Post by oksaradt on Dec 28, 2008 14:30:53 GMT -5
On more than one occasion I’ve observed a frustrated handler watch their dog work all around a scent source yet not indicate/alert. Sometimes the source might be in plain sight and the dog still doesn’t find it, much to the handler’s embarrassment and confusion. …….”the dog must be broke, aye?” This same dog may have worked the hell out of other scent sources just previous to this and afterwards, but all the handler can remember is the dog couldn’t find the one. This dwells upon the handler.
What is sadly more common often times is the handler (who is visually ruled) decides the dog must need the source pointed out. The handler sticks their finger in guiding the dog and “surprise” the dog finds it and alerts. Has the dog really found the scent source….ummmm, no. The handler feels better. The dog is worse. I’ve observed handlers, whose dog has done a great job, got close to the scent source, alerted, and targeted to perfection, who still insist on showing their dog where the scent source was.
Humans are visually oriented. Dogs are scent oriented. That’s why we need the dogs. Creating a “visual dog” will bite one in the back side every time. Teaching the dog that an “object” is putting out the scent convinces the dog that it must identify an “object”. So, let’s say we have an elevated scent source who is “dripping” scent down upon a metal bowl (for example), the bowl collects the scent to a point stronger than the source above. The bowl is an object, just full of scent….BY GOLLY I”LL TELL MY HUMAN THIS IS IT!........sowwy, game over, go to the back of the line. This scenario is much more common than we’d like to think.
Repeat after me, “Humans Look. Dogs Smell.” We compliment each other. There is no reason for either of us to try to out do the other species in their expertise.
So, what the heck is going on?!
?
Contrary to one of the popular books on training cadaver dogs, unless human remains are in active “warm” decomposition, most of the diffusion is at the whim of temperature gradients and air flows. (TECHNICAL ALERT. Good old boy/gal handlers can stop reading.) Hot goes to cold. Warmer air will push towards colder regions.
Example 1: I put a strong decomp source in the ground at a depth of 8 inches early in the morning. It turns out to be a bright warm sunny day. At dawn, the soil temperature of the grass-covered soil was something like 48 degrees with an air temp of 34 degrees. After being a live-human scent source for the area dogs for hours, then the dogs can work the buried which has been in the ground…..say 3 hours. The Air Temperature is now a comfy 57 degrees while the soil….is now up to 49 degrees (Farenheit). The dogs struggle. The experienced dog that knows when it’s handler says “glue your nose to the ground” that it should grid tightly and vaccum the earth does indeed locate scent AT THE SEAM OF THE BURIED. The other dogs only get it if *sigh* their handlers point it out.
Do the dogs suck? Warm air, cold soil, air flow is pushing down into the soil, and source has been there a very short time, so diffusion out into the soil is minimal at best.
Now, work that same source in the same hole, the next morning where the soil temperature is again 48 degrees and the air temperature is a cool 37 degrees……The dogs find the scent 5-8 feet away and narrow in to target. Same problem, different conditions.
Example 2: This is my favorite as I can torture handlers to no end with it. Any one that works with me knows I have duct tape available to tape hands to sides and feet together (if the handler decides to shuffle close to the source…..you laugh….I’ve seen handlers point with toes, kick clods toward a source, on and on in their desperation for the dog to find scent.)
For me this is the epitome of the scent void. A bone is placed on an insulator, say handy dead tree bark. The air is colder than the soil, so diffusion from the bone drops down on to the insulator till it reaches soil. The warm air coming out of the soil pushes the scent up and out away from the insulator. The dog will pick up scent all around the insulator. If the insulator is put at the top of a slope, the scent will rise up, hit cold air, and be pushed down the slope. The dog will work like crazy all below the source, but when it reaches the insulator the scent disappears. I’ve observed great dogs walk over such bones time and time again. The credit to the dog is it’s not visual. Again, the dog usually will make the find by 1)its nose hits the source and it has an ah-hah moment; 2) The dog moves the source onto the soil in its search and suddenly scent is readily available; 3) ohhhh, the handler cheats….pretty common and we all have our moments of weaknesses.
