Another Excellent Day for Tracking
The tracking test--the first for our local kennel club--went off without a hitch. We had two dogs pass--the first dog and the last dog. The first dog was a Briard and my understanding from the owner is that it's the first Briard in 15 years to get a tracking title. So, woo!! It did a brilliant job, took the turns like it was on rails, had a little bit of trouble on turn three, but worked it out, found the glove at the end and even picked it up and retrieved it to the handler. Lots of fun to watch and it was on a track that was easy to see.
I took unusually bad pictures today, but here's a decent picture of the start of track one. Sadly, there are no judges, trackers, or dogs in this picture:
No one passed on tracks 2, 3, and 4, which was too bad as they were nice tracks. One dog got all the way to the last turn and then went left instead of right which is always heartbreaking.
The other passing dog was a smooth-coated collie, who was a slow and methodical tracker, but got the job done and found the glove (this wa the track with the deer graveyard, which had apparently been cleaned up overnight by a coyote or two)
The judges used the alternate track as a certification track and that dog did well enough to certify. This is a map of the alternate track, which I laid, one of the corners on this is actually wrong (I didn't draw the map) but, if it shows up, I thought it'd show people who are interested what a TD-level track can look like:
If you click through, there's a larger version.
I took unusually bad pictures today, but here's a decent picture of the start of track one. Sadly, there are no judges, trackers, or dogs in this picture:
No one passed on tracks 2, 3, and 4, which was too bad as they were nice tracks. One dog got all the way to the last turn and then went left instead of right which is always heartbreaking.
The other passing dog was a smooth-coated collie, who was a slow and methodical tracker, but got the job done and found the glove (this wa the track with the deer graveyard, which had apparently been cleaned up overnight by a coyote or two)
The judges used the alternate track as a certification track and that dog did well enough to certify. This is a map of the alternate track, which I laid, one of the corners on this is actually wrong (I didn't draw the map) but, if it shows up, I thought it'd show people who are interested what a TD-level track can look like:
If you click through, there's a larger version.