Talk about nose work...

Ravenbird

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Asha blows me out of the water. Fake antler, some antler scent drops. Introduced today. This is her 4th run in her life for antler. I threw it about 20 feet so my footsteps wouldn't be near it. First place she runs to is the spot where it was for run #3 a few minutes before, then she regroups herself coming back to me, goes by me and at :42/43 seconds you will see she catches odor, does a 180, slows down just enough to find it (probably eyesight), scoop it up and bring it toward me. She did drop it though because she knew she'd get the ball. I'll clean that up, no problem. Probably covered 2 - 3 acres and found it in less than 1 1/2 minutes!


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Nice! Our club was recently approved for nose work so our first match is in June. I agreed to be the show chair and I'm going to observe everything I can so maybe I can give it a try with one or both of our dogs in the future.
 
Our club was recently approved for nose work so our first match is in June
Is it AKC nose work? That's what we've been doing. There IS a thing called Shed Hunt, but few & far between and it's not in kennel club stuff. We just thought we'd encourage the dogs to find antlers in the wild when we hike. Not for competition.

I have to say, I didn't expect her to be on it like this so quick, so I had handled that fake antler without even thinking. She knows how to find human scent articles, especially my scent, so I'm going to have to get one of our old found antlers out of a basket using gloves, then add the antler scent, then hide it. She may have been using MY scent to find the antler, but I'll do it carefully the next time. Wild shed antlers won't have human scent on them. :rofl:
 
Is it AKC nose work?
No this is UKC. Shed hunting could bring in quite a few extra bucks for you since they sell for quite a bit of money. One of our friends is an avid shed hunter but there was way too much snow this winter so he can just now start looking.
 
Great job, Asha! She's so excited about it! And fun to watch her!

I have a miniature version of that. 🤭Most of the time I have tiny treats in my coat pocket. Sometimes at night when I'm bringing horses in the barn and waiting for them to finish their grain (I take the buckets out of their stalls) I will throw one down the aisle for Kali to find. They're really small and we don't have a lot of lights on so it's pretty dim. And of course a lot of other different smells. She always finds them. Sometimes she can see where they land; sometimes she can't and has to go by her nose. I figure it's a fun little workout. 😁
 
Nice! Our club was recently approved for nose work so our first match is in June. I agreed to be the show chair and I'm going to observe everything I can so maybe I can give it a try with one or both of our dogs in the future.
This happened yesterday and now that I know what's involved I'm ready to work on it. Now I know the scents they work with on each level and you can actually buy kits with all of the essential oil scents for training.

UKC Target Odors​

Botanical Names of the UKC Essential Oils are:
Sweet Birch (Betula Lenta)**
Aniseed (Pimpinella Anisum)**
Clove Bud (Eugenia Caryophylatta)
Myrrh Oil (Commiphora Myrrha)
Vetiver Oil (Vetiveria Zizanoides)**
 
I hope you go forward with this, @JanS, it really is a lot of fun for the dogs as well as you! Please keep us posted and maybe some pictures! Do you have an instructor or classes in your club? That would be ideal.

I'm assuming your club does only UKC, but just to say, AKC & NACSW scent trials may use different essential oils (most the same or related) and different amounts. I trained with NACSW scents/amounts when Asha was a pup, but then found AKC trials way closer & more often. They used 2 drops per Qtip instead of 1 and I thought it would be easier, but no! The odor was actually more overwhelming and would spread out more readily so false alerts happened nearby the actual hide once we moved up out of novice. So train according to the venue you will be trialing!
 
I'm assuming your club does only UKC
Yes, this a UKC club but there is a club about an hour from here that is more AKC. I saw a couple of them yesterday and asked about class availability but it's pretty much the same as here and over booked with too few trainers.
 
Asha blows me out of the water. Fake antler, some antler scent drops. Introduced today. This is her 4th run in her life for antler. I threw it about 20 feet so my footsteps wouldn't be near it. First place she runs to is the spot where it was for run #3 a few minutes before, then she regroups herself coming back to me, goes by me and at :42/43 seconds you will see she catches odor, does a 180, slows down just enough to find it (probably eyesight), scoop it up and bring it toward me. She did drop it though because she knew she'd get the ball.
Amazing, good girl Asha! So cute how she was like "Here you go, mom, close enough! Ball now!"
 

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