Author Archives: Canine Co-Pilot

The summers first water training

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Well the end of May brought us our first water training for the search dogs. A nice calm quite private lake, a boat, multiple handlers and K9’s and a few of my students. The kids loved swimming and driving the boat, the dogs loved swimming and riding on the boat……..i swear there are not many differences between them!

Water trainings are great BUT BOY does it take a lot of pre-planning, set up, and specific execution plans to make happen. The dogs obviously get no water work during winter and colder months, lending to just a short time we can get them on a boat ever year. We have 2 water seminars later this year, one in August in Mawah NJ, and one in September in Binghamton NY with Amigo Search Dogs. Both will be excellent opportunities to get some good training in.

Anywho back to our water training.

First off was Abby- Shes a certified HR water dog meaning that per NYS Federation of Search and Rescue she is certified to search for lost people and human remains on or near water. She is excellent at “driving” the boat with her nose pointed in the correct direction. My focus for water training was to work a blank area with no scent and see how it differed from when she worked scent. BOY WAS IT OBVIOUS!!! She was just out for a cute boat ride!!! She knew her sensitive little nose had nothing and she was calm and quite just hunting around a bit checking to see if she got any scent as we went around the lake. Zach was our boat driver and he was impressed by how different her body language was.

Abby on the boat

Our next order of bussiness was to get Abby comfortable in the water. Last summer i was able to enlighten her to the benefit of “wading” in the water and how much fun it was to splash around but she didnt have the confidence necessary to dive out swim across the pond and get her toy. This summer the boys know its fun time in the pond for Abby!!!! The goal is to desensitize her to swimming in all environments and build her confidence around the water. In the lake she was already swimming out into deep water to get her ball!!!

Abby swimming in deep water on her own

Moving on, Ms. Raina is working on her water skills, i’m in turmoil over how much to push water work on her. She loves it and seems to excel at it so i have no reason not to pursue it with her but I’ve held back mostly due to her “crazy drive”  She seems calm when in the boat and we practiced that with running her on a nice blank boat ride, then following up with some short HR boat work. I was impressed with her behavior change during the work and will defiantly be continuing it to see what the outcome is.

Raina and I with Jimmy the driver.

Lastly we have little miss Eme to report on. This training was a huge step for us as a trailing team as i was able to run her on one of her blind training problems.  It was a hot trail, about a mile long and the last .3 miles was double blind with no idea where the trail layer went. The joy and exhilaration that came with the successful completion of the trail and then comparison of how well she had run it (no more then 20 feet off) was insane!

Eme’s hot trail approximately .8o miles long.

Eme is red the subject light blue. She gave me a good negative immediately but after resting her and re casting she went on a bit more before giving me another negative.

Us running the road portion of the trail.

All in all it was a great training, and with a few airscent problems in the mix as well a tiring day for all. So thankful for my team mates and my girls who share this great experience with me.

PSARC an april event

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April brings us the yearly Pennsylvania search and rescue council experience and 2012 was a different one! The one and only time I ever attended this was when Bo was in training back in 2010. This year I went sans 3 German Shepherds, 2 Belgian Malinous, 1 Chihuahua, and 6 students!!!!!

As always a lot was learned for both the dogs and the handlers. Raina and Abby worked with Linda Murphy and John Valvardi of PA Recovery Dogs. They set up amazing search scenarios and both girls had some challenging nose work all 3 days.

John instructing Jenn on her search area with K9 Abby

Eme got to work a few trails, giving her variety in her locations and allowing other handlers and trainers to watch her raw talent. She has some impressive natural trailing traits in her genetics, we are fine tuning them and me as a trailing handler!!  It was also great to watch a bunch of other trailing dogs work, i never knew how many people did trailing and the variety of dogs too!!! This was my first experience as a trailing dog handler at a public trailing event, most of what i learned came from the days when Maya, Emes mother was a trailing dog and my general overall absorption from over the years.

Of course the kids had fun, they had responsibilities too like helping take care of the dogs, taking a few classes for humans, and assisting the trainers with setting up problems. Everyone also took turns helping work the dogs through drills or other search work. Some times though they just hung around.

Our evenings held one of the greatest activites, the pack walk! Now we were in a public campground with not only other SAR dogs and persons from this event but hundreds of locals who keep campers at the campground year round. We took off each evening with 6 Shepherds, 2 Malinois, 1 chihuahua, and 1 golden retriever. If that isn’t a site to see I don’t know what is!!! Everyone was well behaved and it gave us time to fine tune our obedience in a busy public place.

Ready Rainy

The kids behaved wonderfully, the dogs were amazing, and the experiences priceless!! What a better way to spend an April vacation?

Nikon D80 learning trials

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Well i can’t say im bad at taking pictures, i mean im no pro but i get some decent shots here and there with my cameras. The one thing that frustrates me more then anything though is taking 100 pictures and getting none that turn out!!! I feel like that happens with my D 80 especially the more i try to make setting changes to get better pictures. Im in the process of learning but i’m a perfectionist and i haven’t mastered this quick enough for my taste!!

