Avondell's Coach Woody NW1
Woody's Page
Garth before his surgery in Maryland
Garth
after his surgery in Maryland
May 11th, 2013: A
new dog arrived today to live with Eli and me. When I
first saw Woody, his name was Garth and his picture was posted on the American Black & Tan
Coonhound Rescue's Facebook page. He was rescued from a
shelter in West Virginia by Katie Holt. He got very sick just after he
was pulled from the shelter. He had some intestinal problems, probably
caused by worms, and had to have a large piece of his intestine
removed. He was very ill for a few days and they were not sure he would
live. He did, and Katie nursed him back to health and sent him out here
to live with us. He had only been "Garth" for a few weeks, and I wasn't
crazy about that name, so I changed it to Woody. Woody is about 7
months old and he weighs about 40 pounds. Buckeye's birthday was September 25th, and that seems
pretty close to Woody's birthday, so it now is. Initially, he seems to
have made the plane trip well...no messy cage and he wasn't
distressed...but we've come to discover what seems to be a new and poor
reaction to loud noises, and it could have been caused by the flight.
The photo below is the first picture I saw of Woody, posted on Facebook shortly after his surgery.
May 17th, 2013:
I took Woody and Eli to walk in the 17th of May
parade today. Or rather attempt to. We got to the staging area at the
start of the parade and one of the high school bands started playing
and Woody freaked out. Luckily I had him in a tracking harness, just
for greater crowd control, or he would have gotten away from me. On the
panicked and terrified scale of 1-10, he was about an 8. Deep bass and
deep rumbling noises are especially scary. Once I got him a few blocks
away from all the people and noise, he calmed down and was fine.
June 17th, 2013: Woody got a nice Ruffwear Web Master
harness just like the one Eli uses for tracking. I don't know if I'll
teach Woody how to track, but this harness is very secure. I worry
about sudden loud noises freaking him out...he got away from me a
couple days ago and ran all the way across Shoreline Center before he
stopped panicking. I had to get a ride from a passing car to catch up
with him. This is going to be a focus of our training in the next few
weeks. Also enrolled Woody in puppy classes on Sundays for the next 6
weeks at Fuzzy Buddys. Here are a couple of shots of Woody in his new harness.
June 23rd, 2013:
Woody had his first puppy class at Fuzzy Buddys
today, although he wasn't supposed to
attend. I didn't pay very close attention when I signed up for the
classes...they are beginner classes, as in people who haven't trained
dogs before. So Woody was a bit of a distraction. Actually, he was
really horrible at first...running around peeing and pooping on
everything and annoying people...but for the last hour he behaved
pretty well. I had a ton of treats and I just made him do puppy
push-ups for awhile to keep him busy. After talking to the trainer
after the class, their training styles and philosophy seem to be pretty
close to mine, so I am looking forward to training there.
June 30th, 2013: Woody
had his second
puppy class today. There were 7 other dogs in the room today, compared
to only 3 last week, but Woody still calmed down and was able to focus
on me and begin training in about 3-4 minutes. Last week it took 15-20
minutes, so it was encouraging to see that he's gained so much self
control over the last week. The training is helping a lot. We've been
working on heeling with attention and loose leash walking over the last
week. It was just too difficult to train in the harness, so I had to
use a chain choker for the first time in about a decade because I
couldn't think of anything else. Naturally, it worked like a charm and
he's walking much better on a leash again. I got him a nice Spindrift padded martingale collar that I'll just use for a training collar.
At class today we tried a little hand targetting. I've got him trained to target the Manners Minder
target, but not my hand, so we didn't do so well. The trainer reminded
me that hand targetting can be used for a great recall, so I need to
work on that more and targetting the wand less. Then we did a few puppy
push-ups and moved on to 'leave it', another thing I haven't
trained...or so I thought. First, we took a treat and threw it on the
ground and when the dog went for it, I would step on it and say, 'leave
it'. Woody figured that out fairly quickly. Then the trainer passed out
little metal bowls, just like their food bowls. She instructed everyone
to toss a bit of food in the bowl and give the command. This is easy
for Woody, as this is one of the first things I teach any dog: how to
wait for their food. I put Woody in a sit/stay and started dropping Zukes
into the bowl, making it ring. He was so good that the trainer asked me
to demonstrate for the class. He sat and waited 5 feet from a bowl of
treats while I talked to the class and walked completely around him. He
watched me the whole time and when I was done I released him and he
walked over nicely and ate his treats. I was pretty proud of that last
part...no crazy dash for the bowl. And this is with 7 other dogs
watching.
