As part of our training day Saturday we ran a couple of blinds.  A blind retrieve is where the bumpers (or a bird) are set in the field, but the dog has no idea where they have been placed.  The dog’s handler must use hand signals to direct the dog to the bumpers.  It can be quite a challenge because the dog has to stop on a whistle, turn, and look for direction.  The blinds can be as long as 100 or 150 yards at tests.  When running blinds control over the dog is key.  Training blind retrieves is a big part of our training routine.

One of the blinds that our trainer set up was a “poison bird” with a blind.  A “poison bird” is a bumper thrown as a mark.  Usually it is a very simple and straight forward mark.  The dog watches the mark and then must run a blind retrieve right past the mark.  The dog must not pick up the “poison bird” mark until directed to do so by its handler and usually after the dog has run the blind. The challenge of poison birds is making sure that the dog does not retrieve the mark instead of the blind.  The handler has to have enough control to stop the dog with a whistle and cast them away from the mark to the blind.  This is a great way to make a blind more challenging and to work on control.

This a diagram of the set up.  The mark was thrown from the right and the blind was run straight up and under the arc of the mark.

Poison Bird
The Mark (Poison Bird) Was Thrown Right To Left And The Blind Was Run Under The Arc Of The Mark

Storm did pretty well on this set-up.  The dogs had to go over a pile of snow for the blind, which added a bit of difficulty.  Storm took a bad initial line, trying to head to the mark or avoid the snow pile, but she was called back and resent and did a nice job on the blind, considering that she has not done much blind work since last November.

Some pictures of her work:

Storm Has Already Seen The Mark And Is Lining Up For The Blind
Storm Has Already Seen The Mark And Is Lining Up For The Blind
She Is Sent With The Command "Back"
She Is Sent With The Command “Back”
Headed To The Snow Pile
Headed To The Snow Pile
Whistle Sit To Get Storm Back On Line And A Command "Back"
Whistle Sit To Get Storm Back On Line And A Command “Back”
To Get Her Over The Snow Pile
To Get Her Over The Snow Pile
Another Whistle Sit To Correct Her Line
Another Whistle Sit To Correct Her Line
Back On Line
Back On Line (The Bumpers Are To The Right)
She Sees The Blind Which Is A Pile Of Bumpers
She Sees The Blind Which Is A Pile Of Bumpers
Good Girl Storm
Headed Back
Good Girl Storm
Good Girl Storm

Once the dog has the blind, they are then sent to pick up the mark.

Storm Getting The Mark
Storm Getting The Mark
Having Fun
Having Fun

Freighter ran this a little differently because he is not as advanced in his training.  He watched the mark and picked it up before he attempted the blind.

Freighter Watching The Mark
Freighter Watching The Mark
Sent To Retrieve The Mark
Sent To Retrieve The Mark
Digging It Out Of The Snow
Digging It Out Of The Snow
Good Dog
Good Dog

Even though Freighter picked up the mark before running the blind, it still worked to pull him over to where it had been.  It would have been that much harder for him if he had not picked up that bumper already.  Between the mark drawing him over to where it had been, and the pile of snow, Freighter ping-ponged a bit in front of the snow pile.

Lining Up For The Blind
Lining Up For The Blind
Whistle Sit To Correct His Line
Whistle Sit To Correct His Line
He Was Sent To The Right, But He Is Going To Try To Go To The Left
He Was Sent To The Right, But He Is Going To Try To Go To The Left
Another Whistle Sit To Try To Get The Correct Line
Another Whistle Sit To Try To Get The Correct Line
Finally Over The Snow Pile
Finally Over The Snow Pile But Another Whistle Sit To Get Him In Line With The Pile Of Bumpers
He Is At The Blind
He Is At The Blind
And Grabs Two Bumpers--Good Boy
And Grabs Two Bumpers–Good Boy

Freighter’s whistle sits were pretty nice.  He blew off a couple of whistles, but on the whole took the casts.  We just really need to work on blinds this Spring and especially water blinds if the water ever opens.

fitDogFriday_150x126We are joining the Fit Dog Friday/K9 Kamp blog hop hosted by Slimdoggy, Peggy’s Pet Place, To Dog with Love.

For this session of K9 Kamp the challenge was “hide and seek”.  Due to the weather we haven’t been able to work on this much but in the coming months the dog’s will be running lots and lots of blinds (our version of “hide and seek”).k9kamp new badge 2014

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34 thoughts on “Hide And Seek Brown Dawg Style

  1. Pretty cool! We love watching the labs train on weekend mornings in a field we walk by. Having just gotten about a foot of new snow and temps going down to below zero and single digits, it will be a while until our water opens up for sure!

    1. That may be a bit difficult for me because we sent both Storm and Freighter to a trainer to teach that part of their training. Hubby taught Thunder but that was a long time ago now. I will have to see if I did any posts on it way back when to help me remember…lol.

  2. I imagine it would be difficult for an inexperienced dog to go past something they saw fall, to find something they didn’t see. 🙂 Did that sound right? LOL

    Freighter is a good boy, he will get there.

  3. Great pics. Glad you guys got a fun training day in. Love that the exercises are tailored to each dogs’ skill level. 🙂

    1. That is the beauty of working with a professional trainer. He helps us work on the thing that matches where the dog is in his training.

  4. Great pics! Glad you guys had a fun training day! Its neat that the exercises are tailored to each of the dogs skill level 😀
    –Siamese Smothers–

  5. How very impressive! 🙂 I’d love to see your dogs compete, it must be really cool! Thanks for sharing these great pictures and that wonderful diagram!

  6. Love this. I actually think Rudy would be good at this and probably would love it. Poor boy is stuck with us…

    1. Thanks. But to be honest both Freighter and Storm went to a pro to be taught whistle sits. We just reinforce. Hubby taught Thunder but that was a long time ago now and I am not sure I remember all if it. I will see if I have an old post on it. 🙂

  7. Hi Y’all!

    Freighter, you aren’t foolin’ anyone! I know why you brought 2 bumpers back! That dang snow is COLD and freezes the snoot and feet! The quicker you get the bumpers back to the crazy humans the quicker you can get home and lay in front of a cozy fireplace!

    Y’all come back now,
    Hawk aka BrownDog

  8. What a fun hide and seek challenge and hard poison birds are hard so you guys rock for choosin this for your kamp fun. Norman used to bring back all the bumpers too, must be in the cursan lines. LOL

    1. LOL you might be right about why Freighter tries to do it. I hope he inherited more than just bringing two bumpers back. teehee 🙂

  9. Your version of hide and seek is great! It seems like it is so much fun for them as well as providing training. It doesn’t feel like spring is around the corner with the way the weather has been lately, but we should be getting there soon I hope!

  10. this is super cool! I’d love to train my dogs in an activity like this…

    I also wish we had so much snow like you guys do! So much more photography potential haha. We don’t have a single crumb of snow here in Southern California… LOL.

    ~Fiona
    http://lancerandrara.blogspot.com/

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