 

So if anyone has some advice i would appreciate it! A few questions and picture examples below

Moving- not blurry but with the sun out white washed.

 

Just not as clear as i know it should be, i believe on macro setting zoomed pretty far in but i don’t know what i am doing wrong!!!

 

I feel like i can and should be able to get much better pictures, since i started playing around with modes like aperture priority and such i swear i’ve gotten worse pictures!! Grrrrr so frustrating. The main thing i shoot are dogs, usually moving, typically outside and with teenagers with them. I invite advice!!!!! EliteInstinctCanine@gmail.com

Franky’s big adventure

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Frank made his debut kayak trip last month and a week later got a follow up with the seniors from the school. I don’t think i have ever seen a pug take to the water like this guy!

Franky watching the world go by

 

He was so excited he jumped into the kayak on his own!!! Most of the time he just soaked up the sun and enjoyed the cool breeze.

King of the world!

 

Frank is a wonderful dog, he has overcome many issues since he first entered the pack 3 years ago. He is trusting and confident now, he knows i will not put him in harms way and that he is safe and secure in everything he does. He surprised me many times on this kayak trip when he waded out chest deep in the water himself to swim, this is the same pup who walked into the deep end of a pool years ago and wouldn’t go near water.  The german girls helped him a lot over the last few summers desensitizing and showing him that water was ok. The power of social learning!

Frank watching the kids ahead

All in a days work

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Part of my job with my K9 partners is to search for runaway students from the school i work at teaching dog training, The Family Foundation School. Monday morning comes and I’m minding my business getting my lesson plan for the week together when i see a girl take off running. K9 Abby and I deploy with two flankers and get a direction of travel. She has a good head start on us and as the only K9 team out we make a search plan up as we go.  Checking frequent travel routes by runaways we pop out 4 miles later and get back to the school for a break and some food. Next we harness up K9 Raina and redeploy covering another 5 miles of potential land.

Raina with PA and the Delaware river behind her

Tuesday morning brings us back out again, this time covering another 4 miles with some beautiful views of NY and PA, some great quarries, and some hot weather. The girls did fantastic working tirelessly for hours and each got closure wednesday morning when they got to meet there subject after she was returned to the school. Unfortunately she has no idea where she went, but Abby gave us a pretty good picture.

Raina working the quarry

 

We gave the girls their “paychecks”  by giving them a short easy find with a lot of play time!!!

I’m always amazed at the level of dedication in the dogs and the people, especially my students who go out on the searches with me. It was a lot of miles and a lot of gator aid.

The view

 

I am a wild one

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Frank, Raina, Emeline, Abby

I have been absent for many months, but have no doubt the dogs have been busy!!! Life has thrown a few curve balls but I’ve managed to hit everyone, and i think i even scored a home run.

Many have thrown around the description “Tenacious”  lately to label my atheltic drives, stubborn bullheadedness, and desire to get what i want and need accomplished……….i guess it is a lot easier to say 🙂 Regardless i know who i am, and i am a perfect reflection of my canine companions, tenacious but still sweet and loving.

The year is 2012 and my goals remain the same, train dogs, save lives, and teach humans how to have the ultimate relationship with their canine companions through communication, consistency, and mutual respect. I hope your ready for a tenacious summer ❤

A very tiring holiday weekend

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Raina

 

Friday morning K9 Raina and K9 Abby deployed with me south of Utica to search for a hunter who went missing on thanksgiving. We were on the road by 5am and in the field as soon as we arrived.  We met Kara our flanker from Amigo and got Raina started first, working Abby later in the afternoon to finish up our area and recheck a couple places Raina had scent. The search was called off later that afternoon after he was located deceased. It was a sad ending but at least the family had closure. Raina and Abby worked about 7 miles total and were happy to get home and take a break!

Of course there is no rest for the weary and we were deployed last night at 7pm to Ellenville to search for a missing man. He had been missing for almost 22 hours already and K9 teams were out all day. We took the night shift working from 7pm till 5am this morning. It was a crazy night in rocky mountains and high mountain laurel up and down over the hills chasing scent and clearing areas. After 7 miles with Raina I got abby out to clear the rest of my area. She dragged us up to the same mountain top and worked scent all over till my phone rang. It was our subject, he thought he was on the mountain across the street from his house and he was cold, hungry, and not 100% coherent.  After the area was thoroughly checked with no trace we re deployed raina back in our area where the dogs had interest. The subject called back again, he was confused and scared and said people were chasing him, and he could see our flashing lights. I looked at my flanker from Amigo Erik and knew we had to step it up! Raina had a bright blue flashing light on her vest and i knew we had been closing in on someone earlier when he had called. Our suspicions were right he didn’t want to get found, he wanted to make it out on his own!! After a scary run in with a confrontational pack of coyotes we took our sticks and moved on clearing the rest of our area. We emerged from the woods and went home at 5:30am. Halfway home my phone rang again, our subject had walked out on his own an hour after we left down the street from his house! He was safe, the girls did great, and we managed a few hours of sleep before our week began again!!!