Nikon’s sister Pieka is so good at nosework, we decided to give it a try. This is my new “sport that we can do indoors during the winter”. My last sport like that was flyball and now we are competing almost once a month so we’ll see what becomes of this nosework gig. Jaime and Pieka have been helping us a lot. The class we are taking uses a very different approach than what would be intuitive to me, I won’t say it’s wrong but it’s geared toward a different type of dog and handler. With my instructor’s blessing, we’re going a bit ahead of our class and following a similar protocol to what Pieka is doing because it just makes more sense. There’s an ORT in Michigan in April. Now I’m new to nosework but if there’s one thing I’ve learned already it’s that if you drive less than 12 hours for an ORT or trial you are lucky, so with one only an hour away we just have to cram as best we can! An ORT is a test where the dog demonstrates they know the odors used in nosework trials. It’s sort of like doing a BH before a SchH1.
Anyway, the first step is making the connection between the odor and the reward. Traditional nosework trainers will “pair” the food and the odor by putting food ON the odor. That just seems strange to me and having a dog like Nikon that enjoys “shaping” (I set up a choice and then reward him for making the right choice, upping the difficulty as it becomes clear he knows what I want) my first step is to hold a handful of food and the container with the odor (birch) in the other hand. When he sniffs/nose-touches the odor, I mark the behavior and move the treat to him. Kinda boring but pretty important.
After a few sessions of building an association of birch = treats, we start with something a bit more complicated. There are three containers, one tin with the odor, one empty tin (to proof the dog indicating the odor, not the tin) and one of the containers I had eaten out of before we trained as an added distracting. This video proves it was a bit too much. Nikon is pretty easy to distract off the odor with food (but he will go back to it) and he also falsely indicates the empty tin. When that happens I just don’t reward because he’s really not “wrong”. For the past four years he’s been trained to find and down on items with my scent on in (for tracking) so we’re still working on cue-ing nosework vs. cue-ing tracking.
At this point I am working proofing Nikon staying with the odor while I distract him by moving around the room (and he knows I have food in my pocket so he wants to go with). Since the containers on the ground proved challenging because of his association with tracking, we actually jumped ahead a bit to hiding the odor using small magnetized tins.
So interesting! Love watching this silent movement and I cheer him on as he goes!
Love watching Nikon…he is such a hunk!! The videos are awesome:)
Lies, thank you so much for sharing this with us. I know it takes time to put this together, I appreciate you sharing your latest Nikon adventure with us! It is so cool when he picks up the scent and then figures out where it is coming from. Nikon is such a good boy! I know have no doubt that you and Nikon will rock-it come April!
This is really impressive. It makes me want to take up nosework with Batman again. Thanks for sharing, Lies!
I love the way he wags his tail while he’s working!
Lies and Nikon look great! I am happy to have another A-T dog doing NoseWork!
I always love watching Nikon work, especially at Flyball (so exciting!), but this is probably among the most important work our dogs can do. I play around with homemade applications of the activities I see you all doing, but it’s all just for our mutual fun and enjoyment, rather than competitive, but still so much fun! By the way, I didn’t know that Pieka and Nikon were siblings! I’ve been following Pieka’s success with nosework, too.
Lies, I’ve noticed some minor fur loss on the margins of Dutch’s ears. Initially, I saw thinning of hair and unevenness when he sat with light behind him. Now, it’s a bit more pronounced, but it doesn’t bother him at all, and the insides of his ears are immaculate and unblemished. I was searching online for answers, and discovered that there are many theories out there, but no solid reason. Then, I accidentally came across your post regarding Nikon’s ears on communitydog.com. It looks like Dutch has the same thing that Nikon has going on! While it’s not so pronounced (yet), I can see that it is the identical problem. Is it Canine Ear Margin Dermatosis? Have you found a treatment for it? It has been very cold here this past winter in the Berkshires, and the humidity is very low in the indoor climate of our home. Perhaps that’s a factor; I don’t know. We are going to the vet this afternoon, but, like the other dogs, I doubt there will be any fungus, etc. found. We look forward to your reply. Thanks!