It’s Bears birthday Nov 8 he is 4 now. Happy birthday to his brothers Mr. Tanner and Kodiak (see eye dog)!
Bear gave me a TR2 score of 90 Sunday Nov 6 on a windy day! I think Bear is going to go far in tracking he is a very good tracker
This is from a friend of mine who is very active in tracking with her Standard Poodles. I have not shared her Poodle News reports on the blog in the past, but with so many people interested in tracking I thought there might be some interest reading the “Poodle News.”
Keith Michael in Midland, MI is offering dog training classes free of charge! Keith is the owner of Alta-Tollhaus Ilea TD, CD ( I-litter Ricco x Allie). Keith is an expert dog trainer and educator and truly cares about the dogs, which is why he is offering his classes for no fee.
Top-Dog website:
A very amazing brag…. my friend Maddie competed at the Marshall AKC obedience trials this past weekend with her Golden Retriever Ginny. Maddie and Ginny earned OTCH points earning her OTCH – Obedience Trial Champion—OK not just her OTCH but Ginny’s TENTH OTCH!!!! Yes 10 times over OTCH on the same dog. Just amazing! Congratulations to Maddie and Ginny!!!
Since the rest of this post is about kira, allow me to share this picture of Kira taken at the Capital Area Schutzhund Club Schutzhund trial, where Kira earned her schutzhund 3 title:
Now for Kira’s story and her first experience with AKC.
About to toss out the junk mail, including a AKC premium list for an upcoming dog show, but before tossing it, I pull it out and open it. It was for the upcoming Battle Creek Kennel Club and the Holland Kennel Club shows. Three days of shows in Marshall, MI just a few minutes from my home. Not just breed shows but they were also offering obedience all three days. I pause, look at the clock the entries are due today at noon and it is now 11:45 am. If I enter this will give me two and half weeks to brush up on AKC rules and practice the AKC obedience exercises Kira has never done. So I plug the phone into he computer so I have a good online connection and enter Kira in all three obedience trials.
Two weeks later, it is Thursday night, the first trial is tomorrow. Have we practiced or trained once? No not once. It has been about 10 years since I last competed in AKC with a dog for a CD. I flip through my memory trying to recall the AKC Novice exercises and more importantly to ascertain which exercises Kira will not be familiar with. She has never done a group-sit stay or a group-down stay. Kind of screwed on practicing that one at the last minute, especially with other breeds. In schutzhund Kira has done the out-of-motion sit, but not the sit-stay per se as done in AKC. So we do a 1-minute sit-stay and then we do a 3 minute down stay. No problem with either of these, she has the concept down. Now the AKC stand-for-exam, she has done a moving stand, but never had to do a stand-stay while a person goes over her. Alone in my building with just her and me, no problem, however, Kira is very social, someone walking up to her to touch her she is going to think it is a love fest. OK what else will be new and different for Kira? Oh yeah the about turns…gotta find out if the German-style about-turn is acceptable or not. Can she do an about-turn just moving to the right? We give it a try, yep no problem. OK, can’t think of anything else. Five minutes of training before three days of trials that should be good. That is 5 minutes more training then we did for the entire month prior to her schutzhund 3! 
My goal just to qualify all three times earn our AKC CD and not embarrass myself, Kira, or the breed.
We get to the showgrounds with plenty of time to find someone to test the stand-for-exam. I find a willing volunteer that isn’t afraid of a big GSD that could potentially lick them to death. I stand Kira, walk 6 feet away, my volunteer approaches Kira to touch her on the head shoulder, back and croup. As they get near her she is wagging her tail and steps toward them to meet them, obviously social time. So a little explaining to Kira that this is not meet-and -greet time and she must not move. Being the brilliant dog she is, she says, “OK got it.”
