Controlling the dog's speed on the track is one of the most important aspects of training for schutzhund, and one of the areas where many trainers have problems. Some dogs are naturally fast, but many speed demons are created by their handlers. I will address both. Too much speed intensifies the conditions in which signicant problems such as missed articles or missed corners (or worse), can occur. Think of it like this -- if you're driving down a residential neighborhood and have to make a turn at a corner you will only know when you read the street sign -- do you think you have a better chance of negotiating that corner correctly at 100 mph or at 30 mph?
The first question you must ask yourself is 'why is my dog tracking so fast?'.
I will address the handler created speedster first. There are many things you may have done (or not done!) in your training that can contribute to an increase in speed. Not necessarily in order -- they might include the following - not spending enough time during your foundation training getting the footprint to footprint habit instilled, not realizing that the ball at the end of your track is really the only thing your dog cares about, not having your dog understand that tracking is an obedience exercise not a race, not controlling your dog's speed when you first notice it was becoming an issue, tracking the same pattern over and over, not making the track difficult enough to elevate focus, and others.
In the beginning stages of tracking (for food) we teach the dog the behavior of searching in each footstep by rewarding that behavior with a small bit of food. This helps create a dog that is both accurate and slow. Problems often occur when trainers, in a rush to build track length, start spacing out the food too soon, thereby focusing on the wrong priority, i.e., more length and not the correct behavior from their dog (methodical deep-nosed tracking). The best way to help prevent speed caused by this error is to take more time during the early stages of your dog's tracking training, really establish the footprint to footprint behavior and wean off the food very gradually with intermittent reinforcement, even going back to food in every print once in a while, even if it's not necessary. Speed problems created by weaning too quickly are difficult to fix by "starting over" and are usually better dealt with by other means. In other words, try to get this right from the beginning (but understand that even if you do this correctly, you may still end up with problems).
Some people track with a ball or other toy as motivation at the end, and for many dogs this is just fine. With my current dog I use a small plastic tub of sardines. Why? Because for Pax, knowing he is getting a ball to play with at the end of his track creates a serious problem, i.e., excessive speed. Even taking the ball away and pulling it out of my pocket after the last article proved to be too much as he was able to read my body language and anticipate at the last article, becoming restless and wanting to break the down. So for a period of time, the ball was not given until we left the field. This was a pick your battles situation. Could I have applied force and made him comply -- of course I could have -- but applying force in tracking is not the same as in obedience or protection. While you do have to use it, as you will read below, for what and where is much more problematic in tracking. Ending up with a dog that quits or comes back to you because of improperly used force on the track is one of the worst things that can happen to you in training, or trial. So while some dogs can easily handle a ball or other toy at the end, some dogs cannot -- in the sense that a drive that is useful to us in other aspects of training, may be detrimental in this phase, mostly by causing excessive speed and hectic behavior.
As I have said before, tracking is an obedience exercise. It is not a fun walk in the park or run along the beach, though many dogs love to do it. As your dog becomes more accomplished at this task and gains confidence, a natural tendency in some of them is to do the behavior faster, which we do not want in tracking, as opposed to getting faster retrieves, for example. Unfortunately many handlers do not even notice this change creep up on them as they are so happy to see their dog make progress they kind of let things go, until one day they wake up and realize their dog is dragging them down the track. So how do we strike that correct balance of force and motivation while minimizing the chance of negatively impacting our dog's tracking?
We take an an approach that allow us to use a variety of tactics in a random order (random as far as the dog is concerned - not the handler).
You must answer several questions about your dog in order to know which of the following to apply, to what degree you apply them, and how often. Can your dog take the pressure of a physical correction from you? To what degree? Do they bounce right back if given a toy (or other reward) after doing the correct behavior? Is this a puppy or mature dog? How accomplished a tracker are they? Do the know corners? Do they know articles? Apply common sense. Recognize that we do not handle a 6 month old puppy the same way we do a 3 year old dog.
Speed control
Tactic 1:
A simple correction from a prong collar (via a second leash), accompanied by a verbal correction (such as pfui) followed, by an "easy" command (and a recommand to track if necessary) followed by verbal praise upon slowdown. The goal, as at the beginning, is to have the dog track with a slack in the leash.
