Last Saturday we ran two water blinds from one side of the pond and then moved the starting line to the other side of the pond to run a long water blind.  A blind is where the dog is sent to retrieve a bumper or a bird, but the dog has no idea where they have been placed in the field.  The dog’s handler must direct the dog using arm signals.

Water blinds are some of the most difficult concepts for dogs to learn.  People watch a well trained dog working a water blind and think there is nothing to it, but that could not be further from the truth.  Many a dog has blown a test on a water blind.

Think about it this way:  You point a dog at water and send the dog, but the dog must hold a straight line until it gets to the water, must enter the water on the same line and then must swim for as long as possible using the same straight line.  The dog is tempted by smells in the field, but the dog cannot stop to sniff.  The dog may be tempted to check something out in the water, but the dog must stay on the line.  The wind may be blowing across the dog or the dog may have to contend with a cross current, but the dog must fight it and stay on that line.  Sometimes there are sticks or logs in the water, but the dog must ignore them.

Try it sometime with your dog.  Stand back from the water 30 or more yards and send your dog and see how long they hold that line into the water.  That is what we are working towards.  The longer the better.

This particular water blind required the dog to make a long entry and exit on the land.  The entry was down a hill.  In between the dog had to swim parallel to the bank of the pond.  One more point of difficulty was that the handler had to handle (or direct) the dog over a strip of land.  You may recall that for the previous water blind the handler was keeping the dog off a point of land but now the handler wants the dog on and over the strip of land.  All this plays into the difficulty of this blind.  Last but not least the wind was a factor for these blinds because it was strong and dogs tend to fade when swimming into or across the wind.

The purpose of all of these training exercises it to hopefully trip the dog up so that the handler must handle the dog.  As a handler, you want to practice handling during training so that when you get to a test, your dog will be familiar with what it needs to do.  Hunt testing is not like many other dog sports where you can practice each and every concept.  For example in agility, the dog sees a jump and when you point to a jump, dogs jumps, or tunnel, dog goes through.  Obedience you practice all of the commands, and it is just the order that may throw the dog off, but basically they are the same elements you have practiced.

In hunt testing there are infinite things that can change a concept and throw the dog off.  You may point a dog at the water but that does not always mean the dogs needs to get into the water the quickest way possible.  For example, this blind requires the dog to enter the water perpendicular to the bank.  This is an easier entry than the first blind that the dogs ran which required an angled entry.  Sometimes the test will be set so the dog must not get into the water at all but run in a line next to the water.  Don’t forget wind tends to blow scent around adding more difficulty and pulling the dog off line.

Despite the difficulty with this water blind, Freighter did a very nice job.  He held his initial line down the hill from where his handler sent him to about 1/2 way through the first section of pond (about 1/2 way to the land strip).

He started to fade a bit so his handler stopped him and gave him a “back” command and he adjusted.  He was stopped again on the strip of land to direct him over.

I think Freighter needed one more cast to keep him on line once he got over the land strip.  There were so few handles on this blind, I did not get a picture.  This blind was running parallel to the bank of the pond and Freighter must have learned from the blind he ran just before this one because he did not try for the bank at all on this blind.  In fact if there was any criticism he was probably a bit too far away toward the very end, but that is OK for where he is in his training.

The blind was up on land so the dog had to leave the water in order to get there.  Because of the strong wind, the dogs were having a tough time hearing whistles at the end of the blind, but most dogs could smell it and if they carried their line they got there.

Coming back Freighter was a bit confused because the helper went over to make sure he got back into the water and no running back on land.  Again, the wind prevented the dogs from really hearing their handler so we did not want Freighter to develop a bad habit.  He did get back into the water and carried a nice straight line back to his handler.

Very very nice job Freighter boy!