The funny thing is, it never occured to me that I can
transfer this behavior to a really simple and bombproof 'leave it'
command. I never put a specific verbal cue on the sit/stay...when I
say, "do them dawgs wants some foods?", they immediately assume sitting
and waiting position. I can attach the 'leave it' command to that and
do it every time I feed them. Then when I really need them to leave
something alone, I just never release them. Super simple and
spectacularly effective. I have to feed the dogs at least once a day
and a big bowl of food is a strong reward/motivator. Might as well use
the activity to produce a really strong command or two :D
Saturday, July 20th, 2013:
Woody has had 4 weeks of training classes at Fuzzy Buddy's now and he's
progressing well. His loose leash walking training is nearly complete
and he is just about ready to graduate to a flat collar. His close
heeling is getting better with practice and we aren't stepping on each
other quite as much now. He still has puppy outbursts, though. At last
week's class, he was pretty good through the normal class, but
afterward we attended a second, polite greetings, class. Woody wouldn't
stop barking at the new dogs in that class and we had to leave early so
Dana could teach the class. So far Woody knows or is learning the
following commands or behaviors:
- Sit: So
far he knows to sit at heel on verbal cue (heel), sit in front of me on
verbal/visual cue (front), sit in general on verbal/visual cue
(sit).
- Stay: sit/stay only. He'll stay for 30 seconds or so. We haven't trained this much.
- Come: He
currently comes running at full speed when I call him from the
backyard. Don't expect this to last, though. At this age, they all come
when called. Wait until he's 2 years old. Probably not so much then.
- Touch: He will reliably touch my hand on verbal/visual cue.
- Heel: We
are starting to refine our heeling a little. He can stay with me in a
straight line, slow/medium/fast speed, and he can make great right
turns. Left turns are getting better, but need work. He heels on the
left side...we are just now starting to work on the right side.
- Turns: Can
stand on bowl with both front feet and turn left with verbal/visual cue
and coaxing and some luring. He's getting there. I try to avoid too
much luring, but shaping only goes so far with this method and large
dogs like coonhounds. He can turn right about 180° but I haven't gotten
him to turn the rest of the way yet. Just tonight I noticed him using
this skill to rotate into heel position, so this method I've used works
good...I don't need to make the connection between the turning on a
bowl exercise and turning into heel position because the dog got it on
his own.
- Shake: He can shake hands if you offer him your right hand.
- Kiss: He
will give me a kiss on verbal command, even if he has to stand on his
rear legs to reach me. This isn't well generalized and for some reason
seems hard to generalize.
Sunday, August 4th, 2013:
Took Woody out early this morning to the new Shoreline Eastside Off
Leash Area and then over to the Golden Gardens OLA. First time for
Woody at both places. I should have brought Eli along too, just to
protect him. But I didn't and Woody was fine. Only one dog at the
Shoreline OLA, and he got tired of Woody fast and chased him off. At
the GG-OLA there were several dogs and Woody settled down and made a
few friends.
Tuesday, August 6th, 2013:
Woody completed his basic training at Fuzzy Buddy's on July 29th.
He's doing very well and his training is advancing nicely. Today was to
be his first Nose Work class at Fuzzy Buddy's, but I had to leave him
home. I had to work late at a National Night Out event and I arrived
for the class a little late and without Woody. It was a fun class and
Pritamo Kentala seems to be a good teacher. She explained a little
about Nose Work and what to expect and then the dogs came in one at a
time and searched boxes for treats. There were 9 boxes out and they all
contained treats. The students walked their dogs through the boxes
while Pritama reloaded the boxes with treats. Right now we are just
learning that looking in boxes is good, and also learning a 'done
searching' cue at the end of the search.
Friday, August 8th, 2013: Woody and Eli both began their Nose Work training this week.
