Nimrod's Adventures

 Notes from tracking on Jan 20 Thomas Dale ball field/cold/no wind Laid a 70 yard/65-yard track with a wide-angle turn. Did a bag drag with turkey sausage, laid chicken every five steps. Washer to mark the turn, a couple flags in the track. Nimrod had particular difficulty with distraction. We shared the field with a large flock of migrating robins. It took multiple verbal cues to get him going. He seemed to always know where the track was, but those robins were fascinating. I was surprised he managed to finish the track. Also, I laid the second leg though a football sled. (It's where the double line up took me) Nimrod bumped into the sled and it rang. That freaked him out and he did a quick dash backward. When not distracted, he moved with more confidence than I've seen, and he was faster. I am mapping the tracks now, but I haven't quite figured out how to put them in the blog.

 1/19/24 Nimrod and I did a 50 /45 yard, open angle turn track. FD every five steps, single laid the track with a bag drag. Nimrod stopped and stared three times while he tracked. I used a cue word not food to get him going. He did well. Found the turn without even a bobble.

 We tracked at Point of Rocks Park on January 16th. The afternoon was lovely. I decided to set the tracks one at a time because the park was busy. I've been tying Nimrod in sight of my track laying. With people around and the tracks getting longer, I wanted to keep him close. I laid the first track and was getting him into the harness. A woman with a yellow lab wandered onto the field and her direction of travel would have had her crossing my freshly laid, chicken heavy track. I asked her as politely as I could to alter her direction of travel. She was accommodating. Unfortunately, what seemed reasonable to her was to bring her dog over to me, let him root in my pocket for chicken and greet, paw and otherwise spin Nimrod up. The first track reflects Nimrods high level of distraction. He does better on the 2nd track, but I don't think he was giving me LOS so much as "When is happening over there!"   When it was time to lay the 3rd track the field was overrun with dogs,...

 This post is for tracking on January 10th, 12th and 14th. I wanted to get some tracking in before the snow on January 10th. I went around to some of the school yards we haunt but there were large numbers of staff and students hanging around after hours. Finally, I chose Carver Acadamy as the most deserted. It's not my favorite the field is small and trashy. The light was low due to the coming storm, and I had difficulty finding double line ups visible at 70 yards. I took normal steps with a FD every 4 steps. Straight line, no food drop. Tracking was uneventful except that apparently, I was tracking in a field adjacent to the school bus parking lot for all of Chesterfield County. As we tracked the busses came home to roost: they belched and groaned and squealed and beeped. Nimrod was distracted by this but got back working with a little food thrown on the track. January 12: Tracking was uneventful except Nimrod was a little concerned with the sound of snow sliding off the school...

 I just watched the snow tracks in reverse order. I'm impressed at how much better he got in the snow. No wonder he came home and passed out with his head hanging off the couch.

 Tracked with Nimrod on 1/7. Once again 50, 60 and 70 yards, straight line, no article, flag one yard before the final FD. FD every two strides. Watching him track in snow was interesting. I could watch him go from footprint to footprint. He couldn't find the chicken a lot of the time, especially when it sank into the snow. I got a lot of LOS signals from him. Could that be, "It all smells like chicken, but I can't locate it." On the first track I put him in the harness and then dropped the leash while reaching for my phone. He charged the start flag and started without me. I dropped a glove while laying the second track. I didn't spot it until we were running the track. Nimrod gave it a nuzzle as he passed. I wasn't sure how to respond. It wasn't meant as an article and I'm working on nuzzle, down as an article indicator. I try to practice article indication every day using "oops I dropped it." I'm getting an unprompted down about 30 per...

 Nimrod and I ran 3 tracks on Jan 3rd. Tracks 1 (50 yrds) and 2(60 yrds) supplied multiple distractions. On the first track, a cyclist surprised me, appearing seemingly out of nowhere. Having had close friendships with a couple of extremely reactive dogs, I reacted badly. Nimrod, however, was unfazed. The second track provided scent challenges: dry leaves, packed stones and disturbed earth all seemed to hold scent differently than grass. Also, to the left of the track I laid, was a scent Nimrod badly wanted to investigate. We walked that track several times after running it getting to and from our third track. Each time Nimrod urged me toward the brush line. The third track was short grass with no distractions and Nimrod took it away.  

 Notes from tracking on December 31:  We tracked on the ball field of Carver Academy. I set 40,50- and 60-yard tracks using a double line up with FD every 2 strides and no article at the end. The grass cover was patchy. The first and third tracks were laid on a fair amount of packed sand. The third track had a few deer tracks in it. When tracking on the packed sand Nimrod tracked about four feet to the left of the track. I could plainly see the food drops. He didn't indicate loss of scent, and he was going in the correct direction, so I let him carry on. On the first track he got very distracted by an open trash receptacle (not in the frame). I hadn't noted its proximity while laying the track. I threw food on the track, and he got back to work.   We continue to work article games separate from tracking. I'm getting an unprompted down some of the time. I work the article games in microbursts, maybe three repetitions of "oops I dropped it" and one pass at an articl...