trained by starting her right away on all surfaces. With each new dog, I learn new ideas. In this photo she is on the last leg of her successful TD - the only dog to pass that day in high windgusts, on a track that had aged to just over one hour old.
In addition, I admire my friend Karen Boyes' Aussies Jasper and Penny who are both Tracking Champions - and I love their stick-to-it determination and decided I wanted some of that for my next tracking dog! Jet is much like this when she tracks, but now that we are in Alberta, Jet is a stockdog first. So Caden would be my new tracking dog.
I have found that a dog with such a strong working drive is very different to train and handle. I tried to teach Caden the way I have taught my other dogs to track, and he was pulling me onto my knees and dragging me without mercy. Hence, the Schutzhund Seminar! I went to the Thunder Bay SCH Club for help in handling this ball of wire! It was then that I realized that when you have a dog with so much drive - it is not only possible, but important, to use more control in your training. But, more on drive later.
Caden started as a pup on all surfaces just like Jet did. But, I also make sure to keep him focused on the primary track and don't let him make mistakes in training. I try to keep him calm and focused, so that his confidence and belief in himself will stay strong. Later - much later - he will be introduced to more complex ideas and problem solving.
So what is the third part of the tracking trinity? It is knowing what your own dog is made of - the dog! What are your dog's drives and behaviours and how do you work with them?
Never stop learning!
When you decide to think out of the box, stop being a tracking snob, or to open your mind to new ideas - it is amazing how much more there always it out there to learn.
What I have learned from my SCH friends is that you bring the dog's drive into low gear so they can learn in their "calm" brain. The dog is rewarded by being allowed to go into high gear. In this way, your dog learns to basically control his own drive while he works.
I felt enlightened, and inwardly embarrassed for my previous criticisms of the sport of Schutzhund. That is not to say that it is all roses, because as in any sport - there are people who train in extremes. I have been fortunate to meet people who have been very in tune with a dog's behaviour and who care very much about their own dogs. Observing their dogs, I can see happy, goofy, very bonded dogs who love their masters...a good sign, I think!
Wallace Payne thought Caden showed a lot of early promise for Schutzhund and complimented his tracking at 6 months of age. He said that if I spent every day for three weeks training him to footstep track, he would never forget it. I was not quite that dedicated but I did spent the rest of the summer doing only footstep tracking. My friend Bob told me that I would find that Caden would have his nose down on every surface with this foundation.
In this photo, Caden is dead on his track last month. I can see the benefits of his early SCH foundation paying off in our tracking now.
Last fall and this winter, I have put Caden in harness to play around with CKC style tracking. I am delighted to say he is the most nose down dog I have ever had! Last night I had a wonderful conversation with Erich Kunzel, a well-known CKC tracking judge and a life member of the GSD Dog Club of Calgary. He said that one could take the best of CKC and SCH to train a tracking dog.
Getting back to my weekend tracking training...
I took Caden and River out on Saturday afternoon to lay a footstep track for Caden and see if he would remember his foundations. It was a simple L-track on a snowy parking lot. I put him on a collar rather than on harness, and used the word "Such" (pronounced Sooook" - German for search), rather than my normal "find it!"
For the first few steps, Caden wanted to go to the right, in the direction of the wind. I 'blocked' him with my line and pointed to the track and wieners in the toes of my footsteps. Suddenly, he kicked right into footstep tracking as though he had never stopped tracking that way. At the corner, he did not take one step beyond - he paused, leaned over the corner with his body, turned his head and went down the next leg on rails! There was a jackpot of food and a tug waiting for him at the end. His reward is to tug -- and he always tugs me in any direction AWAY from the car, because he doesn't want things to end!
I left a glove there, and brought River out after taking Jet and Ted for a quick jaunt around some nearby trails (I multi-task when I train!). I wanted to see how she would handle the L compared with Caden. I decided to show her the scent pad and not have her on a line or harness so she would be free to do it her way.
