Anybody active in this? I have a new, bloodhound puppy that I would like to begin training for man tracking. She has some excellent working dog lines, so…
Any advice, groups I should be talking to?
My other bloodhound was a rescue and had way too much baggage to do much more than family tracking, but man, what a nose and problem-solving, persistence these dogs have.
So enamored with this breed.
I am curious too. One of the dogs I walk is very focused on tracking scents as we walk so I have been playing with that a bit but don’t really know what I am doing. So far I have been hiding treats and giving the command “find it.” He loves that game but don’t know if that is really teaching him anything.
Yeah, we are, also, very un-educated when it comes to the actual “training” used for sar. My girl is very, very scent-oriented, much more so than my rescue hound, and she is only ten weeks old. :). I don’t think she uses here eyes for much of anything:O,
What a super thing to do with your dog. I have always admired S&R dogs. It must be so rewarding to work as a team with your dog and perform such a great service (although in some circumstances it must be very heartbreaking too).
I hope you and your puppy turn out to be an awesome team. Keep us updated on your progress. 
My husband is very active in SAR. He has both a live scent dog and a human remains dog and is a member of the FEMA Task Force Team, Texas Task Force 1 and the local fire department’s team.
What area are you guys in and I’ll try to locate a good training team for you to consult.
What you do is go meet with a team and learn a bit more about it by helping them out playing victim and other things. Then, if you think your dog might have what it takes, you arrange an evaluation of the dog. If he passes the evaluation, you will likely be invited to begin training with the team and working towards you testings.
There are certifications that YOU must pass and that your dog must pass in order to be on a real SAR team.
It is a lot of fun, but does require a very heavy time commitment. You will likely be training at least 3 days a week. It consumes your life, but is very rewarding.
My husband is called out by fire departments and police agencies regularly with his human remains dog and, of course, they were deployed during the hurricane in our area a couple years ago and during the wild fires in Texas.
Sonesta that sounds awesome! I don’t have any advice or knowledge on SAR but I read the book The Scent of the Missing about a woman and her experience training her golden puppy for SAR. It was a really good read and very interesting. The author had to do lots of training herself, with charting, including lots of shadowing handlers and dogs. I recommend the book!
A couple of friends of mine are active in SAR - I know that their dogs work on air scenting, rather than following a specific person’s trail. (I “get lost” for them for training sometimes!)
As Sonesta said, it takes a pretty heavy time commitment, much of which is doing things to help the team in general, not only working with your dog.
For a less “intensive” way to play with your dogs’ scenting abilities, I have friends who are taking canine nosework classes with their dogs, and they all agree that the dogs love it! I watched them practice for an upcoming test and it looks like fun!
http://www.funnosework.com/home.html
Try this for a start. OP, don’t know your location but I see that Laurierace is in MD:
Both PA and VA have very well respected Task Force SAR groups. You could also contact them (easy to find with a Google search).
In my case it isn’t my dog but a client’s that I walk. I am just trying to make our walks more fun. No way I could do any real training with him but would like things to work on anyway.
If just for fun, then nosework: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJxG--4t3SU
http://www.amazon.com/Fun-Nosework-Dogs-2nd-Ed/dp/1888994037
http://www.thedogtrainingsecret.com/blog/nose-work-1-introduction-nose-games/
My daughter out in Monterey, CA just started SAR classes with this gal. http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/08/us/cnnheroes-mary-cortani-interview/index.html
DD has a 17 month old German Shepard who had a base of solid obedience work and socialization under his belt before joining the class. She and her dog are having a blast in classes and she looks forward to being helpful for someone down the road. My own Pop who had dementia, obviously her Grand Dad, walked off and we found him the next day, deceased. In a perfect world she’ll be able to be on a team that keeps another family from going through that nightmare; that is her goal.
So sad. I do hope your daughter’s dog is successful in preventing a tragedy.
TV coverage of my DH and his dogs (and those of other FEMA handlers) yesterday. My DH is the one one hiding in a hole and rewarding the black lab for finding him. His dog, Scrappy, is the yellow lab (not the whitish lab) that is sticking his head in the hole with the reporter.
http://www.abc40.com/Global/category.asp?C=143385&clipId=8015609&topVideoCatNo=85381&autoStart=true
Great pair!
I have an ACD with an awesome nose. I got her at 9 months old (I’m her fourth owner!) and it was pretty obvious that she had a good sniffer. I looked into SAR but the time and monetary commitments were too much for me. Our local SAR requires daily at home training (must fill out a daily training log to prove the dog is “up to speed” in case something goes wrong and someone tries to sue :no: ) plus one Saturday every four weeks for group training. All expenses for training, travel, and gear come out of your own pocket. That was nine years ago.
Last year I discovered nosework and signed this dog up for it. She excelled in the class and we had a lot of fun.
Do you want search and rescue, or do you want sport tracking? Two different things.
(Tracking is the most fun I have ever ever had with my dog. Cannot recommend it highly enough.)
Sorry that it took so long for me to get back. I do not have internet at home and have to find the time at work to reply.
My girl and I are going to do man tracking, or pet tracking. My goal is to be a go to person for lost dogs/cats/horses, etc… We lost one of our dogs a few months ago when the gate was not closed properly and she slipped out. Even chipped, tagged, multiple lost and found ads with a substantial reward, door-to-door, findtoto.com, nothing… we did everything. We never got her back. I am haunted by not knowing. I would have been so happy to have had such a service…
So… that is my goal for me and Daisy… the extraordinary nose. to find lost pets…
[QUOTE=SLW;6690948]
My daughter out in Monterey, CA just started SAR classes with this gal. http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/08/us/cnnheroes-mary-cortani-interview/index.html
DD has a 17 month old German Shepard who had a base of solid obedience work and socialization under his belt before joining the class. She and her dog are having a blast in classes and she looks forward to being helpful for someone down the road. My own Pop who had dementia, obviously her Grand Dad, walked off and we found him the next day, deceased. In a perfect world she’ll be able to be on a team that keeps another family from going through that nightmare; that is her goal.[/QUOTE]
How tragic, but what a tremendous way to heal and give back.
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