Reply To: Rachel & Vidoc FE520

[Alana McGee]

Thanks for the great in-depth answer and observations!!!

I will ask my herding instructor for a couple small, fresh truffles for Vidoc so we can take advantage of our last training week before we have a “video training – feedback” break for a couple of weeks.

[quote]I would argue that it was something else at play, not the truffle odor itself. Remember Dog?s nose?s are exceptional for detecting odor, we just have to try to get them in the right place to do so, and understand if they don?t alert, what exactly is going on. Was it the environment, or why did the source not meet Vidoc?s previous specifications.[/quote]
That puzzled me too as I know my dogs have brilliant noses. I think 2 things happened:
First we had a nice long walk in the woods. And I got yelled at again… This time 3 angry old women because my dogs were off line. They were wrong (dogs are allowed off leash) and it really aggravated me a bit that so many people have the need to let off their steam at the next dog person they see. I don’t think the walk with all the sniffing tired Vidoc (nose and/or mentally). Then it was windy too.
But the main thing could be that we were training with Italian truffles for quite some time. Since we started training I bought only 2 truffles. This new one had a very strong odor (still has even in the glass jar but less the ones I wrapped in paper towel and used already). Since he easily showed me each hole (I didn’t need a marker to see it but will do so the next few times) maybe he didn’t generalize this new truffle with the other ones.