Our turn is up. I make a major mistake on …yep… an about turn, big points off for that one, handler error is the killer. Kira is slightly off-center on her recall, and a few other minor points off here and there and we finish her first CD leg with a 195 (out of 200) and a first place. Next day and next trial. I decide to be very clever and put some napkins in my pocket so I can wipe the sweat off my face during the long sit and down stays. Becasue it is in the 90′s and the building has no air or ventilation the sweat is profuse, I reach in my pocket and pull out my napkins, wipe my face and return the napkin to my pocket. At the very end the judge goes down the line and tells each of us if we qualified or not, she comes to me and informs me she deducted points for putting my hands in my pocket. Apparently this is a double cue/command….? News to me, but maybe it is if you train with food and keep food in your pockets. The judge also says to me with a big smile on her face, and “I see the cheese in your hair.” Very confused I start groping my hair for cheese. I leave the ring still groping my hair, and go up to my friend Maddie and ask her if I have cheese in my hair. Her response to me is “you don’t train with food.” Ohhhhhhh the light went on in the little pea brain. I was being accused of cheating? This was upsetting, one because I do not use food at all when training Kira and two I don’t have that much hair to hide anything in it! Instead of rewarding/training with food Kira works for her ball. I have tried training her with food and she gets bored and lazy. Despite the judges comment we still Q’d and Kira got another first place. Sunday, I think, was free from handler errors. During the long stays I never put my hands in pocket and let the sweat run in my eyes, I barely breathed. Day 3 another qualifying leg for Kira, another first place, and her first AKC title “CD” companion dog. Kira is something special! Her new name and titles: UCH V Quellie vom Kirschental schH3 KKL1a LBZ CD
Karen Sessions took this photo of Kira and I during training about a year ago.
Since we did not get to run Via, 8 months old O litter puppy, in Rally Sunday afternoon, the Kidlet and I took her tracking. After the last track was run, Via (Allie-Xbox) and the Kidlet took a walk in the field and played their version of the two toy game with an empty water bottle and a tug toy.
I spent that time talking to a local police officer who stopped to watch us work on tracking. We talked quite some time about tracking, starting puppies in agility, local positive dog training resources for kids and the harsh methods that his department uses to train their 4 legged officers. He said that several officers have gotten bitten by the department’s dogs both at work and during leisure time! He has a 10 year old daughter and a 12 week old lab that he’d like to get involved in something, put wants it to be with positive, motivational training.
The tracks on the chart are not to scale but are in the correct areas of the field.
Date: 04/17/2011
Day: Sunday
Time: 12:30 pm (for the laying of the first track. Both were ran as soon as they were lain. The first track was ran two times, one after the other)
Activity: Tracking training, short grass
Location: Rose Park, 14250 Judicial Rd, Burnsville, MN (Rose Park is a 12-acre community park located on the south side of County Road 42 just east of the intersection with Rosemount Drive. It is a good place to return to because it has short, medium and long grass areas as well as a sandy baseball infield.)
Weather: Partly Sunny (mostly cloudy)
Temp: 35.6 °F
Humidity: 40%
Wind: Light (16.34 MPH North West)
Tracklayer: handler for track 1 and the Kidlet for Track 2 (dog was crated out of sight in the car while track was laid.)
Track length: 30 paces / 70 paces (child lain) with the wind blowing across the track from the west. (Track 2 was lain west of track 1)
Environment/conditions: Soccer field, short grass, few cross tracks.
Distractions: Person, the dog’s child, was following us. The constant passing of cars on Route 42 in the direction that dog was heading on the track about 100 yard away to the north was a background distraction.
K9 Status: Via was crated for about 5 hours before tracking.
Objectives: Learning doesn’t have to be out of a book or at a desk. The Kidlet, age 9, learns to put down toe to heel tracks for Via. She has lain AKC style tracks and has been the “victim” for SAR trailing dogs in the past.
Here is a short video of the young tracklayer at work.
We did not use any flags. There was a small scent pad and a plastic start article at the beginning and a plastic dog bowl on pace at the end of the track. These items were just used to mark the track for the humans.
Track 1:
The track 1 was laid for 30 paces heel to toe with deli chicken in each toe.
The track was not aged. I laid the track in a straight line between start and end item. Via tracked in her Halti no pull harness with a 4 foot lead attached to the ring on the back of the harness so the no pull feature was disengaged.
Via ran the track without lifting her head BUT did not stop to eat very much of the meat. She even tracked my loop back to the car. So we ran the track twice before I re-crated her and watched the Kidlet put down the second track.
Track 2:
The track 2 was laid (mostly straight) heel to toe with Bil-Jac Little-Jacs moist treats in each toe for what measured to be 70 of my paces.
The track was not aged. Via tracked in her Halti no pull harness with a 4 foot lead attached to the ring on the back of the harness so the no pull feature was disengaged.
Via started tracking to the track before getting to the scent pad but got very distracted by the traffic about 20 paces in to the track. She lifted her head and watched the cars for about 20 seconds. I just waited her out. She put her head back down and did not lift her head from the track until the end. She DID NOT track the kid’s foot steps back to the car like she does mine.
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