Did you already post your CGCU elsewhere?
You know, I may have put those in other threads, now I can't remember.
I'm curious about how you found the extra requirement vs the CGC you can often get at end of STAR puppy, and how the work benefiited an older dog.
The CGCA is a little more distraction oriented, uses more distraction dogs, and uses more challenging situations for the dog while expecting pretty much the same results. What it doesn't do is ask for the 3 minute separation of handler and dog, and replaces that with being able to politely enter a doorway into a building.
The CGCU was some testing about transportation situations, showing that the dog can ride an elevator and use random staircases while remaining calm. Again, heavy on distractions as I recall. We had to show we can wait nicely to cross a street and then cross it under control.
Looking back on the CGCA and U tests, I feel like the primary benefit to both dogs was the training time we had preparing to be tested. Hours together, lots of positive reinforcements, and just practice. Just doing something
together and apart from my other dogs. Kinda like dad and daughter dates. Of course, I think just having passes on those will help in the event of any argument with my home insurer (they ban
Dobermans, yet they know I have at least one Doberman, and renewed my policy anyway). Quite possibly it could help with just the general way that people comment on why would you have a dog like that, or whatever remarks. We keep practicing all the skills by being out in public a lot, especially taking advantage of things like watching parades together, or even being in them, seeking out dog welcoming crowds, etc.
I am thinking nosework is a good fit for Bonnie as she is already a good trailer and we play with it informally on off leash trail walks.
The trick with nosework, (
only speaking from our experience and no one else's) was to turn it away from the dog sniffing out things that are interesting to
her, and turn it towards getting her interested in things that interest
me. To get her to trust me to know that if she finds
my things, she gets praise and reward. There is absolutely no benefit to her to finding a Morel mushroom, but if I harness her up in her nosework gear, and go to the wilderness, she knows that is
one of the 3 things I have trained her on that she will be rewarded. One of the things I did while training her, was to work in the hardware store, and then eventually work our way up to having the hide placed for us in the dog food aisle. Her brain turns completely off of food now when I am asking her for our first 3 scents. Feel free to PM me if you want more details about how I got her started, and I have a couple videos still that I can share with you that were us doing our homework to send to the online class instructor.