Testing our new ideas

I am home from the Dave Kroyer Seminar and keen to try out the new ideas, whilst I still have everything fresh in memory. 

The main difference between what I have done with Gollum and what I am testing with Hero is Gollum learned the search first and then he himself found a way to communicate the find to me (a way to alert).

Dave Kroyer teaches the alert first and then he adds the search. This will be interesting to try with Hero as Hero never found his own way to alert me to the find. He is efficient in his search, but unless I know where the hide is, I would not be able to tell from what Hero does. He can't communicate to me, where it is. 

Hero and Gollum are very different. Hero is a full speed and power machine. Gollum is a thinker. What worked for Gollum has not been perfect for Hero, so I will be excited to see if this works for him. 

Today we have had 2 short sessions of the target behaviour I want him to use to alert me about the find. I want him to freeze and stay with his nose on the find until I releash him. He is doing the target behaviour on a target, which has the lavender scent on it, so hopefully eventually, he will offer this behaviour everytime he smell lavender. 

Those that do not like this method says that if the dog gets frustrated as it cannot find the hide, it will offer a target behaviour anywhere to get rewarded, so I risk a lot of false alerts. Maybe I do. I don't know, but I am willing to try. 

So this is one of our first sessions. 

Otherwise we have been in the woods, reported the results from last weekend's shows to the Kennel Club and been grocery shopping as we had no food in the house at all. 

See you tomorrow
Emmy and the Hazyland Boys