Saturday, August 17th, 2013:
Our training is going well. I'm getting a better understanding of how
and what I need to train right now for the dogs to be successful with
Nose Work. We've been practicing at home, both indoors and outdoors
during the week, and at work on weekend mornings. Woody is doing well
and we are building his drive and excitement for searching boxes. This
work is also helping reinforce his crate training and building
discipline more. I'm beginning to see his patience and self-control
improving in little ways...he doesn't bolt out the door and run to the
end of the leash, he is able to stop himself and wait. Walking to the
car is a big challenge, but he's learned that he gets there faster if
he heels. We've gotten many new toys in the last couple of weeks. On
the advice of Pritamo, we bought a really great Julius K9 Power Harness from Clean Run
that is superfast to put on and doesn't move around very much. I've
been through a lot of harnesses in various designs over the years, and
this one is simple and works very well. More impressed with it than I
expected. It is as good as the Ruffwear harness, but much easier to put
on. We also got new collars for both dogs from Collar Addict. Woody wanted to stay with his 'bones' theme (see photo above) so he got the Marquis Bones style with black leather padding (black and tan, of course). Eli got a Dragon's Breath embroidered with his name.
Saturday, October 19th, 2013:
It's been a couple months since I've updated this page, which isn't
much considering I go for years without updating some of the pages.
Woody is getting bigger and stronger and smarter. We are still taking
Nose Work classes every Tuesday, and next week is the final class of
the 2nd Nose Work series of classes. So far we have practiced container
searches, room searches, and vehicle searches. The next series of
classes will introduce us to the scents used in Nose Work competition.
Woody and I are both very excited about Nose Work, and Woody loves
hunting through boxes or objects...we just need to practice more! Woody
recently had a pretty bad rash covering his belly and the inside of his
left leg that was almost certainly caused by seasonal allergies. I
began giving him Benadryl (25mg twice a day) and it cleared up
overnight. I bought a new camera a couple weeks ago and I've been
taking a lot of photos of Eli and Woody, so I decided it was time to
make a photo page for Woody.
Sunday, January 5th, 2014: Today
Woody and I started the 3rd series of Nose Work classes, Introduction
to Scent. We've been practicing since our last class in October and he
was ready to go. In this series of classes we will learn how to
introduce the dog to a certain scent...in this case birch oil...to
find, rather than have them find food. Woody did very well and found
the scent every time. Woody is now a little over 15 months old and he
is starting to mature a little bit, especially with Hubert around.
Woody and I go out every weekend and train at the senior center, stop
in at pet stores, hit the off leash areas, and visit at Mom's house.
This year I want to continue on with his Nose Work training and also
keep working on the basics so we can eventually try some Rally-O.
Saturday, January 11th, 2014: Woody and Hubert went to the Senior Center with me this morning to practice some Nose Work and after we were done I made a video showing Woody heeling off leash.
Sunday, January 26th, 2014:
Hubert did his Nose Work yesterday, so today was Woody's turn in the
exercise room. Woody is on scent (birch) full time now and he seems to
be doing well. Unfortunately, we've missed the last two classes and we
are on a break until Feb. 9th. So far all we've done with scent is
containers and Woody is good with those. In the near future we'll start
practicing interior (room) searchs and when the weather isn't too bad
we'll practice some more vehicle searches. At home we've been doing a
little utility training and reinforcement and a little experimentation.
