River's Urban Track - Mostly non-veg and she did great

I have enough material to blog for a week! I tracked with all four dogs this afternoon. It took 2 hours to do that, and 3 hours to upload the video! I would rather be tracking, but it is so worth it for me to relive moments on the track and think more about what happened. I will talk about River's track tonight. Over the next few days I'll post about the other dogs. Everyone did a great job, Caden did a short nv leg, Ted did a nice job, and Jet blew my mind today, doing a fanastic track, even with a sore tooth. She is something else - and will be my next CKC urban dog.

Here is the map showing River's track - the parking lots are numbered to correspond with the video below. I laid River's first, then cut through the College to lay Jet's out front. Then I laid Caden's. I ran them in reverse order, so River's was 1.5 hours old, which could compare to an older rack in ideal weather. River's track was 540 m with about 200 veg and the rest non-veg.

First leg



Since last July I have been working on River's starts. Today I could see the fruit of my labours. I worked on just scent pads, and then just a short straight line from the start for nearly a month to encourage better focus. She casts too much and wastes energy which, at age 9, and in this heat, she simply can't afford to waste. A better start helps her remember the scent she is following and stick to it more closely. This retraining was done using the SchH footstep method. She will never be a footstep tracker, but it really did help.

First parking lot (of 3) and nv turn to first article



River cuts the corner and zeroes in on the sock


Crossing the second parking lot to turn on veg



Here River goes up onto a boulevard and works her way up to a left turn, to cross the road into the third parking lot. I placed some dried liver in strategic places for her along this track.

Turn on 3rd parking lot



At this point I wished I had brought water. It was only about 2 C but of course, a dog uses a lot of energy tracking, and she was showing it here. She did get a bit flustered on this parking lot. A student walked by and at one point she got sidetracked on his fresh scent. But she came back to turn between two concrete barriers - not where I went through, one too soon - then she goes over to where I passed through. She has the 'general direction' in her head, but is unfocused here for some reason, even seeing something and going to check it out. Thank heavens for a little piece of liver that really brightened her up.

This was definitely the low point of the track. If it had been a test and I was nervous, I am sure this would be where we would be strugging. If I was checking out sites for test plotting, I would probably recommend an article here. I tried not to interfere too much today. River will work at it, she never quits. I have been stepping in a lot in the last few months and it is time for me to back off again and let her work it out.

From parking lot to wood chips



After checking the veg briefly, River focused right in on the wood chips and you can see her nose dip, a sign I watch for. We rarely track on this surface but it was not an issue, until she decides to go potty out of the blue. Knowing she was stressed a few moments before I almost wonder if it was because she had to go - even though she had ample opportunity before her track - it would explain that lack of focus. Hmmmm....


Going into the new open air garage and the 2nd article - metal




The garage was as interesting as I hoped! But there was a huge FAN blowing, which was not on when I checked it out a few nights ago. I have no idea if this impacted anything. I chose to put a metal article here, in a slight depression in the gravel. River KNOWS there is an article but she takes a few passes before she zeroes in on it! Again, lots of nose dips here. I was quite proud of her because she kept searching for it. I threw in some encouragement, which I would also do in a test.


From the garage to the end of the track

River cuts a corner again, following the curve of the pavement (I did an L to the right). She misses a small serpentine on the gravel, but backs up and catches it the second time on her own. As she is working, a student passes us. Earlier when I laid the track, he opened the locked door so I could cut through the building. River barely looks at people when she tracks. She crosses gravel and wire mesh, grass, and brick here to get to the final article. The entire track took her nearly 18 minutes.

Good Girl! You worked so hard!



Tomorrow: Jet's Urban track