So, what’s the point of all this. To be a decent handler, we must come to learn how the scent (our dogs hunt) works. We must learn that the best time to work buried (of any kind) is when the soil is warmer than the air. And, (to me) water is just another form of buried, so when the water temperature is warmer than the air. Seems simple, yet I’ve had more law enforcement than I care to count call me with recounts of a search and I ask simple questions as to temperatures, terrain, time of day worked, etc. I recall one agent that told me of a large black dog the handler worked at the hottest time of the day to seek out buried IN SUMMER. He was not happy when I was laughing over the phone and said, “I expect the dog was simply hunting shade at that point.” Unfortunately, I was right.
To become a decent HRD handler, the digital meat thermometer must become one of your tools IN TRAINING. When working problems with your dog, if it totally ignores a source and you just don’t know why….don’t talk the dog into the find, figure out why it couldn’t get scent. Run another dog over the area IMMEDIATELY. If the other dog gets it, it might be training. If the other dog has just as much trouble, most likely the issue is the environment you’ve accidentally come upon. The other dog doesn’t get it, the race for your thermometer. Pay attention to sunlight about the source (it warms the air) versus shade (cools the air). Get a temperature reading of the source if possible. Get a temperature reading of those materials conducting thermal energy to your source. Get a temperature reading of the air about your source. Why go to all this trouble? So, you can recreate the situation and teach the dog how to cope with it without your help OR (and just as important) learn what environments are best to search in and what environments can make searching for scent near impossible at the time. Search Smart.
The nice thing about working HRD is you can schedule when you work with law enforcement. The “dead” are not going anywhere. If it’s part of a criminal investigation the suggest that perhaps working the morning will be more conducive to a find than working mid-day (or visa versa….there are times when working in the sun of winter is an advantage).
In this arena, the dog is your partner in learning how the scent works as long as you’ve built a solid foundation with it. Once my dogs reach a certain point in their scent work, I have the utmost respect for what they tell me the scent is doing and I learn from them in that regard. To be egotistical to the point of, “I can see the source. The stupid dog just is just blowing me off!”…….ooooo, if I had a quarter for the many times I’ve heard that I could buy my own Starbucks franchise and get my coffee for free.
So, there is plenty of food for thought. Go experiment. Go learn from your canine teacher as he/she has much to tell you.
Jim
What is sadly more common often times is the handler (who is visually ruled) decides the dog must need the source pointed out. The handler sticks their finger in guiding the dog and “surprise” the dog finds it and alerts. Has the dog really found the scent source….ummmm, no. The handler feels better. The dog is worse. I’ve observed handlers, whose dog has done a great job, got close to the scent source, alerted, and targeted to perfection, who still insist on showing their dog where the scent source was.
Humans are visually oriented. Dogs are scent oriented. That’s why we need the dogs. Creating a “visual dog” will bite one in the back side every time. Teaching the dog that an “object” is putting out the scent convinces the dog that it must identify an “object”. So, let’s say we have an elevated scent source who is “dripping” scent down upon a metal bowl (for example), the bowl collects the scent to a point stronger than the source above. The bowl is an object, just full of scent….BY GOLLY I”LL TELL MY HUMAN THIS IS IT!........sowwy, game over, go to the back of the line. This scenario is much more common than we’d like to think.
Repeat after me, “Humans Look. Dogs Smell.” We compliment each other. There is no reason for either of us to try to out do the other species in their expertise.
So, what the heck is going on?!
?Contrary to one of the popular books on training cadaver dogs, unless human remains are in active “warm” decomposition, most of the diffusion is at the whim of temperature gradients and air flows. (TECHNICAL ALERT. Good old boy/gal handlers can stop reading.) Hot goes to cold. Warmer air will push towards colder regions.
Example 1: I put a strong decomp source in the ground at a depth of 8 inches early in the morning. It turns out to be a bright warm sunny day. At dawn, the soil temperature of the grass-covered soil was something like 48 degrees with an air temp of 34 degrees. After being a live-human scent source for the area dogs for hours, then the dogs can work the buried which has been in the ground…..say 3 hours. The Air Temperature is now a comfy 57 degrees while the soil….is now up to 49 degrees (Farenheit). The dogs struggle. The experienced dog that knows when it’s handler says “glue your nose to the ground” that it should grid tightly and vaccum the earth does indeed locate scent AT THE SEAM OF THE BURIED. The other dogs only get it if *sigh* their handlers point it out.
