A question for those who've done Tracking

[Mojave's Mom]

I'm about as green as they come when it comes to Tracking....so forgive my questions if they seem off.

A quick run down: The local club I've "joined" (and I use quotations because I'm not so sure I'm going to stick with them long term) offered a sort of seminar put on by a lady who has a TDX on her dog. So I showed up and learned all about the equipment needed, some of the rules and then watched her demo with her TDX dog. She then offered to have us do some "go outs" where someone ran away from us, putting on a show by hollering the whole way then hiding behind a bush/tree. Then we were told to let our dog go (with us at the end of the lead following). When the dog reached the person, it was rewarded with lots and lots of treats. After the seminar, this same lady offered to have a couple more get togethers two weeks in a row following the seminar and I went ahead and showed up. She showed us how to lay track and we did more run outs.

OK, so now for the "problem" (or at least what I'm worried about). When I asked her how best to practice with my dog on the BASICS, she told me I should be going out and laying my own tracks and practicing this sort of thing on my own, with and without someone actually running out for me and my dog....and after just two "lessons" which consisted of my dog basically chasing another person to his/her destination...?? This seems very rushed to me...shouldn't there be basics taught first?

So I'm totally confused and thinking I'm just going to cut this group out and wait until the club down in PHX resumes it's tracking in the fall. I learned looonggg ago it's best to start things the right way when one does not know what they are doing and I'm already worried Kaiya might have caught onto the whole "I'm supposed to chase the person for the treats" and how she'll transition from that to an actual TRACK and something at the end of it (other than a person with treats). I haven't bothered to do any kind of go outs on my own for fear of screwing something up I'll have to go back and take lots of time to fix....

Am I totally off base? I realize everyone has different training methods and that run outs may be part of teaching all of this, but it all just seems like its so rushed (to be told to go out and lay my own track and then have my dog run through it that is)....where are the transition points? My dog doesn't quite get it yet, so how do I do what she said to do and succeed at the same time??

Sheesh I hope this thread makes sense!

Any advice is appreciated and I'd love to hear some personal experiences as far as to what training methods you used to teach your dog to track?

[MARYDVM]

Most beginning dogs follow a baited track to start. This gets their nose on the ground sniffing, and they are encouraged to eat their way down the track. The main problem in AZ is that within seconds of hitting the ground the bait is covered with ants. I did a lot of tracking when I lived back east, but after a couple of attempts here I gave up. I really enjoyed tracking in the past, but I just can't stand battling the bugs.

[fbkeays]

This "go-out" thing sounds way too much like SAR training then AKC tracking. If my goal was AKC tracking, I would not be doing this kind of thing at all. If my goal was SAR or for my dog to take the shortest route to the person/article, then this go-out thing would make sense. But in actually tracking we want the dog to forget about short cuts and focus on the actual path the person took.
In both AKC and schH style training, you want the dog to use its nose to follow the footsteps the person took. Granted in AKC, a little off the actual path and a little air scenting usually won't get you the whistle, but cutting a corner and bypassing actual legs is a huge no-no. In AKC tracking the tracklayer is usually somewhere behind the dog during the test. You don't want the dog to go to the flag, take the scent and then head backwards to the tracklayer. In TRACKING, the goal is the path, not the person. In SAR the goal is the PERSON and rarely the path (unless it is for an evidence search).
I think you have a right to be uneasy about this training if it is for tracking and not SAR.

[Storm]

So many different methods, opinions, styles and reasoning behind it. Bottom line get the dog to put its nose down, follow the track and understand what this concept is. Foe what I do I would run in the opposite direction, with my dog, as this woman ran int the bush. LOL!

Sch style foundation proves very succesful for AKC style tracking, my dogs always scored from 95-100 for kennel union tracks. Kennel union style tracking will cost you points in sch, generally! Depends on type of education.

Some say with sch style tracking the dog always tracks as if he never knows where the food is and that is what keeps him going which is bollocks, the dog knows where the food is and can usually smell it miles away. The difference is IMO it becomes an act of obedience where the dog offrers the behaviour knowing it will get rewarded for the behaviour. Track association with food is the easy part, track obedience for food is the hard part!