Tall Grass, Standing Water
I took all three of my Poodles tracking this week. That was fun as I had to fit three crates in my truck. We met Joyce and her Goldens at a different location. When we arrived we saw surveyors in the fields marking off areas with flags, this is very upsetting because it is hard to find land to track on. These fields are not supposed to be developed for at least another three years, if they are markings with flags then it will probably be earlier than expected. This is area has very nice fields to track in and a lot of different cover for obstacles. The only drawback is it is very near a huge airport and the fields are right in the middle of the flight path, so a lot of loud jets going over our heads as they land.
We decided what we wanted for each of our dogs and started laying tracks. Joyce laid Ziggy's as she is working on TDX with him and knew what she wanted and it would be run last with the most aging. I laid Micah's on the other side of the road. Joyce wanted to test him with a full length track, so I made it about 475yds with 4 turns. There was a lot of tall cover as the fields had not been mowed in while, most of it was over 4' tall, but it was not so dense as the field where Joyce laid Ziggy's track. It had rained very hard all night so there was a lot of standing water on Micah and Ziggy's tracks.
After laying theirs we decided which of mine to lay, so Joyce headed to the opposite end of Micah's field to lay a track for Blueberry (the map will come later as I left it at home). After she laid Blueberry's we went off in another direction with Jasmine. Since she is just beginning I held her while Joyce laid some straight tracks in front of us. She would lay it and we would run it. She started with a 20yd track, then built up from there, 35, 45, and then 60 yds. Jasmine did very good keeping her head down and working it out. Joyce is really correcting me if I don't stop the instant my dog's head comes off the track or they drift off the line. I have been bad about moving with Chauncey and I think that is why we have so many problems now. Jasmine loved it and Chauncey was able to see us and it really made her jealous.
We ran Blueberry's track next. She started very well and kept her nose to the ground. Blueberry is a very serious tracker and takes me with her as she tracks. She works the turns very simply, a double check and she is off down the next leg. Due to the heavy cover she had to find her way around some large bushes that Joyce walked around instead of through. On the last leg we came to a definite change of cover, it went from tall, thick grass clumps to shorter, very dense weeds. Blueberry went back and forth in front of the new cover looking for a way around and then just plunged through and found the glove on the other side. Her track was about 300yds long and had aged for about 40 minutes.
Micah's track was next and it had been aging almost an hour. Micah started well and right after the 30yd flag was a car path that was driven over before and after I laid his track about 4 or 5 different times by the people surveying the fields. When Micah came to the car path, he went left and right a couple times and the crossed over to pick up the track on the following side. I wasn't sure how he would handle cross tracks that early, but he did fine. Once we got back to the truck Joyce reminded me that he has had cross tracks a couple times now, accidentally, with no problems. Micah did very well with his track and each time he came to a turn he would pick up the next leg and be pointing directly at the landmarks I picked out to lay the track. Water and tall bushes did not slow him down at all. He happily worked his way to the glove in nice time.
Joyce then headed off to another field to lay a track for Chauncey. We are not aging hers very long right now, but really focusing on turns, keeping her working and focused on the track. There were about 5 turns (again my map is at home) with 3 articles on the track. She started okay and then after the first turn she found article one halfway down the 2nd leg and really started working better. She worked the turns okay, but Joyce was very good at telling me to stop if she wasn't working. Sometimes it helps to have someone watching you and keeping you straight during training! Chauncey does not give a very clear signal when there is a turn, so we are working a lot of turns to help me read her better and help her give more signals. We finished the track and she found her glove. A much better effort on her part than last week.
Ziggy's was last to be run, in the tallest and thickest brush, and aged the longest (almost 2 hours). He started well and worked through the brush fine with no hesitation on going from shorter grass to tall thick grass. He found 2 of his articles, but missed the third one. He also had standing water and went right through it. Ziggy has been in 3 TDX tests so far, the first two he took the cross tracks and the 2nd one he missed his articles.
