Training of a Search Dog

I’m trying to catch up on my training with Musket, so I’ve actually hired a pet sitter to hide for Musket, twice a week. I’m using these shorter trainings to keep the fun for Musket and to work him with a scent article. I’m experimenting with teaching him to scent discriminate — to become a scent-specific air-scent dog. For this particular training, I had the pet sitter, Christina, park up my long driveway and leave a scent article — a rounded, cotton swab that she placed against her body, in a baggie next to her car (which was parked next to the “sleeping wolf”on the map). She then went into my woods and radioed me when she was in place. I took Musket up to the car, opened the scent article bag and told him to “check it.” He did, then I gave him the command to “Search.” He went around the car and then hit onto her trail. Since the time has changed, it was getting dark in the woods so he was way ahead of me. While I’m still stumbling through the darkening woods, I get the message on the radio that she had been found. Less than a minute after the radio contact, Musket ran up to me and barked. I told him to “show me” and he took off, leaving me bumbling through the woods again. The poor dog came back two more times to take me to Christina and finally his ball reward from the subject. He really loves this and has been doing great hitting her trail.

This map is somewhat misleading because the roads were planned roads but were never built. Part of my long driveway is part of one of these planned, non-existent roads. This area is actually wooded.

Musket and Brad in the Attic

Besides my wilderness training, I am also adding disaster training such as directionals. Eventually, I will get into ladder work with Musket, but he decided to jump ahead of me. A week ago, I had a co-worker assisting me running some network cabling for a security video system that I am installing. We were both in the attic and Musket was at the bottom of the rickety, folding attic ladder standing up at its base. Upstairs, I could hear Musket, but was busy with the cables. A few seconds later, I heard some scratching and turned in time to see Musket climbing from the ladder into the attic with us! He had taught himself how to climb that ladder.

The only problem was that he was not as confident coming down. After about 30 minutes of trying to coax him down, I finally had to pick him up and walk down the ladder with my back against the ladder. He was perfectly still in my arms, as I’ve trained him to be, and that was important for both of our safety.

As I posted earlier, I’m trying to make up lost time in training Musket. In this training video, Tim, one of my teammates, hid in the valley. I knew that he was in the area, but did not know his exact location. Since Musket is being trained as an air scent dog, my original aim in this training session was to walk him along the top of the ridge to expose him to Tim’s scent which should be lifting up the hill due to the rising heat of the day.  The fault in my plan was that Tim had left from the same location that Musket and I started. Instead of following me along the ridge, Musket followed Tim’s hot trail. I was thrilled that Musket followed the trail and quickly found the subject.

An air scent dog is a free agent; he has the freedom to follow a trail, if he finds one, or to pick up the scent as he gets closer to the subject. The handler, meanwhile, continues on his pattern, usually following the terrain in an organized manner to insure that he, and his wandering canine, cover the area. One thing that I like about German Shepherds is their herding instinct. They may range, but they come back to watch the original herd, which is me. I never really trained my previous search dog, Circe, to come back to me from time to time during a longer search. She would just naturally check back in. Musket does the same thing. During this training, I did call him when he came within view, but that was only to make it a little easier for him to locate me. He gave me a definite bark indication, although I would prefer more barking when he came back. I am continuing to work on a stronger indication.

The search team that I am a member sponsored a NAPWDA (North American Police Work Dog Association) certification on Human Remains Detection. We had two of our members testing, and the rest of us were benefiting from the NAPWDA instructor. I was only able to go to the Saturday portion of the seminar, but it was worth it. I am not, at this time, training Musket in Human Remains Detection. Instead, I am staying with Live Detection at this point. Although I was not participating in the Human Remains portion, I did observe because I have done this with my previous K9, Circe.

These pictures demonstrated an interesting training technique for HRD sources. Each box was lined up, as the pictures indicate, with only one of the boxes containing an HRD source; the other boxes were clean. The first picture shows an assistant introducing the boxes to the K9 so the dog will know where it will be expected to search. The second picture shows this particular Lab properly indicating at the box with the source. Once the dog indicates on the correct box, an assistant would pull a chord which would pop out a tennis ball through the hole at the top of the box. This is for an instant reward for the dog.

Air Scenting

There was a person at the seminar who has, for the past 9 years, trained her dog in scent-specific air scent, so I did spend a great deal of time with her. And, I had several opportunities to work Musket, and did great, especially since I have not been able to work him as much as I’ve needed.

