I have this book, but found it quite hard going initially. I am ashamed to say that I didn't follow it to the letter - but did follow its methods and do have a good tracking dog (so far anyway)

To my knowledge Ivan has not done any tracking books. I have been on a course with him when he was in the UK but only on obedience and protection.

http://www.fleming-plumb.ca/videos.html

Joanne was the person whose name I was trying to remember

I joke - I don't mind

We train our dogs for the cold scent tracking of deer for the event of a deer running off after either a RTA or a bad shot by a marksman. It is what our breed was bred for. Not everyones cup of tea though

Thanks

1. We practise mantrailing. Food is left only at the end of the track to mark its end (if she follows a track put by somebody = no human at the end) or as additional reward for finding a "victim". My dog has been trained to follow human track right from the beginning, I've never put any food on the trail.

2. see above

3. At the beginning a member of the family just walked (100 yards, later 200, then with turns, etc.), and from time to time left more scent by flicking it from the garments or dry "washing hands". Usually we left a few objects on the track, remembering to change their number each time for obvious reasons. The objects were dirty socks, gloves, pieces of cheap T-shirts we slept in a couple of nights earlier, the dog's toys earlier kept in the pocket. The objects must carry the scent of the human who put the track. The beginning was easy because it's kind of natural for the dog to follow a pack member to make sure the pack is together.

Later at the beginning of the track we gave the dog an object of the "victim" to smell, so that she got into the habit of associating the object with the track.

Then we started exchanging the family members with friend she knew, and now we train her only on strangers or almost strangers.

If anybody is interested, I'd happy to share my experiences. I found mantrailing really fascinating and enjoyable, probably because my dog loves it

PS Ups, I think I posted under wrong topic, since you seem to have meant tracking for hunting? I apologize, will be more careful in the future

No you have exactly what I wanted to know I'd be interested in seeing some pictures of your dogs though Louie already has the hunting down but often his head is too far to the ground that he doesn't realise what he is hunting has already run off

Thank you

It worried me when my girl was tracking with her nose up and lowering it only from time to time, especially when following a fresh track, until our trainer explained that that meant she had excellent nose and was only checking from time to time if she was on the correct route. I can PM you a link to my picassa album with photos from our exercises

What I found a little hard in mantrailing is to be able to leave the initiative to the dog. Normally the human is (at least should be) the leader, in tracking - we must assume the dog knows better and trust her! It requires quite a bit of self-training!

Yes please I love CsV's
Self-training, so as well as learning to relax I now have to learn to trust Louie not to lead me on a wild goose chase should be fun

Haha... with time and practice they start treating tracking as real work, meaning that when they set on the track they tend to ignore distractions.

I was more than surprised when during the seminar, when I was heading with her towards the beginning of the track, Lorka ignored a deer that ran 10 meters away from her! Two minutes later I asked her to sit, she touched the object with her nose and followed the track as if she was completing a very important mission

CSVs when tracking seem very relaxed, as if they were going for a picnic . Sometimes they make spontanous breaks, but after a couple of minutes, return to work.