Hubert taught Eli how to jump the 26" ex-pen barrier awhile back, but
Woody has not learned. I've deliberately avoided teaching my dogs to
jump for...ever. It's nice to be able to contain large coonhounds with
small, flimsy barriers. Alas, that has come to an end. So I needed to
teach Woody to jump just for utility. This is a fairly easy thing to
teach, you just set up a jump with the bar on the ground and
click/treat for stepping over it. Then raise it an inch and C/T for
crossing it...keep raising the height criteria until the dog can jump
as high as you want. Woody picked this up very very fast. Remarkably
fast. Not jumping itself, but generalizing and combining this
behavior, which is way more important. I set up a jump in the hallway
with the bar about 6 inches high and stood next to it and Woody jumped
over it. C/T. I quickly raised the bar until we were at 17 inches and
he was easily going over it. C/T...maybe 8 repetitions. I started
adding a cue immediately: as he was starting to jump or while he was in
the air, I said "Jump!" One or two reps and I could point at the bar
and say 'jump' and he would go over. A few more and I could stand 8
feet away from the bar and point to it and say 'jump' and he would go
over. I could say 'jump' again and he would come back. We quit for the
night. Today I wanted to test the behavior out in the yard so I set up
a 17 inch jump with a couple milk crates. No problems, the behavior
generalized instantly. I decided to add in a stationary target. Woody
already knows this behavior. We went back inside (lowering one criteria
to raise another) and practiced in the hallway. Now he will sit at heel
next to me and I can send him out over a jump to touch his nose on the
Manners Minder stationary target. We just finished this session, and in
a couple hours we'll do one more. I'm confident that I can complete the
entire behavior in the next session, so he will sit next to me and on
command go out over a jump to a target, touch it, and then return over
the jump to finish at my side. I started training this behavior about
24 hours ago. Yesterday afternoon I would have guessed that it would
take 4 weeks to get this far. Woody really learns this stuff fast.
Tuesday, February 4th, 2014:
We are working on component training some of the aspects of the
go-out/retrieve. Woody can now jump as high as the other dogs. He's
beginning to get the hang of retrieve as we work in the back bedroom I
converted into a training room. We have 2-3 training sessions a night
on the weekdays and training at the senior center on the weekends.
Saturday, February 8th, 2014:
Woody is consistently and happily retrieving to hand
the rope dummy. He did it tonight with the other two dogs in the room.
We have over 100 reps in now. I've had him retrieve a few other
objects...a rubber ball, rubber and rope bone, and a regular tug
rope...but he prefers the dummy. We've been training on birch scent in
containers a lot and his Nose Work classes start up again tomorrow.
He's very good at all the set-ups I've used so far, so I need to get
more creative and find out what I can do to keep improving. I know I
need to work more on room searches and using objects other than
cardboard boxes. We have been training with plastic sandwich baskets
and Woody does fine with those. We're working on refining our heeling
some more, so we spent some time on that at the center and the dog
park.
Saturday, February 8th, 2014: Woody is now preparing for an Odor Recognition Test on April 27th.
Wednesday, April 30th, 2014:
Woody passed his ORT last Sunday! I've had to take some time off from
training due to increased work this spring, but now we are through and
back to training. We went over to Whidbey Island on Sunday for the ORT
in Langley. It was a nice day and Hubert, Woody, and I enjoyed a short
ferry ride over in the morning. Woody's test was early...around
10:30am. He started off well, but quickly became distracted by the new
surroundings and people. It took about 2 minutes of walking around and
watching him before I started to worry we wouldn't pass. I took him
back near the start to try to get him going. There was two rows of
boxes with six boxes each. He seemed to start working on the row to the
right and on the 4th box he swung his head back in a classic indication
and I called alert. I wasn't entirely sure it was the box, so I asked
Miriam and she said it was the right box. Woody has a lot of drive and
enthusiasm, but he's easily distracted and it's hard for him to stay
focused on his job. I think what got us through this ORT is the sheer
amount of training we have done. More generalization training...doing
searches in lots of different places...would have helped a lot more,
but I know that is a weakness I can work on. The large amount of rote
training, especially on odor, that I've done with Woody has helped
condition him to default to searching when certain conditions are
met...he's wearing his harness and I have him on a long line, my
behavior and commands, ect. So when we were standing there in the gym
in Langley for a few minutes and he didn't know what to do, when I took
him back to the start line and gathered him up and said, "Go hunt!", he
didn't have to think about it...he just started the behavior and that
got us to the box. Now that the weather is getting better, we'll work
on more generalizations and we're continuing classes with Pritamo at Fuzzy Buddys on Sundays. There is a NW1 trial in Bellingham at the end of next month that I'm thinking about getting Woody into, but I'm not sure he's ready yet.
