Fading out the food?

[ShatteringGlass]

I've been teaching Sydney tracking for a bit, started with food in each step, then every other or so step, but she was getting so concerned with finding ALL the food in the steps, she would blow pass the article, or be right on top of it and still look for more food in the steps. So i started really enforcing her article indication, and when she would get to the article and pick it up, she would get a special treat of canned food. So now im at the point of balancing the food on the track and the reward at the end for finding the article. I dont want to use too little food on the track that she gets confused when theres none there, or too much so that she starts to care less about finding the article. I tried a couple really short tracks with like 3 or 4 pieces of food in the steps, and she did ok, but i could tell she was loosing the track, but she has done excellent article indication, picking it up right away. So how should i fade out the food on the track so i can be sure she understands what scent to follow? I dont want her to become too dependent on the food on the track.

[Kayos and Havoc]

She already has become dependent on the food which is why I don't use food.

Had a lady come out tracking with us about a year ago. Her GSD was not progressing as fast as she thought she should. So I laid her a track and "forgot" the food. The dog never noticed, ran her best track to date and now has a TD.

Now, some dogs do need some help and I have used food on the turns a few times but I do not start a dog with food. I do not want them hunting food.

Since you have started with food you have to continue fading as you are. How many articles do you put out? You might want to increase your articles and put a piece of food on your article, and then feed a piece from your hand for the correct indication.

I do not put food on articles either but use several articles and feed from my hand at the article.

Most trackers use food, I am in the minority on this.

[GSD07]

Kathy told me not to use food so I haven't because I knew nothing about tracking so I did what I was told I can say that I'm very happy with the results.

[Kayos and Havoc]

And Yana will probably soon be ready to certify and title.

[GSD07]

She's really getting better and better every time we train. I did two tracks with her last week and I was left with the feeling that she deserves a better handler than I am because she did so good.

[ShatteringGlass]

thanks for the tips, I thought using food with Sydney would be best, she has EXTREME food drive lol, its pretty hard to get her interested in doing something when theres no food in it for her. A guy I work for part time trains schutzhund dogs and he uses the food in the footsteps method, so thats how i started with Sydney. I think I just need to really fade out the food slowly over time and she will get it, i think im the one being a little too impatient. Im only using 1 article, and in the beginning i would put food on the article, but now she picks up the article as soon as she finds it so i feed her from my hand.

[Kayos and Havoc]

I have always started with multiple articles and fed at each article to keep interest up. This also helps you with training article indication and re-starts.

My "baby" tracks generally have an article every 10 to 15 feet for a pup and every 15 to 20 feet for an adult. Then with each track I space them further and then start eliminating articles until I have one per leg or sometimes one every other leg - but that is well into training. I always have more than one artilce per track as that is where the reward is.

Schutzhund folks work very hard at that stylized, methodical, slow footstep tracking so they use a lot of food. I also like a dog with a deep nose and committment to the track but as an AKC type tracker I am not as concerned about being as methodical as a Schutzhund tracker.

Use of food is fine if you chose to use it. I am not that against it but would prefer not to use it as I do not want my dog hunting for hot dogs. It has to be faded and it sounds like you are moving in the right direction with it. So I would just continue a systematic elimination of it.

Tracking + patience! (I have little patience too).

[ShatteringGlass]

Thanks Kathy, I will try adding more articles. Today I went to a local field to do a small track, and I realized I left my cloth glove at home, so I took off my sock, poor Sydney had to pick up my stinky sweaty sock!

[Kayos and Havoc]

And I bet she loved it!!!! I use old stinky socks, gloves, pieces of leather, plastic lids, metal objects etc. Just scent them up as you walk along and drop them on the track.

[lhczth]

Since you started with food in every footstep just start removing it little by little. For example 10 steps with food, 3 without, another 5 with food, 2 without, etc. I do use food on my tracks, but not in every footstep even in the beginning. Even my experienced trackers will still have a few pieces at the start, a piece after the corner, one right after the article and maybe a couple on long legs most of the time. I do vary all of this. I primarily do SchH tracking.