River started off very nose down as well. Along the leg, she veered off with the crosswind, to go about 20 feet to the right of the track. But what I found very interesting, was that RIGHT AT THE CORNER River stopped dead, lifted her head and turned, to run back to the next leg, pick it up, and carry on to the glove. She was beautiful and confident. She did it because she loves to track and she loves to do it with me. She doesn't tug, and she doesn't play at the end. She RUNS for the car because she wants her cookies!
On Monday, I laid a zig-zag track for Caden to show the Schutzhund trainer I am working with how Caden works, and to allow him to critique my handling. Again - I am so humbled because coming from my background remember I always viewed SCH as the "harsher method." The biggest criticism this trainer had was that I DON'T PRAISE MY DOG ENOUGH! Well, hahahaha, shame on me. He also felt that my line handling, and blocking my dog the way I did, was too harsh at his level of training, and that I should try gentler verbal cues like 'no, no - such, such' instead of quietly just preventing Caden from taking a wrong step.
I must say that it was so great to be out and have someone else who is so knowledgeable critique me, because I know I don't get that enough as a tracking instructor. Caden did a good job though, despite his handler's flaws!
What is drive in tracking?
I would like to add a note about drives and tracking here. I have a strong conviction that every dog loves to track and the biggest drive that motivates a dog to track is its bond and relationship with the owner. A dog decides to follow a track FOR YOU - even if you use food or toys in the beginning to train your dog. Caden's additional working drive means he might be more determined and work a bit longer or harder - and this places a lot of responsibility on me as the handler to make sure to watch out for his well-being.
The Border Collies Jet and Ted also have a ton of working drive - and there are many stories out there about Border Collies who will work even if they are suffering from heat exhaustion...without showing a sign until they keel over. It is the owner's responsibility to look out for a dog like this. So with more work drive come different challenges.
And there are different types of drive, too. River has food drive. Ted has play drive! He LOVES to find articles and would rather fling them in the air than have food at the end of a track. In tracking, some dogs have hunting drive and some have prey drive. But in the end, it is still your relationship that makes them want to track when you ask.
I can guarantee that a couple of dogs who I have LOVED beyond words would have definitely shot me a dirty look if I asked them to work in hot weather, and one of them would probably have wandered off to find some shade and a stick. As a hint, his name started with a TH and ended with an ORN. If you can guess who that was - you will know how much I loved him even though he really didn't like tracking that much!
Did Thorn have drive? You bet. He loved me. So when he did track, it was all from his heart. Even though he never excelled at it, whenever he did a nice job I probably loved him more than I could ever describe because I knew he was pulling it out for me.
Here I am hugging Thorn in October 2006. He had just failed an attempt at TDX. Do I look mad or sad? No, I loved that dog. We went back to see where he failed, on our own, and caught a few photos. He had a little play session and made me laugh. We got rid of the bad vibes on that hill and put it behind us! Do I wish he would have passed? Of course! But he did many nice tracks in training, and that time spend together is worth more than anything.
And once tracking gets complex and tough - you can have a dog with all the working drive in the world, but if you have not treated him right, you are not going to have a great tracking dog. Wallace Payne told us this at his fantastic tracking seminar. I saw him nearly choke up when he talked about tracking and he told us it was his favourite of the three phases of the sport of Schutzhund. He did an off-lead track with his greatest competition dog at a SCH championship competition, and scored 99 / 100. And he told us that when his dog did tracked he knew it was for him - (click here for video - from his website http://www.schhcompetition.com/)
I am very excited that Caden is opening doors for me to learn new things in the sport of tracking. I feel funny calling it a sport, because for me, it is a passion and a lifestyle.
Thorn says - wouldn't you rather play with a stick? What did I learn from Thorn? To laugh and enjoy the journey.
I hope you enjoy these ramblings. I used subtitles to try to break this up a bit. Watch for some photos and maps to be added over the next few days.
Back to tracking, and evaluating where I am at
I was out twice with Caden and River this week. I can't believe the temperatures - hovering between minus 10 and plus 1 C (0 Celsius = 32 F). I had a heads'up that I might meet a local Schutzhund trainer (and a very good one at that) for some tracking on Monday. So I decided I should go out to see if Caden remember his early SCH tracking lessons.