Monday, May 26th, 2014:
Woody has been having some pretty bad allergy problems in the last
couple of weeks. His eyes are all puffy and he's got hot spots and
rashes all over. I've been giving him baths every day or two with Zymox shampoo and conditioner, daily Benadryl or Claritin, and I've been giving him Animal Apawthecary's Spring Tonic. That seems to be helping some. Eli and Hubert
are having very minor problems from the allergens in the air, but Woody
is really hurting. Despite that, he still enjoys training and he's
gotten very good at doing interior searches. As you'll see in the
videos below, he can handle large room searches and he works very
diligently. We've also been training vehicle searches more now that the
weather is getting nicer. We train religiously every weekend and we go
to class on Sunday afternoons. Eli has had a Whistle since January and
now they are offering WhistleGPS, so I bought one for Woody. Should arrive soon.
YouTube Videos: Interior Search #1, Interior Search #2, Interior Search #3
Sunday, August 24th, 2014:
Woody's allergy problems turned out to be allergies, a fungal
infection, and a bacterial infection. We've got all 3 mostly under
control, but he still has been having flare-ups under his neck. He was
taking 200mg ketoconazole and 100mg Simplicef. Woody's first NW1 trial is next Saturday near Bellingham! We
are preparing for the trial this week and getting our equipment
together. I have next Friday off, so we should be fully prepared by the
time we leave early Saturday morning. I am looking forward to having a
good experience and making it a fun trip for Woody.
Saturday, August 30th, 2014:
We left at 6am Saturday morning and drove up to Deming, Washington,
just east of Bellingham on the way up to Mt. Baker. The NW1 trial was held
at Mt. Baker Junior High School, a large facility with multiple
buildings and a nice campus. We arrived at 8am and the weather was
overcast and 65° to 70° most of the day, with a couple of sunbreaks
here and there. We parked next to some RVs in the reactive dog area and
I attended the walk-through and the briefing. There were 40 people
participating in the trial and they broke us into two 'packs'. I was
7th to run in Pack A. The trial was set up so that we would do two of
the searches in the morning and two in the afternoon. Containers and
Vehicles were up first.
Containers:
They originally wanted to do containers inside the large gym, but
because they have a nicely polished basketball court they moved the
search area to an outdoor location. The standard cardboard boxes were
arranged in two rows of about ten (? I didn't count them) each. They
were on a very wide, covered sidewalk about 60 feet long with a brick
wall on one side and grass on the other. One end was open and the other
end has a set of doors with glass windows. The wind was blowing from
the open end/starting line down towards the closed end. We started at
the open end, but I made a mistake right off. Because there were
several wait stations before we got to the search area, I had the leash
on his collar. I forgot to take it off and put it on his harness so we
ended up doing the whole search like that. There were quite a few
spectators and that is always a small distraction for Woody. He didn't
really start well and he only checked a couple of boxes as I walked him
down the path between them. I didn't care that much because I knew he
would focus after a few moments and I wanted to get down to the other
end and restart him into the wind. As we reached the closed end, the
glass doors were about 20 feet away and Woody could see his reflection
and he reacted slightly to that. I laughed a little because I knew he
was going to hunt. I turned him into the wind and he hit on the 4th or
5th box we walked by hard. I called "ALERT!" and everyone clapped. Time: 1:02.08 - no faults.
