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to CyberHound How to handle a tracking dog is one of the most important but misunderstood aspects of tracking. As a judge, I have seen dozens of handlers pull their dogs off the right track and cause their dogs to fail a tracking test. As an exhibitor, I have succumbed to the temptation of trying to second-guess my dog's tracking behavior. This article, the first in a series, will explain the purpose of handling, its proper limits and a few introductory points to help you become a good handler.
In a previous article, I explained the AKC rules about guiding, and how the purpose of a tracking test is for the DOG to find the article(s), not the handler. However, the handler's role in both training and exhibiting is crucial. If nothing else, good handlers don't mess up their dogs.
The main purpose of the handler in a tracking test is to not inhibit the dog's tracking performance; it is NOT to help the dog find the article. This is AKC tracking; not search and rescue or man-trailing (person-trailing?). Although the handler can help the dog over difficult obstacles (TDX) and disentangle the lead at a tracking test, the handler cannot help the dog find the track or encourage the dog to go one way or another. This is often hard to remember when you do these things in training.
In training, you might want to handle differently than at a test if your dog has a training problem. If, for example, your dog has been overshooting turns, then you want to make sure than you know where the turn is next time, so you can observe the dog's behavior. By gently correcting the dog before it has gone too far off the track, you might solve a training problem in this way. This requires some guiding in training, precisely what is not allowed at a test. When you have solved such a problem, you might then want to go back to a blind track (where you don't know where it is), to get rid of any bad handling habits you might have picked up while correcting the dog's turn problem.
I know a woman whose dogs (not Bassets) used to look back at her at turns, because they had become so dependent on her body language to tell them where to go. This subconscious problem was caused by the handler not running blind tracks. She had no idea that she was causing a training problem for the dogs because she was telegraphing where the track was. This can also happen if the person who laid the blind track tells you when your dog is only one or two steps off the track. By not giving you some leeway to overshoot a turn and see if the dog corrects itself, your tracklayer is doing you no favor. A blind track where the tracklayer tells you immediately when you are off the track is not really a blind track after all! Blind tracks are necessary for you to learn to be a good handler at a test (again, not to help the dog, but simply not to inhibit him).
Several common handling errors often result in teaching dogs to hate tracking (inadvertently). Dogs who get mixed signals from their handlers sometimes stop tracking, because they have no idea what is expected of them. Remember, it doesn't make any difference whether your handling mistake is intentional; the dog doesn't know. If you accidentally step on the lead while your dog is tracking for example, this can have a devastating effect on the dog, who might think it was a severe correction.
Learning to handle the lead smoothly, without jerking it, is one of the most important skills that tracking handlers can learn. The following method was taught to me by Glen Johnson, the author of "Tracking Dog: Theory and Methods." Mr. Johnson, recently deceased, was one of the foremost tracking trainers and educators. Most trackers I know today train with at least some of Mr. Johnson's techniques.
Handling the lead behind a tracking dog is like raising kids; you wish you could learn to do it properly somewhere else before you make mistakes with the kids. Well, with lead handling, you CAN learn some of it without messing up your dog. All it takes is two people, a tracking lead, and the courage not to be embarrassed by looking a little silly.
This is an exercise that teaches tracking handlers how to place the proper tension on the lead, how to deal with a slack lead, and why you don't want to jerk the lead when handling. To start, one person is the "dog," and the other person is the handler. The "dog" ties the lead around his/her waist, and the handler keeps a slight tension on the lead, following about 15 to 20 feet behind. The "dog" walks forward in a straight line, and the handler follows. As the "dog" speeds up and slows down, the handler can practice keeping an appropriate amount of tension on the lead. The goal is to keep a constant slight tension, but without jerking. This is not as easy as its sounds.
Next, the "dog" should purposely deviate from the track left or right. The handler should then increase the tension in the lead as the "dog" gets farther off the track. This increase in tension, gradually applied, is a way of telling the "dog" that he/she is off the track, and more tension is applied the worse it gets. This is a form of "guiding" for the purpose of training the dog to stay on the track. By practicing with a person and not a dog, you can develop the difficult skill of keeping tension without jerking the lead. Once the first person has practiced as a handler, he/she now trades places and becomes the "dog."
By being the "dog," a handler can feel the jerkiness of the other handler before he/she develops the skill to be smooth. By being in the dog's shoes, so to speak, a handler can better appreciate why bad lead handling can produce training problems. By practicing this technique a few times with another person before handling the dog, you can develop a smoothness that many handlers never learn. I cannot emphasize too much: GOOD HANDLERS DON'T FLUNK THEIR DOGS.