Saoirse is absolutely loving her K9 Nose Work® classes, both at - TopicsExpress

Saoirse is absolutely loving her K9 Nose Work® classes, both at home and in Maria’s classes. At home, Saoirse hovers by the door to the basement as soon as she comes in from her morning out. Clearly, she now knows that exciting activities, activities that she really values, occur down in the basement at my house every morning. The way that I handle initial training in my house is that I have a baby gate keeping Saoirse out of the training room as I shuffle the “hot box” around. However, Saoirse eagerly watches me as I refill the “hot box” and move it to a new location. And, as has happened with so many other dogs in my classes, Saoirse has learned to follow where the “hot box” is placed, even if I try really, really, really hard to “mask” where I set the “hot box” down. Sometimes I pick up three, even four, neutral boxes, and pretend to set the “hot box” down several times. And, I try other variations of this in an effort to “fool” Saoirse so that she hunts more for the box as opposed to racing right in to the “hot box” location from muscle memory. But, I rarely “fool” her. Clearly, she has learned to “lock onto” the “hot box” when I pick it up and to not lose track of it as I try to shuffle things around. This just goes to show how intelligent, how sentient, our dogs really are!! And so, at home, Saoirse rarely loses track of the “hot box.” And, one can see in this video that she nails the “hot box” virtually every time despite Maria’s efforts to direct Saoire’s attention to other boxes by tapping them or moving other neutral containers. Some instructors might say at this point to not let her “look” when I am placing the “hot box” and, for sure, as training progresses it is important that the dog not watch where the “hot box” is placed so that they start to develop that “internal responsibility” of searching in the absence of a visual prompt. (And sometimes it is really a struggle to not let a dog “cheat by looking” as the dogs definitely know what is going on out on the floor when the instructor is re-setting a hide and they really want to watch!). But, I am happy that Maria still has the dogs watching in this third week so that the dogs gain clarity of what is expected of them as opposed to them having to “wonder” what is going on, and that they start to develop that positive expectation that a hide will always be out on the floor to find, AND that they will always be successful. Equally important, allowing the dog to watch in these foundation classes creates DRIVE to get to source. By allowing the dog to watch, we are conditioning those “neural pathways” to fire in the way we want the dog to work – which is with eagerness, enthusiasm, focus, and willingness to try. And THAT is what foundational classes should be striving to condition into their dogs. So, thank you, Maria, for helping me to condition that into my pup!!