Search & Rescue Dogs

Hello all! I am curious to know your thoughts on how to encourage a dog to range more. She is still green and needs more nose time and confidence but I just wanted to ask if you'd share thoughts and ideas on how to help her commit to scent and go in. When we set up, we know where the misper is (I am in the US, is this short for missing person?)
Thanks all!!!

Rio

Hello Dutchie
Welcome to the Forum!

Yes, misper is 'missing person' - and I have similar problems with my dog! (6 year old English Springer Spaniel, what's yours?)

Once she's 'on scent' she's fast and keen, locates the misper, returns to alert me and then take me for the re-find, all in good style - but it's been difficult to get her to search thoroughly (before finding scent!) off the track to 25m. I have blamed this on the fact I spent the first 4 years of her life teaching her to walk next to me or behind me and NOT to run off into the woods!!

I find it helps if I do walk in with her, 'pushing' her in front of me (not physically, most of the time!) so that I am constantly crossing the path from one side to the other. Obviously this does slow down one's 'forward' progress, but the idea is once she has built up the confidence and the habit it will be easier for her to do that on her own whilst I stay on the track. It's been a bit slow, but we're getting there!

Stay patient and keep trying!

I actually run a boxer who has the opposite issue, when I send her to search she'll stick by but once she has scent, the next time I'll see her is when she gets back and is giving her alert. My teammate has a golden retriever and I think you touched on something........the handler is a very precise and "motivated" walker (we are working on getting her to slow down!). Been working her dog for about a year and I now wonder if she needs to just stop and let the dog pursue the scent without the dog worring about being left behind.....hhhmmm "pushing" and supporting the dog into scent to build confidence?? Hobbling the handler to slow down and support her dog into scent?? Just rambling on here........
Thanks!

Rio

Hi Rio

I'm having a very similar problem with my young dog (20 months) at the moment. She'll go maybe 80-100ft away but not more. Some of the reasons I put it down to
1. At around 12-15mths, she seemed to go a bit feathery on her recall, so I did a lot of recall work to bring her back under control, however, by doing so I realise I created a ranging issue. Obedience is fine but there's a thing of having too obedient a dog that they're too attached and afraid to leave you.
2. She doesn't seem to have the confidence yet to just 'go' and leave me, yet she is a very independent dog so I'm struggling to understand it. I'm doing a lot of general ignoring work at the moment to stop her paying attention to me so that she'll be more willing to leave.

So exercises I'm doing at the moment to try and bring this along.
1. Place a person at a certain distance away, let's say for example 100m away. Bring the dog on lead to where they should wind the person, when the dog winds and raises the nose, release and give the 'go find', on hearing the 'go find' the misper calls the dog. If the dog is moving towards the misper, the misper stops calling. If the dog stops, the misper calls the dog. Dog moves - misper goes quiet again (because the dog is doing what it should be doing, noise is interference). At the same time, the handler stays still while the dog is moving away from him to the misper so as to increase the range, if the dog stops and looks back at the handler, the handler moves instantly in the dog's direction so the dog sees the handler coming his way. The misper does all the work here. Finish the sequence as you usually do on the find. It takes a bit of getting used to and is all about timing. Repeat the exercise from the exact same locations, increasing the distance when appropriate. Treat this as a ranging exercise rather than a search exercise.

2. One I've heard that works but haven't tried yet, is you find a straight forest track, the misper gets in the car and calls the dog mad while driving away. As the car is still moving away, the handler releases the dog, misper gets out of the car and dives into the bushes calling the dog, finish as normal. Might sound mad I know but I've heard it works!!!You could use someone on a bicycle just as easily, just a quick way to create a lot of distance fast.

3. The other thing to be very aware of is yourself and how much you're 'talking' to the dog. Too many commands on a search can be distracting to the dog, be quiet and let the dog work.

4. I've started cycling with my dog now, great way of creating distance, yet she knows it's ok. We'll see how that works...

I would really appreciate any other ideas on this from people. I know if you've the right fantastic dog, ranging shouldn't be an issue but...

Good luck!

PS. Dutchie, in relation to your 'motivated walker' friend, is she walking ahead of her dog? Something I'm told you should never do, dog always works in front of the handler. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you said though.

Just a slight variation on the last answer:

Have the misper a distance away hidden / out of sight of the dog with the dogs reward, bring the dog out and get it ready to search, at this point the misper stands up calls the dog and makes it obvious it has the dogs toy, they then drop to the floor and the dog is released with only one word of command. In theory the dog will fly out to the misper, now gradually increase the distance. Once your happy with the distance decrease the noise / movement of the misper, the dog will have now learnt to range at distance but in a straight line. Start to now move the misper off to one side (up wind) so that the dog goes out in a straight line but then hits the mispers scent coming in at a right angle, this will also help the distance and teach it independence and to trust its nose.
Easy in theory but all dogs are different and there is no one method that suits all dogs, there will be a hundred methods of solving the problem its just finding which one.

Mike

Thanks Mike, I like variations! Looks like we had a breakthrough session today, thankfully. Were working on mountain lowland, steep hillside with heather.

Three runs doing the exercise I described above although only the first call was needed, she flew off.

Had a short break, then did what Mike suggested above. Put misper uphill about 300ft and off to the left, about 150ft in from the borderline. Wind blowing beautifully at right angle to the way up. One call from the misper at the start, she worked the way up, struck where I expected her to, job completed.

So definitely need to play around with different methods and see what works for the dog and help her build her confidence.

Now, maybe someone can help me. One thing I realised today, is that she loves and seems to have no problem going uphill, but for some reason she's not as enthusiastic about going to a misper downhill. I probably just need to work down hills more, but just thought it a bit unusual.

dmg,
My "motivated walking" friend does, at times range in front of her dog. We are working on that. She (handler) is just of the perosnality of very driven and if there is gridding to do, by gosh, gridding gets done! So, we are re-vamping her ideas of gridding to make sure the dog has thebest opportunity to catch scent. I like the idea of having the misper having the toy and presenting a few seconds before ducking down. I am hoping that once the dog gets confidence to leave the handler and the handler supports the dog going off, the ranging issue will work itself out.
Thanks to all!!!!!!!!

Rio

P.S. I will actually be in the UK next May! Maybe there is a chance to meet some of you

You are more than welcome to come along to training if you want to come to us. We are in Berkshire not far from London.

That would be fantastic! I'll be staying in Hutchin, not sure how far that is from Berkshire but I am planning to rent a motorcycle to buzz around on (and remember to stay on the left side of the road!).
I tried to uplaod a picture of my pup but to no avail.

Rio

Rio are you sure that's not Hitchin in Hertfordshire UK
if so it is about 65 miles from our training area