  Is there anybody out there? September 2004 A new chance to go on a training camp with the search & rescue-team showed up this autumn. Since I am a very stubborn person ;-) I had worked with Kims sudden and unexpected timidness towards strangers all summer. I had gotten a pretty good picture on how to build up his confidence on the last training camp.
This was as far as we had come when we went on training camp far away from home... Would it work? Would Kim go search for total strangers in a totally strange environment? That was not the biggest issue to deal with, as it turned out late friday evening when we arrived. The camp was put on a military area, where they were practising shooting from the minute we arrived, to the last minute we left... Poor Kim, he was terrified! And I gave up with a big sigh, thinking "that was that, now Kim will spend the weekend in the car, feeling bad everytime he hears a shot". I tell you, it was no fun.
And I have never seen him run like that between the trees, searching with high intensity for "lost" persons in the terrain. He had no difficulty at all to leave my side, he didn't need my support when finding the strangers that hid in the wood and he went out again and again during gun shots all around us! It was truly amazing... Any hesitation that he had displayed earlier, was gone with the wind. For two days we were doing search and rescue, and this time we got the basis done correctly. Since the wind was not to our satisfaction, we used an extra person to trigger the dogs will to go out and search. First person Y went out into hiding. Then we used another person (X) to play with the dog and give him treats on the path. After that, person X ran out about 5 meters in the terrain towards person Y:s hidingplace, calling the dogs name and showing the toy/treat.  Preparing the search exercises carefully is very important. All involved persons must know their roll in detail, because everything that happens once you take the dog out, is a learning experience. After that, the dog was removed and person X went back to the path, hiding behind the other persons in the group. By doing this, the dog has seen "someone" (person X) run out in a certain direction, and when the dog is brought back, person X is gone. The dog has the direction and placement of person X in fresh memory, and will most likely run out in that direction and start searching.
Can you imagine what I felt after this weekend? I wanted more!!! And I got more. Kim and I were invited to join the "pro's" on their search and rescue training at home. I will let you know how everything works out! :-) |
At first, I gave the lead to a person that Kim knows very well, and asked her to take him for a little walk and play with him and give him treats. Then I did the same thing with a person that I know well, but who was a stranger to Kim. Same nice result. We advanced by placing this stranger around the corner of a house for Kim to find. Eventually we could do a little search practice on a well-known person.
If it had been enough wind, we would have done the first exercises differently; letting the dog play with person Y on the path, be taken away while that person goes into hiding with the wind blowing from the hiding place out on the path, taking the dog back and send him searching ones he shows he has scented the person. We could do this on day two, when there was more wind. But both ways worked excellent with Kim.