I am a fanatic about planning and goal setting, so as I was out on the weekend, I spent a lot of time thinking about how I got to where I am - and where am I going? To know how to train my dogs I need to have clear goals and timeframes.
Caden was 6 months old last July when I had the privelege of attending a Wallace Payne SCH seminar hosted by the Thunder Bay Schutzhund Club in northwestern Ontario. Check for the links to this club, and to Wallace Payne's website in the sidebar menu under 'Handy Links.'
I found Wallace Payne to be one of the best tracking clinicians I have ever worked with. To be honest, it was a very pleasant surprise to find out similar our view of tracking are.
I think that we are all guilty of become narrow-minded about our sport. I confess to spending many years being critical of SCH tracking and viewing it as harsh and 'stylish.' I was a bit of a tracking snob over the idea that CKC (or AKC) style tracking permitted a dog the freedom to explore scent in a more natural way. I also felt my method of training was far more motivational and less compulsion-based (i.e., force training).
Over the years however, I found I wanted a dog that was going to have more working drive. I don't say this in any way to criticize one dog I have worked with. We all know that dogs are a product of our training.
River is so confident on non-veg now! River learned to track the traditional way - on veg only. For her TDX, she learned to cross roads without really tracking on the road. One of the biggest challenges I had in urban tracking was to convince River that when we went from veg to a parking lot, she should not look up and run across. Now I am convinced she likes urban better than field tracking. It's interesting. She whines in parking lots the way my old dogs whined on gravel roads in the country.
My current UTDX-ready German Shepherd River is the best dog I have ever worked with, and that is very likely because I have fine-tuned my training and expectations and she has benefitted from that. She and I are such a team - and I like to use a completely loose line on her. She knows her job and works very hard at finding the track. In urban tracking it is nice to have a dog that will work this way. I am trying to keep River fresh, happy and confident in her tracking, and will be looking for some urban tests for her to try for the final level of tracking in Canada and hopefully a Tracking Championship.
Learning from mistakes
Dogs are our best teachers! I made some errors when I first trained River in urban tracking. I did not set the boundaries very clearly, thinking that in urban tracking a dog will probably go all over hell's half acre to find the scent, and I should let her do that. I accidentally allowed her to follow scent drift and parallel the primary track. She became frantic at times looking for the track. This made me realize I was doing something wrong. I emailed people I respect, to ask for advice. The people who really helped me were people with CT (Champion Tracker) dogs, who had been successful in one or more VST tests (a UTDX is comparable to the AKC VST test). The people who made the most sense to me said that even on a hard surface - keep her close to or on the primary track. Another great piece of advice was to lay tracks in big parking lots where she would not be pulled over to any veg edges.
Sure enough, I began to keep River in check. I worked with a friend and we experimented with putting a lot more articles on the track, to keep our dogs more track-focused. I spent more time laying long legs alternating with complex patterns in industrial parks full of buildings and parking lots. River seemed to be relieved that I was giving her more clarity. And over time, she became more and more confident - finally to the point of cheerful and cocky - on non-veg surfaces. When I saw this happen I gave her back more control and watched her bloom as an advanced tracking dog! Finally, we earned our UTD - and surprise - we were really READY.
The trinity of tracking
Last summer, the universe converged on three key tracking concepts for me.
The first was to read Steve Ripley's book Making Scents of the Urban Jungle where Steve emphasizes that we should NEVER follow our dog unless they are ON the track (in training, when we know where it goes). Steve will allow the dog to explore and think but will not follow unless the dog is right back ON the track. So knowing what your goal is, and training right is the first part of this trinity.
The second thing to happen for me was attending the Wallace Payne Schutzhund clinic, where Wallace showed how to start a dog the SCH way, by ensuring the dog is nose-down on each footstep - using praise and motivation - and building in minor "blocks" where you verbally or physically prevent your dog from every going off the primary track. So proper praise, motivation and correction (!) are also part of the trinity. Certainly there was a day when the word "correction" was never mentioned in the same sentence as 'tracking' but I hope you realize that by correction what we are really doing is SHAPING BEHAVIOUR.