I sheepishly return to my webposting, after taking several months off. Although I have been training Musket, it has been at a much lower level due to my long work hours over the summer and during the start of school. I’ve had major projects going on at work, forcing me to work many 14-hour days and they are just winding down. And, I must admit that I’m emerging from a lot of Funk — my definition of depression, loss, and other negative feelings. It began with Circe’s death, then continued on through my father’s death on August 22. Everyone experiences loss such as this; it’s a part of life. It’s just been my turn.

But I’ve been thinking about Musket and what that loss of quality training time means to him. How many dog years have I wasted? The old rule of thumb that a dog ages 7 years for every 1 human year really isn’t accurate, for a dog obviously matures far faster than a human, especially in the early years. I did some searching and found various sites talking about dog years. But, for my purposes, this chart, found on http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/age.htm works.

Musket will be 2 in January, so I used the chart between 1 Human Year = 15 dog years and 2 Human Years = 24 Human Years. Since I’m dealing with the period in Musket’s life between 1 and 2 Human years, I decided to find out how many dog years were wasted during 5 months of Funk. My computations are below:

The first Human Year = 15 Dog Years.

The second Human Year = 24 Dog Years.

If I subtract these years, I discover there are 9 Dog Years between the fist and second Human Years (24-15 = 9).

So, how do I determine how much Musket aged within a few months between the first and second year of his life? If I divide 9 Dog Years by 12 months, I get .75 (9/12 = .75) per month.

Since I had roughly 5 months of Funk, that adds up to 3.75 ( 5 x .75 = 3.75) wasted Dog Years!

My math may be fuzzy enough to allow me to run for president, but I think it works here.

Violating the 11th Commandment: Thou Shalt Not Waste a Good Dog

Did you hear that booming voice telling me I had violated a major commandment? This has to rank right up there with the 7 Deadly Sins; this is the 8th deadly sin! Wasting 3.75 dog years may just get me in the rungs of Hell reserved for politicians. This is serious stuff now, so I’m in a hurry to make it up to Musket. The boy is in his prime, and it’s going as fast as mine went.

Because of my Funk and my general anti-social attitudes, I’ve had limited success in finding someone in my area to hide in my woods for Musket. So, I’ve done like every good Capitalist, and I’ve payed someone to assist me. I’ve hired a pet sitter to come Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and hide in my woods. If I add this additional training with my more standard team training, I’ll get him back to where he should be now. And, as for me, I might, just might, place myself up the rung of Hell away from the politicians and on the level of the mass murderers. At least that’s a better class of people.

I haven’t posted in a while, partly because I recently lost my long-time Search and Rescue partner, Circe. This is her dedication.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvC7Shju_vM

This was a training on March 19 where Musket did his first search. Before this, he had been doing basic runaways. Musket definitely has the first part down. The next part is getting him to come back to me and bark. After that, he will have to take me back to the subject before he gets his reward. You teach this in small steps then put it all together. I’m really proud of this dog!

Late Saturday afternoon (03/12/2011), I received a call from a county deputy sheriff who lives in my neighborhood asking if I would like to do some training. I immediately told him yes if he would also hide for Musket. He said no problem, so I put Musket in the Jeep and headed to his house. My adrenaline was high as I drove to his house because I have hidden for police dogs before and have the scar to prove it. But, I was really looking forward to it.

This deputy lives on the back side of Lake Tara’s dam, the largest of the three lakes in our subdivision. Directly behind his house there is a large clearing cut for a gas line, then woods that lead down to the overflow spillway of the dam. This is where we held our training.

Fairfield Plantation in Villa Rica, GA

We first started working with Nitro, the deputy’s dog. I went from his house and ran down the large cut area of the gas line, dropping my hat along the way, then cut right, through the woods and hid beside a maintenance shed. The deputy let my scent “cook” for about 15 minutes before he started out. Nitro was on my trail for the most part, but varied a little at the turn in the woods. That’s natural because the suction effect of the cut area would pull the scent away from my turn. However, Nitro realized the scent was dissipating and turned back to the stronger scent and was quickly back on my trail. I could see this from my location as was impressed with this dog. He was on me within a minute of this time and the deputy was going through his yelling routine: “Let me see your hands! Raise your hands! If you do not raise your hands I’ll release the dog and you will be bitten!” Nitro was literally drooling with anticipation as he waited. I rose up and slowly raised my hands, revealing his pull toy in my right hand. At this point, I threw the toy to Nitro and he slung it from side to side.

