Tips on training my Choc Lab to track blood

[Ricky Stanley]

hey guys, I understand the idea of getting my choc. Lab to associate Deer blood with "food" or (something posative). I dont want him tracking the smell of fur or the deer itself i need him on the blood so that he doesnt track all 20 deer that were in the field for that week. i havnt started anything with him yet so no bad habits are formed but im thinking that i should have him 1)smell the blood 2)give a treat, smell the blood, give treat, ect, ect, about 20 or 30 times. then make a trail of blood through the yard for him to follow with a deer hide or treat at the end of the trail. so on and so fowarth... please let me know if im on the right track or if there are any tips that you can give me. the dog is 1 year old in october. he will sit, lay, very good at stay, a great retreiver and WILL NOT take off after the toy that i throw until i give him the command "go get him". walking through the woods he will "heal" (stays right beside me at all times). he is a very good dog and as obediant as you could expect a 1 year old to be with no shock collar training. i am not against a shock collar im just too broke to buy one. as a matter of fact Cowboy is so obediant that he doesnt even where a collar because i dont use a leash with him. (i will use a leash in the feild with a real tracking senario so he doesnt get away from me)
I have tried him out with a T-bone steak and im concerned because he never picked up on the scent. i fed him about 3 small peices of steak and told him to stay. i tied the steak to a string and dragged it (out of his sight) through our living room, down the hall, and into the bed room behind a chair. (i know this might have been a mistake doing it inside the house but i have not and will not do it again until i know what im doin) cowboy >the lab, was a little too excited running around and sniffing everywhere but not on the trail. he reminded me of a young child guessing at math problems. his nose was everywhere but he was going too fast and would cross right over the trail with no intended pattern (he wasnt zig zagging the trail). how do i get him to calm down and pick up the scent and stay on it???
lol if you cant help me please help Cowboy he deserves a better training job than what i am doing right now...

im new here to the GON forum so forgive me if i make a mistake on my first couple of post.

 

[Bkeepr]

Hi! Labs are traditionally used as blood tracking dogs in some parts of the south. Cowboy wants to please you, he just needs some more work to figure things out. You can find some good info at www.unitedbloodtrackers.org.

Motivating him with food is a great idea, Labs looove food and if he equates finding a downed deer to eating he will work real hard.

If you have some venison at home, next time you thaw some out to eat save the bloody drippings and some chunks of it. Put the bloody drippings in a baggie and poke a hole in a corner so it will drip. You can make a trail in the back yard with the drips and leave some chunks of venison at the end of the trail. At the start of the trail give your command for him to "find it" or whatever you use. When he gets to the end of the trail and gets to the meat praise him. If you don't have venison, a bloody piece of beef liver will work. You can tie it to a string, attach the string to a pole and then hold it out to the side as you make the trail so your scent does not interfere. Of course, don't let him eat the string! Later you can try this in the deer woods where there are lots of distracting smells.

Best of all: tell all your friends, if they make a clean kill on a deer, call you and Cowboy to find it, even if they know where it is laying. Let him find easy deer, even if they fall where they are shot. He is smart and will get the hang of things quickly. Good luck!

 

[Ricky Stanley]

thanks a ton bkeepr, i didnt think about holding the meat out to the side to keep him from smelling my tracks... and ill check that website out, thanks again...

 

[sadler2]

I have done the drip bag thing when i had my beagle and that work really well....what I done was when I killed a deer cleaned it and got what blood I could from the deer put it in the bag and froze it...when u get ready to use it thaw it out and go for it. I also heard of guys taking a sponge and sucking blood up with it and then trearing it into pieces and make a trail out of that. I used that last method once the dog wanted to eat the sponges so I stoped with that method.....but when he got the hang of it he done great...good luck to u and your dog keep us updated

 

[Ricky Stanley]

thanks for the tips yall, i had a local deer cooler give me a call to let me know that they had some remains for me. i had told them of my plans with cowboy so he agreed to call me anytime one of his customers brings a deer in. so with a bag full of guts and a deer hide in tow Cowboy and i went out yesterday to work on trailing for the first time he just seems to be a natural. i made 3 seperate drags from easy to hard. the first one was 200 yards with a ton of blood. i filled a pillow case with the guts so blood would leak out easily and dragged the hide over the blood. the second was 300yards, and the the third was about 500yards. by the third drag there was very little blood left but cowboy found the trail everytime and all the way to the deer. he did come off the trail about 3 times on the last drag but made about a 10 to 15yard circle and got back on the trail. the only thing i wish he had done different is kept his nose to the ground i think he was getting excited and kept shortcutting the trail. he also wanted to go really fast so i held him back just enough to keep from dragging me but i also didnt want him to think he was in trouble. (when i was teaching him to heal if he got out in front of me i would tug on the leash enough to let him know and he would slow down and get beside me) i also talked the wildland FF on the phone last night (awesome guy) he told me to use a longer leash about 30' and let cowboy weave it through the trees if he needs to, i guess i need to teach cowboy to slow down first though (not sure)... well you guys have a good one

 

[gsu51]

How old was Cowboy when you started this? I have Two labs I would like to try and trail train. Berkley and Bandit are 1 1/2 years old. Do you guys think they can still pick this up? Both are smart dogs the gyp is smarter but Bandit has more drive!