Do the dogs suck? Warm air, cold soil, air flow is pushing down into the soil, and source has been there a very short time, so diffusion out into the soil is minimal at best.
Now, work that same source in the same hole, the next morning where the soil temperature is again 48 degrees and the air temperature is a cool 37 degrees……The dogs find the scent 5-8 feet away and narrow in to target. Same problem, different conditions.
Example 2: This is my favorite as I can torture handlers to no end with it. Any one that works with me knows I have duct tape available to tape hands to sides and feet together (if the handler decides to shuffle close to the source…..you laugh….I’ve seen handlers point with toes, kick clods toward a source, on and on in their desperation for the dog to find scent.)
For me this is the epitome of the scent void. A bone is placed on an insulator, say handy dead tree bark. The air is colder than the soil, so diffusion from the bone drops down on to the insulator till it reaches soil. The warm air coming out of the soil pushes the scent up and out away from the insulator. The dog will pick up scent all around the insulator. If the insulator is put at the top of a slope, the scent will rise up, hit cold air, and be pushed down the slope. The dog will work like crazy all below the source, but when it reaches the insulator the scent disappears. I’ve observed great dogs walk over such bones time and time again. The credit to the dog is it’s not visual. Again, the dog usually will make the find by 1)its nose hits the source and it has an ah-hah moment; 2) The dog moves the source onto the soil in its search and suddenly scent is readily available; 3) ohhhh, the handler cheats….pretty common and we all have our moments of weaknesses.
So, what’s the point of all this. To be a decent handler, we must come to learn how the scent (our dogs hunt) works. We must learn that the best time to work buried (of any kind) is when the soil is warmer than the air. And, (to me) water is just another form of buried, so when the water temperature is warmer than the air. Seems simple, yet I’ve had more law enforcement than I care to count call me with recounts of a search and I ask simple questions as to temperatures, terrain, time of day worked, etc. I recall one agent that told me of a large black dog the handler worked at the hottest time of the day to seek out buried IN SUMMER. He was not happy when I was laughing over the phone and said, “I expect the dog was simply hunting shade at that point.” Unfortunately, I was right.
To become a decent HRD handler, the digital meat thermometer must become one of your tools IN TRAINING. When working problems with your dog, if it totally ignores a source and you just don’t know why….don’t talk the dog into the find, figure out why it couldn’t get scent. Run another dog over the area IMMEDIATELY. If the other dog gets it, it might be training. If the other dog has just as much trouble, most likely the issue is the environment you’ve accidentally come upon. The other dog doesn’t get it, the race for your thermometer. Pay attention to sunlight about the source (it warms the air) versus shade (cools the air). Get a temperature reading of the source if possible. Get a temperature reading of those materials conducting thermal energy to your source. Get a temperature reading of the air about your source. Why go to all this trouble? So, you can recreate the situation and teach the dog how to cope with it without your help OR (and just as important) learn what environments are best to search in and what environments can make searching for scent near impossible at the time. Search Smart.
The nice thing about working HRD is you can schedule when you work with law enforcement. The “dead” are not going anywhere. If it’s part of a criminal investigation the suggest that perhaps working the morning will be more conducive to a find than working mid-day (or visa versa….there are times when working in the sun of winter is an advantage).
In this arena, the dog is your partner in learning how the scent works as long as you’ve built a solid foundation with it. Once my dogs reach a certain point in their scent work, I have the utmost respect for what they tell me the scent is doing and I learn from them in that regard. To be egotistical to the point of, “I can see the source. The stupid dog just is just blowing me off!”…….ooooo, if I had a quarter for the many times I’ve heard that I could buy my own Starbucks franchise and get my coffee for free.
So, there is plenty of food for thought. Go experiment. Go learn from your canine teacher as he/she has much to tell you.
Jim