Vehicles:
We immediately went to vehicles next. The vehicle search was outside in
a large parking lot. Three vehicles were parked nose to tail facing the
same direction along a curb: a four door sedan, a small SUV, and
another four door sedan. They were facing directly into the wind, which
I thought was a huge help. The start line was also at the front of the
first car, so we were again starting the search upwind. My plan was to
walk down the left side (my left as I'm facing the front of the cars)
and around the back of the last car and up the other side, working into
the wind. However, Woody got into scent when he hit the right front
tire of the SUV. He worked all around the wheel well, but never really
settled on a spot. We'd only spent 30 seconds searching and he seemed
to give up on the wheel well, so I took him down to the last car and
around the back to the other side, like I had planned. When I came up
to the SUV again, Woody stopped on the left wheel well and was clearly
in scent again. He worked around to the front of the car and he sort of
zeroed in on the license plate, but he still didn't really give me an
indication. I was still only a little over a minute into the
search and I have a 3 minute time limit. I thought that maybe the
source was on the first car and the wind was blowing it into the front
and wheel wells of the SUV, so I tried to take him to the first car but
he didn't want to leave the front of the SUV. At this point I'm pretty
sure it's there...I just don't know where. I know where his strongest
indication has been and I don't seem to have any hope of getting closer
so I called ALERT! The judge says, "Show me." My heart is sinking. I
see nothing. There is nothing to point at. I point at the top right
corner of the front license plate on the SUV and he says, "Yes." Time: 1:48.40 - no faults
I'm
elated. Two for two. Vehicles was scary...I couldn't believe we got
that one. Sometimes I don't do a great job of reading my dog (more
about that later) but when it comes to scent, I am proud of my ability
to read my hounds. I credit Aileen Logan and her tracking classes for
that. I believe I have a great advantage over some others in Nose Work
because I've spent a few years behind a hound working a trail and I'm
able to use that experience. Vehicles was another instance where that
helped. When a hound is on a track they will sometimes criss-cross the
actual trail...going in and out of the scent. If you watch closely, you
can tell by their breathing and head-set and speed how deep in the
scent they are. That's the skill I used to approximate where Woody's
indication on the SUV was the strongest. His speed picked up very
slightly when he got within a foot of the source and slowed immediately
after he passed it. I saw that twice and just guessed that was the
source. It was. I think that would be hard to learn in Nose Work. In
tracking you see the dog do it over and over and over...a hundred times
in one track.
We stayed in the truck most
of the day. The weather was nice and Woody and I really just enjoy each
other's company, so we just hung out and played games. It was a long
wait; while I was the 7th person to search in the morning, in the
afternoon Pack B went first so I ended up being 27th to search the
Exteriors and Interiors.
Exteriors:
The exterior search area was another covered double wide concrete
sidewalk that ran along one of the red brick school buildings. From the
starting line: On the right there was a door with a
doorway/foyer/entryway and past that the wall curved out from the
doorway and then continued on straight. In the middle there were some
large wood and steel pillars supporting the walkway roof. There
was also a grass strip about 5 feet wide along the left side. The area
was marked with cones and flags, which the officials said would not be
the source. Wind was blowing directly into our faces as we stood at the
starting line. I made sure to hook the lead to Woody's harness this
time, then I told him to hunt. There were, of course, more spectators
and Woody was more interested in looking around at them. This is
becoming a pretty common thing, but it doesn't bother me too much. It's
understandable...he's in a completely new place surrounded by people
watching him and he'd have to be a robot to NOT want to look around. We
only have ten seconds at the start line, so I just don't have a problem
with starting him and taking him for a quick walk through the search
area so he can look around and then after 20 or 30 seconds take him
where I want him to start and have him go. So off we go into the search
area. We got to the end and he walked out into the grass and I got a
head snap and it sure looked like he was in scent. He sniffed around a
bit and hit on a spot in the grass and froze for a second. Something
was a little weird about that...because that's what they do when they
smell pee, that sudden head freeze. I don't think I've seen Woody do
that with birch oil. At that point we had only been searching for about
30 seconds. I couldn't see anything in the grass where he stuck his
nose, so I decided to not call it and take him back to the start line
to restart him into the wind. I was going to let him work back to that
spot and if he didn't strike on anything else, I would call that spot.
So we get back up to the start line and about 2 feet inside the start
line is the first wood and steel pillar. As we work past it Woody's
head snaps back hard and he's in scent. The pillar itself is a 12 x 12
wood beam and at the bottom of this one is a big crack. Woody worked
his way around the pillar and started up the crack and then stopped and
looked at me. "ALERT!" The judge said, "Show me." This time I pointed
with confidence at the middle of the crack in the beam. "Yes." Time: 1:00.08 - no faults
Interiors:
The interior search room was a classroom inside the Junior High
building. When I saw it during the walkthrough, I thought it looked
like a lot of fun. I'm not sure what Woody's best element is, but my
favorite is interior off-leash and this room was almost mandatory
off-leash. It was about half the size of the senior center dining room,
but a bit more cluttered. There were about 25-30 of those individual
chair-desks for the students set up in rows taking up the middle of the
room. At the front of the room, off to the right in the corner, was a
teacher's desk with a computer on it and lots of books and papers and
stuff piled around. In the middle was a podium and table and a single
chair along the wall. Along the wall to the right and the back wall
were bookshelves lined with books...hundreds of places for odor to
hide. That's the part I liked...Woody has searched in libraries exactly
like that. Along the left wall were some A/V machines on carts and the
doorway/start line was in the left rear corner. There was not a lot of
room to walk around because of all the desks. Afterwards, at the awards
ceremony, the judge talked about how difficult it was for some people
trying to search on-leash in there. I can't even imagine. We were 3 for
3 at this point and I was pretty confident Woody could work this out.
