The Rule of Consecutive Tens

[oksaradt]

I've ticked off more than my share of recovery dog handlers with what I felt were honest comments. I realize that we all have different priorities in life and I respect others' choices. One of my terms that's gotten me in more than my share of hot water is telling a dog handler that I consider him or her a hobbiest. Usually this comes after we observe their dog and no progress has been made. This is followed by excuses that they've been involved with other issues in life. Fine, life happens. The dog hasn't progressed. Don't get upset with me if I don't impart further help until you and the dog have accomplished the next set of tasks. Please understand that I never get paid for what I'm enduring. I willingly go out during crappy weather in crappy conditions for free and help others train their dogs. In trade I get to observe their progress if we get a call-out and I might have to rely upon them and I get someone to set up some blind problems for me and my dogs. Doing this for free means I don't have to suck up to the dog handler like the professional dog trainer who they'll be handing a check to at the end of the session. My focus is on getting the dog up to a working level. If they dissapoint me because of lack of follow-through, I'm not going to smile and make it acceptable. If they worked their butt off and just couldn't get it, I'll meet with them privately and do whatever it takes if the dog has the potential.

So, with that venting, this is a rule of thumb that was engrained into me to get my dogs up to working level. Murphy got to step off into this early because he's showing that he's ready early on. I usually don't start this until 16 weeks of age.

My personal philosophy is I train HRD dogs solely on non-tissue elements of human remains for the first year. That means bones, teeth, hair, skin, and fingernails. The hair and skin comes from my (and others...yes we swap sometimes...just gruesome) Norelco razor where the shavings are dumped into a container to sit for a minimum of six months to decompose. I also get hair from old style barbershops, other handlers, and my own....again aged. Old hair takes on the texture of brittle fibers. There are many "experts" in the know that preach against training on hair, fingernails, and teeth as they feel there is no unique scent in such items. I know I've made investigators very happy finding a deceased's hair when searching. I'll continue to train for my customers. I also come from a background where I did mostly historic human remains work for some time. In decades to centuries old remains, the above is all that's left to work on..


So, finally to the Rule of Consecutive Tens. Some of my cohorts will be ticked at me sharing some of the information I'll impart over time, but if it helps some that are totally confused by the books from the "experts" out there, it will be worth it. It's also been my experience that few handlers are disciplined enough to follow through on this.

Murphy has started on his first "TEN" of hundreds of "TENs". I set up a course of flag cross-hatchings where the visual intersections of the flags tell me exactly where the sources will be. The sources in this round are piles of four "historic-level" teeth, i.e. teeth that have no pulp inside and no remnants of tissue outside....the scent source is solely the dental material. Over a 100 foot course in 4 inch tall dead grass, I had five sources placed. The flags are spaced 10-20 feet away from each source. This also teaches the dog that the flags don't indicate scent. It's a fairly common mistake for a handler to train their dogs to indicate on flags as the handler wants to know where the source is. The problem with this is later on when you and your dog are asked to confirm or deny someone else's finds that they've flagged. You want to know your dog did or didn't find scent regardless of the flags there. It's not uncommon that I'll place my own flags a distance away from the original flags as my dog said the source was in a different location.

So, Murphy got to work his first course of five sources in an area 100 foot long by 25 feet wide with the sources at 10, 30, 50, 70, and 90 feet in the center. Murphy has a natural touch, so when he finds the source he looks at me then turns back to the source and slaps a paw down upon it. I reward if he's at the intersection. I demand this from the start when many handlers are happy if Rover is within their comfort zone....a couple of inches, a foot, 3 feet...just glad to be close. Murphy got all five. I set up the other five this morning. If Murphy gets all five of those, I'll set up a new course with 2 teeth per pile. If Murphy gets all ten of those, I set up a new course with a single tooth per pile. If he misses any in a run, we start over at zero. If he can't get the first one in a new level, we go back to the last level and again have to get another 10 in a row.

Murphy gets the single teeth, then we start putting teeth underground...four teeth at four inches, two teeth at four inches, one tooth at four inches.....four teeth at 8 inches....on and on. It's been my experience that I can stop worrying at 18 inches depth.
I also have to vary soil compositions as clay does one thing to scent, sand does another, high compost percentage does something else, etc.

Murphy got a treat with the first five as we got an inch of snow which is easy buried as the "soil" is clean frozen water crystals with lots of air for scent to travel through. He got to work those after working them on surface once. After three, he decided that digging in snow was great fun, so we stopped with the snow for this time. That he nailed three sets of teeth under 1 inch of snow just pleased me to no end as he's 14 weeks of age.

So, by following the Rule of Consecutive Tens, I always ensure my dog was proficient at the previous skill levels before going on to the next. Most SAR dog handlers succumb to the "what ifs" , the "just this once", "let's see what he does". I have the same temptations and when working with other people it can be very tempting, but if Murphy does something beyond his current skill level, it doesn't mean we're going to skip levels in his training. I believe in building a very solid foundation in the dog's training.