Three is a magical number so I have a lot of faith in this "trinity of tracking." The third thing that happened was Caden. I purposefully chose Caden from his strong herding and working lines because I needed to learn more about working with drive. Jet and Ted have shown me what it is like to have dogs with a strong desire to work work work.
Jet was the first dog I trained by starting her right away on all surfaces. With each new dog, I learn new ideas. In this photo she is on the last leg of her successful TD - the only dog to pass that day in high windgusts, on a track that had aged to just over one hour old.
In addition, I admire my friend Karen Boyes' Aussies Jasper and Penny who are both Tracking Champions - and I love their stick-to-it determination and decided I wanted some of that for my next tracking dog! Jet is much like this when she tracks, but now that we are in Alberta, Jet is a stockdog first. So Caden would be my new tracking dog.
I have found that a dog with such a strong working drive is very different to train and handle. I tried to teach Caden the way I have taught my other dogs to track, and he was pulling me onto my knees and dragging me without mercy. Hence, the Schutzhund Seminar! I went to the Thunder Bay SCH Club for help in handling this ball of wire! It was then that I realized that when you have a dog with so much drive - it is not only possible, but important, to use more control in your training. But, more on drive later.
Caden started as a pup on all surfaces just like Jet did. But, I also make sure to keep him focused on the primary track and don't let him make mistakes in training. I try to keep him calm and focused, so that his confidence and belief in himself will stay strong. Later - much later - he will be introduced to more complex ideas and problem solving.
So what is the third part of the tracking trinity? It is knowing what your own dog is made of - the dog! What are your dog's drives and behaviours and how do you work with them?
Never stop learning!
When you decide to think out of the box, stop being a tracking snob, or to open your mind to new ideas - it is amazing how much more there always it out there to learn.
What I have learned from my SCH friends is that you bring the dog's drive into low gear so they can learn in their "calm" brain. The dog is rewarded by being allowed to go into high gear. In this way, your dog learns to basically control his own drive while he works.
I felt enlightened, and inwardly embarrassed for my previous criticisms of the sport of Schutzhund. That is not to say that it is all roses, because as in any sport - there are people who train in extremes. I have been fortunate to meet people who have been very in tune with a dog's behaviour and who care very much about their own dogs. Observing their dogs, I can see happy, goofy, very bonded dogs who love their masters...a good sign, I think!
Wallace Payne thought Caden showed a lot of early promise for Schutzhund and complimented his tracking at 6 months of age. He said that if I spent every day for three weeks training him to footstep track, he would never forget it. I was not quite that dedicated but I did spent the rest of the summer doing only footstep tracking. My friend Bob told me that I would find that Caden would have his nose down on every surface with this foundation.
In this photo, Caden is dead on his track last month. I can see the benefits of his early SCH foundation paying off in our tracking now.
Last fall and this winter, I have put Caden in harness to play around with CKC style tracking. I am delighted to say he is the most nose down dog I have ever had! Last night I had a wonderful conversation with Erich Kunzel, a well-known CKC tracking judge and a life member of the GSD Dog Club of Calgary. He said that one could take the best of CKC and SCH to train a tracking dog.
Getting back to my weekend tracking training...
I took Caden and River out on Saturday afternoon to lay a footstep track for Caden and see if he would remember his foundations. It was a simple L-track on a snowy parking lot. I put him on a collar rather than on harness, and used the word "Such" (pronounced Sooook" - German for search), rather than my normal "find it!"
For the first few steps, Caden wanted to go to the right, in the direction of the wind. I 'blocked' him with my line and pointed to the track and wieners in the toes of my footsteps. Suddenly, he kicked right into footstep tracking as though he had never stopped tracking that way. At the corner, he did not take one step beyond - he paused, leaned over the corner with his body, turned his head and went down the next leg on rails! There was a jackpot of food and a tug waiting for him at the end. His reward is to tug -- and he always tugs me in any direction AWAY from the car, because he doesn't want things to end!