This behavior (and correction) is best taught away from tracking, preferably when taking a casual walk with your dog. Go to a place where you can take a nice long walk with your dog. A 15 foot leash is ideal. Put on both his fursaver and a prong, but ony connect to the prong. Let him walk ahead and explore. No tracking commands, no heeling commands. Just free walking. You want the dog to start pulling so that you can correct him with a quick pop of the leash, accompanied by a verbal correction (pfui) followed by the "easy" command, which simply means "don't pull on the leash" - something he must and will figure out . When the dog complies you may praise him and allow him to continue on -- as long as the leash stays slack. You repeat this until the dog will walk on a loose lead. You test your progress by waitng for a situation where the dog starts pulling on one of these walks and just give a verbal correction. If the dog stops pulling you are headed in the right direction, if not, you need to immediately correct physically, and work on this until the correct behavior is established.
You do not want to ever give such a strong correction that your dog feels compelled to come back to you or lay down. Be careful! The reason we do this away fom the track is to minimize any negative impact such corrections might have on the dog and desensitize him (somewhat) to the idea of a correction while at the end of a leash and not concentrating on you ( getting him used to the idea that such a correction might occur), so that when you do use it on the track, it will be less of a big deal.
When introducing these corrections on the track to the fast tracking dog make sure you have done enough of these corrections on casual walks and you have strong reason to believe the dog will resond properly to the correction without falling apart or quitting on the track. In the tracking situation you may initially have to offer extra encouragement for the dog to get back to tracking (verbally). This is fine to start with and can be faded later. Keep these tracks relatively short so if you apply pressure, that way it can be relieved relatively quickly at first, by the dog finishing the track. Build the track length back up later. Always remember your primary goal -- at any stage of training. And rember,too, your dog does not understand why his stupid human cannot keep up with his pace on such an easy thing as a track. For him, slowing down may not seem to make much sense.
Once present, speed is a difficult behavior to change. If you go through the website and watch videos of Drago it would be hard to believe that when I started working with Anthony this dog was an absolute speed demon. He was not changed overnight, either. It took well over a year of constant hard work on Anthony's part to get the incredible tracking you now see. And he still does every track with two leads, always ready to correct his dog when necessary.Renember -- always strive for the goal of being able to have your dog track on a loose/slack leash.
In time this may be the only thing you need to do to slow your dog down, but there are many other tricks in the bag that can help slow down your dog while at the same time making him a better and more reliable tracker.
Tactic 2:
Use the track itself to slow the dog down by increasing difficulty, adding articles, and other means that force more concentration from the dog.
While tactic 1 involves active intervention to achieve the goal of a slow tracking pace, it is not the only way this can be accomplished. Using a variety of design elements you can lay out your track in such a way as to create conditions that promote slower tracking.
Putting more food along the track may indeed slow your dog, but as a means of correcting an unwanted behavior I think it is not very useful because when the food is taken away these dogs will often speed right up again. The best place for heavy food use is in the beginning, when you are creating the tracking behavior you want.
I prefer, instead, track design elements that, among other things, add difficulty and foster increased concentration. The use of these, of course, depends on the level at which your dog is already tracking.
Amomg these are the following:
Serpentines - gentle curving of the track off the centerline from one side to the other. This curvature creates a condition in which your dog cannot race straight ahead, but instead has to slow down and concentrate more or risk losing the track. It is important to stay close to your dog when first attempting these - to help prevent circling if he does lose the track (a behavior we never want).
Increase terrain difficulty - Some of you may have already noticed during the course of your regular tracking training that when you dog passes from an area of easy terrain to a more difficult one he may slow down an d concentrate more. This is quite natural as the difficulty increases and is something we can use to our advantage if we plan properly. Look for an area where the terrain is more difficult than your dog is accustomed to. Lay relatively short tracks there and see if this helps promote concentration and yields a drop in speed. Be very careful not to apply force here if your dog gets a little hectic when he encounters this new problem. As is my advice in most situations when something new is introduced, stay close and encourage. Let him work out the problem and learn from the experience. That is the point of training and the more problems he solves, the better he will be. Move back and fade support as behavior improves.
Age - Track age is another passive factor that affects difficulty. If your dog has no problem at 30 minutes increase the aging time to 45 minutes or an hour. This is one area where I think people often underestimate their dog's ability. The main problem with aging tracks on a regular basis is that it takes a kot more time to set up the track. Other than that, it is an effectve tool for adding difficulty, increasing concentration and slowing down the dog.
Speed bumps - We all know what they do - they force us to slow down. Of course, the ones we construct on a track look nothing like those we encounter whrn driving, but their effect on the dog is the same. What do they look like?
More coming soon