We walked back to the deputy’s house, talking about what happened. He was happy with his work and I was as well. We walked past a neighbor who had people on the deck grilling out, watching this strange entertainment. I told them that you can’t really hide from these dogs and the neighbor yelled back that it didn’t take long. That’ s right, it doesn’t.

The deputy put Nitro in his outdoor, covered pen and now it was Musket’s turn. We train in similar ways, yet it is drastically different as well. First, the person that the search dog is looking for is wanting to be found and will not likely harm the dog or the searcher. The police dog is facing the opposite. Since Musket is still in the beginning stages of search work, I held him while the deputy took his pull toy and headed across the open area and into the woods. Nitro was barking which was good for me to see how Musket would react. He looked briefly at Nitro, but then seared his eyes toward the deputy running away with his toy. He was pulling to get to him and, when the deputy was hidden, I release Musket with the command “Search!” He tore off straight toward the deputy and within a few seconds had found where he was hidden. When I got there, the deputy was tugging with Musket as I had instructed him. For us, the subject/victim is who we want our dogs to want. They need to think that every person that they search for is just waiting in the woods to play with them. There was an added benefit of using this particular deputy — he is the biggest man that I know. He is at least 6′ 5″ tall and is a wall of muscle. He is an imposing person and Musket was a little shy around him — at first. But when he started playing with that toy it didn’t matter how big he was.

Musket clearly knows the game, so the deputy ran down the wooded slope toward the dam overflow area and ducked behind some boulders there. I held Musket and allowed him to see the deputy leaving with his toy, but I quickly stepped in front of the dog to block his view. Now, Musket knew the general direction that the deputy went but not the exact route. I let Musket go with the “Search!” command and he tore off in the general direction but off the exact path. He quickly put his nose in the air and got himself back on path. He had no difficulty finding him and this time was not concerned about my big friend.

On the way back, Musket had his toy and would run in front and drop the toy in front of the deputy. He would pick it up and throw it for Musket. I thought this was great for reinforcing victim loyalty. If he finds someone in the woods, he gets a great playtime.

We put Musket up and now it was time for Nitro’s bite-work. The deputy gave me a right-handed sleeve — a thick, right-angled covering where you insert your arm. There’s a handle inside this thick sleeve that allows you to hold the sleeve on.  A thick shield also covers the shoulder in case the dog gets too high. The important thing about using this device is to be sure to get the right arm — the one with this reinforced sleeve — in front of the dog and to brace yourself.  That sounds like common sense, but I’ve found that I have to think about this because when you have a snarling dog lunging, your tendency is to protect yourself with your dominant side.  I’m left-handed, so that’s the side that I would normally use to defend myself. That would not be a good idea in this case.

It’s now dark, so I head down the street from the front of the deputy’s house, around the corner and then ducked into a stretch of woods on the left and waited. I phoned the deputy that I was ready, and within about 10 minutes, he started. I always try to find positions where I can see them coming, and in this case, I was up slightly in the woods from the road. I watched once again as Nitro pulled the hugh officer along, saw him go past my turn, then, stop, and turned back onto my path into the woods. I was once again impressed.

As Nitro was almost within striking distance, I stood out so the deputy could see me. I wanted to make sure that he had complete control of the dog at this point. I stood up but kept the sleeve behind my back while he yelled his commands for me to raise my hands. When he gave the last command to raise my hands or he would release the dog, I slowly moved the sleeve in front of me and braced myself for the impact. The dog jumped from about 6 feet away and solidly hit my arm. Despite all the protection, I could feel the bite of the dog. It didn’t hurt, but I could feel the pressure of the dog’s powerful jaws. I whirled him around making noise and the dog hung on. After a few minutes of this, the deputy grabbed Nitro, gave him his release command. Nitro did release but wanted to go back to me. He still had a lot to give me. At one point, after Nitro had released his bite from the sleeve, I made the mistake of lifting my left, unprotected arm up. Nitro jumped for that arm but the deputy pulled him back and told him to release. He did, but not before chomping into the sleeve of my shirt, but not my arm.  I was lucky.