I left a glove there, and brought River out after taking Jet and Ted for a quick jaunt around some nearby trails (I multi-task when I train!). I wanted to see how she would handle the L compared with Caden. I decided to show her the scent pad and not have her on a line or harness so she would be free to do it her way.
River started off very nose down as well. Along the leg, she veered off with the crosswind, to go about 20 feet to the right of the track. But what I found very interesting, was that RIGHT AT THE CORNER River stopped dead, lifted her head and turned, to run back to the next leg, pick it up, and carry on to the glove. She was beautiful and confident. She did it because she loves to track and she loves to do it with me. She doesn't tug, and she doesn't play at the end. She RUNS for the car because she wants her cookies!
On Monday, I laid a zig-zag track for Caden to show the Schutzhund trainer I am working with how Caden works, and to allow him to critique my handling. Again - I am so humbled because coming from my background remember I always viewed SCH as the "harsher method." The biggest criticism this trainer had was that I DON'T PRAISE MY DOG ENOUGH! Well, hahahaha, shame on me. He also felt that my line handling, and blocking my dog the way I did, was too harsh at his level of training, and that I should try gentler verbal cues like 'no, no - such, such' instead of quietly just preventing Caden from taking a wrong step.
I must say that it was so great to be out and have someone else who is so knowledgeable critique me, because I know I don't get that enough as a tracking instructor. Caden did a good job though, despite his handler's flaws!
What is drive in tracking?
I would like to add a note about drives and tracking here. I have a strong conviction that every dog loves to track and the biggest drive that motivates a dog to track is its bond and relationship with the owner. A dog decides to follow a track FOR YOU - even if you use food or toys in the beginning to train your dog. Caden's additional working drive means he might be more determined and work a bit longer or harder - and this places a lot of responsibility on me as the handler to make sure to watch out for his well-being.
The Border Collies Jet and Ted also have a ton of working drive - and there are many stories out there about Border Collies who will work even if they are suffering from heat exhaustion...without showing a sign until they keel over. It is the owner's responsibility to look out for a dog like this. So with more work drive come different challenges.
And there are different types of drive, too. River has food drive. Ted has play drive! He LOVES to find articles and would rather fling them in the air than have food at the end of a track. In tracking, some dogs have hunting drive and some have prey drive. But in the end, it is still your relationship that makes them want to track when you ask.
I can guarantee that a couple of dogs who I have LOVED beyond words would have definitely shot me a dirty look if I asked them to work in hot weather, and one of them would probably have wandered off to find some shade and a stick. As a hint, his name started with a TH and ended with an ORN. If you can guess who that was - you will know how much I loved him even though he really didn't like tracking that much!
Did Thorn have drive? You bet. He loved me. So when he did track, it was all from his heart. Even though he never excelled at it, whenever he did a nice job I probably loved him more than I could ever describe because I knew he was pulling it out for me.
Here I am hugging Thorn in October 2006. He had just failed an attempt at TDX. Do I look mad or sad? No, I loved that dog. We went back to see where he failed, on our own, and caught a few photos. He had a little play session and made me laugh. We got rid of the bad vibes on that hill and put it behind us! Do I wish he would have passed? Of course! But he did many nice tracks in training, and that time spend together is worth more than anything.
And once tracking gets complex and tough - you can have a dog with all the working drive in the world, but if you have not treated him right, you are not going to have a great tracking dog. Wallace Payne told us this at his fantastic tracking seminar. I saw him nearly choke up when he talked about tracking and he told us it was his favourite of the three phases of the sport of Schutzhund. He did an off-lead track with his greatest competition dog at a SCH championship competition, and scored 99 / 100. And he told us that when his dog did tracked he knew it was for him - (click here for video - from his website http://www.schhcompetition.com/)
I am very excited that Caden is opening doors for me to learn new things in the sport of tracking. I feel funny calling it a sport, because for me, it is a passion and a lifestyle.
Thorn says - wouldn't you rather play with a stick? What did I learn from Thorn? To laugh and enjoy the journey.
Category Article Beginners tracking, Caden, German Shepherd, River, Schutzhund, urban tracking, Wallace Payne
