Time: 3:30pm
Location: Home - Living Room
Description of Environment: In my living room, many boxes and much clutter present, carpeted flooring, this time Mollie was *not* in the search area for half the searches, Frodo seemed less distracted but I believe the competition from the other dog does motivate him to search harder, if less accurately.
What practiced: elevation; hide out of view/obstructed from dog; threshold work
Hides used: small plastic container, without lid, containing TOTW kibble as well as small salmon pieces.
Who hid the hide: Myself
Environmental considerations: We had just returned from a good walk before I searched with him, it was warmer out than normal and he does not like the heat. Could potentially be why he was less motivated to search for longer periods?
Findings: I need to realize that temperature influences the searches, and that the warmer the environment, the less Frodo actually wants to work. During Nosework a dog's body temperature does rise due to the amount of energy being expended. He seems to have less issue with threshold work at home than he does in class. This could be due to the class room being much larger. Though he does not start actively searching at the threshold in either environment.
Trial 1:
Like the last practice session, I started this session with an easy search to let him know it was working time.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Du2oxurf81w
Trial 2:
This time Mollie was in the search area again and Frodo did not seemed stressed like he had last time.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9h34YCqcS0
Trial 3:
This was our threshold search for this session, and as you can see as soon as the gate opens he blows right past the entrance and doesn't start working until he is well into the room. I am thinking I need to do less holding him back before the search and see if that helps. Next session I will have the gate already open so as soon as he gets close to the search field he can start working and not have to stop before the threshold.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seKS5GhbyCw
Trial 4:
In this one I did end up moving closer to the hide in order to try and draw him closer without being obvious and showing him where the hide was. While I do want to challenge him during searches, I also want them to be on the short side and very rewarding so that he builds a high search drive and thinks that searching is the best game ever!
He also caught the scent mid jump and just about fell over himself trying to stop! I would say there is search drive there, motivated by insane food drive of course :)
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn3guDl25gQ
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