German Wirehaired Pointer Club of America

[Eric]

Can anyone give me some tips on training for the tracking phase of the NAVHDA natural ability test. My dog recently was at CKC field trials and was great, he also loves to swim so I think we have those areas of the NAVHDA test covered. I would like to reinforce/enhance his ability to track well.

Thanks - Eric

[Jon]

What leads you to believe that he is not going to track? How is he tracking now? What have you done with him so far?

[whiskerdog1]

Couple of things. I start young dogs on food drags-its a fun game. Lay a track with feet-rub foot onto ground and place liver treat, small cheese every 3 feet to about 20-30 feet starting out. Move on to drag a pork chop on a line-use work "track track". When they hear that word the nose goes right to the ground-expect to find something with their nose. Mine loves a pork chop! Wife says track when kids drop food on ground so she doesnt have to pick it up or throw it out-dogs run over with nose to the ground looking for a hot dog.
I then went to bunnies and ducks as they got older and before vjp test. This will work well for what your doing. For blood tracking the command is a little different but much the same in theory.
Didnt use phez because I never ran Navhda but will work just the same.
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Real men hunt Wire Dogs

[Eric]

Thanks for the input and ideas. I have been doing the dragging exercise and I think he would have done very well in the test. Unfortunately the NAVHDA test has been cancelled due to lack of entries and there are no others close enough that are scheduled before he turns 16 months old. Too bad, I wish more people were interested.