It turned out to be a nice day for tracking and even warmed up quite a bit. Not much breeze and it didn't rain on us even though the ground was wet. We did see a coyote that ran across the field Chauncey tracked in. He took off when the dogs barked at him. I will try to track some this week at home, but we won't meet up for another 2 weeks.
We decided what we wanted for each of our dogs and started laying tracks. Joyce laid Ziggy's as she is working on TDX with him and knew what she wanted and it would be run last with the most aging. I laid Micah's on the other side of the road. Joyce wanted to test him with a full length track, so I made it about 475yds with 4 turns. There was a lot of tall cover as the fields had not been mowed in while, most of it was over 4' tall, but it was not so dense as the field where Joyce laid Ziggy's track. It had rained very hard all night so there was a lot of standing water on Micah and Ziggy's tracks.
After laying theirs we decided which of mine to lay, so Joyce headed to the opposite end of Micah's field to lay a track for Blueberry (the map will come later as I left it at home). After she laid Blueberry's we went off in another direction with Jasmine. Since she is just beginning I held her while Joyce laid some straight tracks in front of us. She would lay it and we would run it. She started with a 20yd track, then built up from there, 35, 45, and then 60 yds. Jasmine did very good keeping her head down and working it out. Joyce is really correcting me if I don't stop the instant my dog's head comes off the track or they drift off the line. I have been bad about moving with Chauncey and I think that is why we have so many problems now. Jasmine loved it and Chauncey was able to see us and it really made her jealous.
We ran Blueberry's track next. She started very well and kept her nose to the ground. Blueberry is a very serious tracker and takes me with her as she tracks. She works the turns very simply, a double check and she is off down the next leg. Due to the heavy cover she had to find her way around some large bushes that Joyce walked around instead of through. On the last leg we came to a definite change of cover, it went from tall, thick grass clumps to shorter, very dense weeds. Blueberry went back and forth in front of the new cover looking for a way around and then just plunged through and found the glove on the other side. Her track was about 300yds long and had aged for about 40 minutes.
Micah's track was next and it had been aging almost an hour. Micah started well and right after the 30yd flag was a car path that was driven over before and after I laid his track about 4 or 5 different times by the people surveying the fields. When Micah came to the car path, he went left and right a couple times and the crossed over to pick up the track on the following side. I wasn't sure how he would handle cross tracks that early, but he did fine. Once we got back to the truck Joyce reminded me that he has had cross tracks a couple times now, accidentally, with no problems. Micah did very well with his track and each time he came to a turn he would pick up the next leg and be pointing directly at the landmarks I picked out to lay the track. Water and tall bushes did not slow him down at all. He happily worked his way to the glove in nice time.
Joyce then headed off to another field to lay a track for Chauncey. We are not aging hers very long right now, but really focusing on turns, keeping her working and focused on the track. There were about 5 turns (again my map is at home) with 3 articles on the track. She started okay and then after the first turn she found article one halfway down the 2nd leg and really started working better. She worked the turns okay, but Joyce was very good at telling me to stop if she wasn't working. Sometimes it helps to have someone watching you and keeping you straight during training! Chauncey does not give a very clear signal when there is a turn, so we are working a lot of turns to help me read her better and help her give more signals. We finished the track and she found her glove. A much better effort on her part than last week.
Ziggy's was last to be run, in the tallest and thickest brush, and aged the longest (almost 2 hours). He started well and worked through the brush fine with no hesitation on going from shorter grass to tall thick grass. He found 2 of his articles, but missed the third one. He also had standing water and went right through it. Ziggy has been in 3 TDX tests so far, the first two he took the cross tracks and the 2nd one he missed his articles.
It turned out to be a nice day for tracking and even warmed up quite a bit. Not much breeze and it didn't rain on us even though the ground was wet. We did see a coyote that ran across the field Chauncey tracked in. He took off when the dogs barked at him. I will try to track some this week at home, but we won't meet up for another 2 weeks.
posted by Kim at 6:07 AM
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