It was about 2:45pm. They opened the door and I saw at least 6 people
standing along the back wall, in front of the bookshelves. I generally
try to completely ignore and forget any people watching the search. I
held Woody and he was looking at the people. I waited about 5 seconds
and he never looked away, so I unhooked him and said, "HUNT!" pretty
sharply. He ran in and stopped for a moment and looked at the people. I
walked along the left wall towards the front of the room and said,
"Woody!" and when he came over to me I said, "Hunt" again and he
started working. He worked up and down between the first two rows of
chairs, then around the podium, then down the third row and he started
back towards the door. At that moment the judge said, "He's pooping,
take him out!" Sure enough, he was about to poop on the new carpet in
this very nice school. I said, "Woody, no!" and he stopped. He was
right next to the door and one of the volunteers opened the door and I
grabbed his harness handle and took him out the door and then ourside
onto the grass. As I walked out the door, I thought of something the
official said during the briefing: if the dog begins to pee or poop,
but you catch them, it isn't a fault. I had caught Woody, but because
the judge told me to take him out, and because I didn't think of the
rule until after I'd left the room, I was pretty sure I was going to be
disqualified for leaving the search area. We went out and Woody peed
but didn't poop. We came back in and I asked the judge if we could
resume and she said no. I was upset and disappointed, but it was my own
fault for not making sure he pooped. (Woody and Hubert almost never
poop on leash. Eli almost never stops.) I got my scorebook back, packed
up my coonhound, and headed home.
On the
way home I was reflecting on what happened. I was disappointed, and a
little upset about the way things took place with the official telling
me to take the dog out. But I was also really proud of Woody and I had
fulfilled all my goals for the trial. Woody worked hard in all four
elements and we did our best and we only lost because of my
inexperience...which is what I was there to get. It was about
3pm...about the time I get home and let the dogs out every day. Of
course he needed to poop right then. Throw in a day of searching and
sitting in the car and I have to be smarter than that. Then there was
the call in the room. With more experience I would know to stay there
and not cross that threshold. The moment I stepped out of the room I
knew I'd made a mistake, but there was nothing I could do. My phone has
been ringing a lot today because Mom is in Christa recovering from a
stroke and last night she accidentally pulled out her feeding tube. I
got a call about 6:15am while I was on the road to Deming and more
calls every couple hours updating me on her plans. When the phone rang,
I thought it was another nurse. Instead it was the trial director,
Alecia Elvstad, asking where I was. She told me they reviewed the
circumstances of our interior search and they didn't feel right about
the way it all went down and they wanted me to have another chance at
it. I was about 20 minutes south of the site, so I turned around and
drove as fast as I could back to the high school. Alecia was waiting
for me when I pulled in and she told me I would get a chance to search.
I got Woody out and took him for a walk and finally got him to poop. It
was 4:25pm and all the other competitors were gathering in the
auditorium for the awards presentation. We got down to the classroom
and the door opened and I waited for a moment. This time Woody looked
away from the people. I cut him loose and said "HUNT!" He went in
working up the first row of chairs and when he got to the end he had
found it...he worked around the podium for a moment and then went to
the lone chair against the back wall and hit on it hard. We were still
only a few seconds into the search, but I knew this was it. I took a
slow step back away from him and I thought, "If he looks at me, I'm
calling it." At that moment he took his nose off the chair and looked
at me. "ALERT!" Time: 0:36.40 - no faults
The trial was skillfully executed by Nose Work Magic and Alecia Elvstad, CNWI. The event went really smoothly and thanks to all the judges and the C.O., Wendy Krehbiel, CNWI. I hope to participate in more trials up there in Whatcom County in the future.
New Title: Avondell's Coach Woody NW1! It was a long and dramatic day, but Woody earned his first Nose Work title.
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