Nose Work trial

Mr. Gollum did his first Nose Work trial today and he was a good boy!

Nose Work is a dog sport created to mimic professional detection dog tasks. The dogs must find a hidden target odor and alert the handler.

There are 4 elements in a Nose Work trial and an element is a specific type of search area. The 4 elements are:

Interiors - the interior building search takes place on the inside of any building. In class 1 (novice) the search is just one room, but in the higher classes it can be multiple rooms. 

Exteriors - exterior searches take place outside, often it contains grass, dirt, cement and/or gravel. These searches can be especially difficult for the dogs as there are a number of new smells (trash/food, animals, etc.) and weather conditions can be a challenge too. 

Vehicles - vehicle searches are 2 or more vehicles. The hide is always on the outside of the vehicle. Today we had a car and a trailer. 

Containers - the types of containers used vary. It can be plain, white cardboard boxes. More advanced levels use luggage, plastic bins, etc. Today it was just plain boxes. 

Gollum did really well. He marked too far from the hide in the exterior search. I think the wind carried the scent away from the source, so he marked where he thought it was, but not where it really was. 

The 3 other elements were just perfect. I am very very pleased with him. 

It has been a long day. We were at the trial from 9 am to 5 pm and Gollum used less than 4 minutes on the searches,, so there was a lot of waiting time. I spend some of the time talking to people and just hanging out, but I also took the boys for several walks during the day. 

My pictures today:
Top left: Gollum waiting for his first search.
Top right: The waiting area.
Bottom left: The boys on one of their walks.
Bottom right: Gollum with his Nose Work result book. 

See you tomorrow 
Emmy and the Hazyland Boys