Murphy will also learn elevateds the same way, 10 consecutives at 2 inches up, 4 inches up, 8 inches up,12 inches up, 16 inches up.....on up to 20 feet overhead with nothing but air for the scent to drop down from. He'll have to be able to find the location of the highest concentration of scent in the air and indicate on that spot. He'll have to do this with confidence and commitment where I might play at arguing with him to see if I can make him change his mind. When he's at that point in buried, elevateds, water, buildings, etc.......then I'll consider him ready to do real searches.

Oh yea, I'm quite obsessed at what I do and consider the label of "anal" as a compliment.


Regards,

Jim

[HRD Handler]

Jim,

I'm working my way through your older posts...

At this stage, what are you doing as far as aging the problems (with the sources on the surface)? Are you reusing the same 25x100 foot area? If so, how long do you wait between picking up the sources from one problem and placing sources for the next problem?

What do you do with a puppy that naturally figures out that your trail leads to source?

Thanks,
Joan

[oksaradt]

Jim,

I'm working my way through your older posts...

At this stage, what are you doing as far as aging the problems (with the sources on the surface)?
++
Depends on conditions. If it’s really dry out and hot, I’d probably leave them out overnight for surface. If it’s humid, I’d leave teeth alone for a minimum of 4 hours. I’d leave bones alone for 2 hours. Leaving the sources longer is more true to life. I’d try to work the dog in optimum conditions as the point of each level is to recognize the dog’s nasal sensitivity has increased as well as its work ethic. So, I’d avoid working them in full sun. At most group trainings you will see bones put out and worked 15 minutes later. This is artificial and rarely reproduces what the dog will come across in real life. The longer you leaves sources out without fear of scavengers, the better for training. ++


Are you reusing the same 25x100 foot area?
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I have enough land at my disposal that I never use the same area for increases in difficulty. That way I avoid any chance of residual or my having to worry about rewarding the dog where stuff used to be. Ok, never is not true. I don’t reuse the same area within a year minimum for skeletal.++



If so, how long do you wait between picking up the sources from one problem and placing sources for the next problem?
++

For surface it really depends on the skill level of the puppy or dog. I set up training problems with a mix of what the dog has passed, easier problems, and the next level of difficulty thrown in. When I’m confident the dog can do ten in a row, I’ll then set up 12 (or so) and run the dog through it. Whether the dog passes or fails, those 12 sets will come back up after maybe a reinforcement run where the dog gets a easy day of picking up what it already found using a “show me” command. If I’m dumb enough to do this with worse conditions, I may set myself and the dog back to having to re-level. Which I’ve done twice in three dogs. It never hurts to repeat what the dog should already be able to do.+++





What do you do with a puppy that naturally figures out that your trail leads to source?

+++

I love this question as it always comes up sooner or later. As part of my routine when I set up problems, I walk, skip, run, roll, rub trees, whatever all over the area as well as blank areas the dog will be expected to go through on the way to where the sources are. I basically put my scent everywhere. It’s pretty evident if a dog tries to solve the problem trailing me OR (more importantly) another dog. I’ve observed way more dogs (including mine) cheat by trailing previous dogs that worked the problem. To avoid this when I’m working multiple dogs, I run a rotation of who works when. I also set a suspected culprit up by working a dog on a long negative and then leading it to another area where sources are then I work the second dog over the same negative area with sources in a DIFFERENT area. I let the second dog check everywhere the other dog walked. If marking occurs, I correct it as we’re here to search not politic. You can’t fault a smart dog for trying to use all the clues possible, so you teach it that certain clues can lead to more frustration than easy wins. I do the same thing with flags because working cemeteries with multiple dogs can place flags everywhere. To be thorough, it’s good to run another dog over the primary dog’s flags to confirm or deny finds and to possibly find some graves the first dog missed. If you allow a dog to just seek out the flags then you get questionable results. So, you’ll see in my problems that I set up that I like to use outer flags to give me visual intersections of where the sources are. The dog can check those flags all day long as there isn’t any source close to them.

Good questions.

Jim

++++

[jespinoza]

Very interesting Jim and Joan. I'm glad there patient people like ya'll out there. I was asked to handle a drug dog once at a previous place of employment. I am normally pretty good with dogs (not great by any means), but I declined the dog job because as I stated to the agency. I want the glory of making the find but I am to selfish with my personal time to give this dog and the agency what it deserves.
I see that a lot of that out there. And that is the reason people in all levels of law enforcement appreciate people like ya'll. I understand where you are coming from when you say hobbiest. It is the glory handlers want and not the work that comes with it. after all it is hard work.
This was not posted to offend any handlers out there, but to thank the ones that actually try to do it right.

John