The width of Nitro's Fangs -- Glad the sleeve was away from my arm at the time.

I’ve learned a lot about being a subject for a police dog. The training subject has to be very careful and not make sudden moves around these dogs, especially when they are in training mode. I laughed at the irony of this — the biggest, toughest guy trained the sweet search dog while the smaller guy trained the snarling, biting beast.

Man, I love this stuff.

On Sunday, after our main training, I tried to work on Musket’s Speak command. I tried the same way of getting him to speak as we did during training, but the best I could get out of him was a sort of a whimper. He’s a quiet boy, unlike my talkative Circe. That’s usually a good thing, but not when I’m trying to get him to bark when needed. So, I worked with him a little while and went on to something else. He was making a pitiful sound that really wasn’t good enough, but that’s all I could get from him at this point. I took what I could.

After this, later in the afternoon, I went downstairs to the garage to load some items for work into my Jeep. The dogs naturally followed me downstairs, and as I opened the garage door, Circe took off around the car. I didn’t think that much of it until she came back, looking me straight in the eyes and barking several times. That was her trained alert. I was a little confused because I was not working her at the moment. However, she continued her barking and looking directly at me — her classic indication — so I told her to “show me.” She took me to the side of the garage where I had unloaded two double-bagged bags of dirt that I had received from training.

Dirt Soaked with Body Fluids

This dirt was taken from where a body had decomposed. The body had been removed by the authorities who gave their permission for us to remove the dirt. Circe did not know those bags were in the garage but knew the scent. Even though the girl is in retirement, she still knows the game. I was thrilled that she indicated on these bags so I ran upstairs, pulled out the pull toy and started excitedly playing with her. Musket had been watching this entire process, so when he saw Circe having all the fun he barked. With that, I pulled the pull toy apart and gave him one and told him “good speak.”

Musket's Pull Toy

Musket's Pull Toy Taken Apart

For the next 20 minutes, I’m in the garage saying “Speak” to two German Shepherds while I’m holding a tug toy in each hand, joyfully having my arms dislocated. I was thrilled both for Circe still remembering the game despite not having any recent training and for her “teaching” Musket to speak. Musket finally understood that he was supposed to give a strong bark, not a wimpy whimper when I told him to “Speak.”

Saturday was a cool, rainy, generally miserable day, so we were fortunate to have our training in a warehouse. This is a great opportunity to train in limited lighting and practice our search methods when searching for people within buildings with no lights. The scent is carried in different ways within a building than it is on the outside and you have to think differently when searching buildings. You try to find out what you can, where the doors are and which ones might be open. Air will find the way out, and when it is drawn out, it is taking the human scent with it. If a person is in the building somewhere, he is still giving off scent but the currents are pulling it away according to its own flow. This scent follows the air currents and sometimes “pools” in pockets in corners or in areas where the air is temporarily blocked.

Musket is not advanced enough to do this yet, so I assisted the advanced dogs by placing the subjects in the building and then going with them as they searched as an observer. It is always fascinating to see the dogs work a room and it’s a great learning experience to see how one dog reacts to the scent area and whether another dog reacts the same way. We are there to learn, and I always do learn something new.

After working with the advanced dogs, it was time for Musket, and another beginning German Shepherd, Guinness, to do their runaways. We do the typical runaways, but work in the darkened area. We have to do searches at night, so this is just another way to get the dog’s head into the game. We can play it outdoors, indoors, in the light and in the dark. Either way, as long as the dog finds the human, he gets his reward!

Guinness About to Start His Runaways in the darkened warehouse.

I don’t have a picture of Musket working, but it was similar to the above picture of Guinness. Musket now loves this game and he had no problem with the darkness. What darkness? Just give me that toy! I am so fortunate to have a dog with such drive.

Now, it’s time for his alert and I’ve finally decided upon the bark alert as I had with Circe. It’s great for Musket, because he is the strong, silent type who rarely barks. We worked on getting him to bark at the “Speak” command by taking his tug toy and having another handler play with his dog with it in front of Musket while I held him. The frustration of seeing this made him bark, so we would give him the tug toy and say speak. After he got worked up, he was somewhat barky, so we used that to encourage his alert. We ended with him beginning to understand that he is to bark when I say speak. This is the second step to his finding people. I will work on this more this week to get it firmly entrenched in his head.