Maintaining your Alert for Nosework and Scentwork

[@darcidatta7245]

This was excellent! Keeping criteria consistent is key and essential to maintaining foundations. Great reminder and very clearly presented. I really liked the video clips.

[@brandonhunt1414]

This is great. Timing is everything and working through distractions.

[@anastasiacr]

Thanks guys!! SUPER helpful. I was struggling to understand why my dogs indication in barn hunt was varying.

[@arleenanderson9021]

I have worked with my dog from a very young age with scent training on my own. My dog is an Australian Cattle Dog and extremely high energy. I taught her to alert by sitting and looking at me. I wanted to go further with her training and signed up for a class. Scent 1 was required before going further. The instructor is wanting me to retrain my dog to a standing nose freeze. This seems to be confusing and frustrating my dog and she is starting to show less enthusiasm for scent work. Also going back to getting paid for just smelling the object and not searching for it, seems to be diminishing her enthusiasm for searching. Should I quit the class?

[@FordK9]

In my opinion, you should always advocate for what’s best with your dog. Even though a trainer may know more about a particular discipline they don’t know what’s best for your dog and some cases. In this particular case a type of indication, such as a focus is in many times a cosmetic desire by a handler or trainer. if your dog is becoming confused or losing motivation to do the Detection work then this is a far bigger issue than a cosmetic appearance of an indication. In some cases, it is important to create focus at the source of odor for clarity but if this is just for fun and for sport, there are tons of teams out there who do not have a focus type indication yet still do quite well within the program. Again, always advocate for what’s best for your dog and have an open conversation with your trainer.

[@arleenanderson9021]

@@FordK9 Thank you very much for your reply. This is what my gut was telling me. Early in my dog's training, in puppy class, I deferred to a trainer about something and I've regretted it ever since. I'm getting the same gut feeling about this issue.

[@mariwhitmer5377]

Very helpful!

[@matthewlewis8738]

Great information!!! Very helpful!!

[@drHera1739]

Great video. Thanks!

[@Pfinn582]

excellent video thanks!

[@claibournejackson3849]

Question: confirm if I understand this correctly… marking the behavior does not have to happen at the same time as paying. That is, it’s totally okay to mark the correct behavior and then pay some short time later? Do you have a marker which is separate from a release for reward?

[@heidibarsness9868]

Should you do an alert command for a trailing tracking dog? I am just thinking if they come up to an unalive person.

[@kelliegunnis6419]

My dog is now in advanced and excellent in ankc. I want to improve her duration when she indicates. She will sniff and I know she is close to finding the source by her smelling. She will often pause when she has found it but then she will look at me. Does it matter that she’s not freezing? Only because I know as this gets harder she may really need to indicate fora longer time. We used a y shaped plumbing tube with scent down the bottom to get them used to holding it. Should I go back to that to increase duration? Or leave it and reward when she’s on odour and get her to hold it for a few more seconds? Sorry for the amount of questions lol

[@BridgetBeck-ml6un]

How do you teach the actual hold / duration please? The videos showed great technique but how do I teach it to my dog? Thanks

[@FordK9]

Hello, we actually cover that and much more in our Block 1 online class at www.fordk9.com

[@sodawild]

I teach my dogs that the mark (click, Yes, whistle) ends the behavior. They don't have to maintain criteria after the mark. Do you feel this is an issue?

[@FordK9]

@@sodawild that is the exact definition of a terminal bridge (aka) Conditioned Reinforcer… once signal happens behavior ends and reward delivered even if delayed due to distance to location of reward etc.

[@sodawild]

@@FordK9 yes, agree. But the take away from this video is that the dog should maintain alert response even after the mark and should wait there for reward. I'm not seeing issues with my dog breaking the response after I mark. Early in train I would try to be close to the dog when I marked so the reward would follow quickly. Now that the dog understands the game I don't need to be close. She will come to me for reward or meet me as I come to her. Works for us.

[@FordK9]

@@sodawild I think the misunderstanding that you’re having is we’re not saying the word alert as a marker. The word alert is for the handler to notify the judge. They found the odor but many do not use this as a marker word or a terminal bridge release. So what we are meaning is if you say alert and the dog breaks away prior to you giving your terminal marker whatever word you use yes click, etc. the dog needs to go back until released if it were to break away when you said the word alert, the dog needs to maintain its position until released by the Terminal bridge if that’s what you’re using

[@lynnmckinney7376]

Are they scored on how long they hold the alert?

[@FordK9]

Depends on what program you’re competing in