Eleven pounds 4oz was what the scale read at ten weeks of age. He squirmed a little more than at his last checkup, but managed to show off his ability to drag his leash behind him without getting tangled up in it. His boundless energy was hard to keep up with at times. I had yet to find an alternative chew toy to my area rug, and the termite hole that was in my living room wall was slowly getting bigger, although strangely absent of termite activity.
On February 1st Quincy and I were voted in as full members of
LaSAR. Finally an official member of the team, I could contribute both my opinion on matters and my skill sets to help where needed. The first item on the agenda was that of the upcoming seminar,
Land and Water HRD, that Lisa Higgins (our lead trainer and nationally respected handler) instructed and which was our primary way to earn money for the team’s needs. Attendees were coming from everywhere to get Lisa’s expertise, from as far as Washington State, to Nebraska, and Tennessee. Although Quincy wasn’t old enough to participate, I could bring him and work him on the side whenever I could fit it in. This turned out to be a great opportunity for him to socialize and be exposed to new things.
Not only was I able to absorb a vast amount of information in a short amount of time, that weekend held a bunch of firsts for Quincy too - it was his first time in a boat, his first time to walk across the grated bridge over the lock on Pearl River, and his first rumble on the beach with a pack of search dogs. He took his longest walk as of yet, dashing in and out of the legs of the other dogs that were running free along a trail in the woods. He was in dog heaven. When there was a break in the schedule we worked on his run-aways, progressing him to search without using auditory cues to get him to my location which was by now fully hidden behind a tree. I was pleased in how well he was progressing with his training, and he definitely was a social dog.
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Grated bridge over Lock One at Pearl River.
Very unnerving for a lot of dogs, but so far Quincy crosses without difficulty. |
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| Quincy found the sand worthy of digging through to China. |
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| So many things to explore! |
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| Socialization just doesn't seem to be an issue |
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| Messy giving Quincy a digging tutorial |
It was interesting watching the other dogs train as I had never seen first-hand how a water search worked. The dogs came to the seminar with a range of experiences but all left with a good foundation in water search. They quickly caught on to locating scent in the open water and with repetition were able to indicate to their handlers when they had come upon the source. After hours of observation it became easier to identify when the dogs were in the scent cone and when the nose suddenly reached down to the water, with the tongue often lapping at the air, it was a sure bet the source was right below the boat. It was truly amazing to see how well these dogs could pick up the scent of decomposition under moving water while riding in a boat. I learned quickly that it was usually not the dogs that were making the mistakes, it was their handlers. I tried to make as many mental notes of what not to do, as I was of what to do.
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| Lisa working the dogs on the boat on land to firm up their indications before putting them on the water. |
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| The dogs working the scent cone trying to find the source. |
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| It's amazing that the dogs don't (usually) fall in when they hit on the source! |
In the week following the seminar my little furball surpassed my five year old dog in height. We also had our first obstacle in his training regime. His training came to an abrupt halt after my husband was hospitalized for 6 days. I tried to keep positive, knowing that we would just have to backtrack a bit when we resumed. I decided that this would be a good opportunity to do more socialization with him. So he socialized at numerous friend's homes, with their dogs, and their kids, for the entire week while I stayed at the hospital. The change in scenery didn't seem to bother him in the least, and luckily when training resumed he fell right back into where he left off after a day of review. He is consistent with his runaways and is starting to put his nose to the ground as they get more challenging for him. I can't wait to add the next challenge - hopefully we will progress again this week!
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| This is not what I meant by a run-away... |
