We have turned a corner with scent detection! We started with wintergreen oil, and special scent detection boxes, and are now officially off the boxes and onto actual room searches and new, random scents to find! It's mostly DD's work at this point, but I still enjoy it from the sidelines and do hides sometimes.
I hid a bolt tonight from DH's workshop, an object DD picked so he wouldn't want to put it into his mouth and try to 'bring' it to us. On the first try he walked around & eventually felt it was too hard, and so shopped around for items in the living room to 'bring' instead. Feeling like it was hopeless he grabbed Raggedy Ann and went into a down with her for DD, as this is his 'alert' signal. Sorry bud, Raggedy Ann is not it. So we restarted him. (Turns out even dogs try and cheat, lol)
Bolt is just in front of the box, the little black dot to the left in the shadow. He started to catch a little something in the air..
But....then the 'this is too hard' look on his face again.
Sorry buddy, gotta keep going! He stood for a bit looking for instructions, so we just stood there 'like trees', as we were taught in class. Totally neutral while he has to work it out. He thought for a minute.
Made it around the box! Went immediately into a down position to tell us he found it!
His face looks kinda wierd from this angle as opposed to from above, but that's just his 'working hard at this job' face. He crouched right over the bolt really well, its right under his nose and he's holding a very still position, perfectly on top! Phew, took some work to get here but he's really getting it! I think training him on the car keys would be great next!
and what a smart pup.
