Skye is a Border Collie and Search & Rescue Dog with SARDA Wales. I have had her since she was 7 weeks old and have trained her specifically for Search & Rescue since I got her. I am a self employed Mountaineering Instructor and member of Llanberis Mountain Rescue Team and she often comes to work with me during the day. You can find links to the various teams and to expeditionguide.com below.

Monday 30 November 2009

Skyes First Time in the snow

I went out for a walk today to check out the snow conditions, Skye came along and enjoyed her first time out in the snow.


Sunday 15 November 2009

SARDA Wales Training Weekend

I have been in bed for the majority of the week gone by with some sort of flu virus which has been a real nuisance. I took Skye along for training yesterday afternoon for an hour with SARDA Wales and did some run outs. Today we headed along again and spent the morning in the Llanberis Pass. We increased the distance on the run outs and also added some obstacles in the dogs way, such as wet boggy ground on one occasion and a dry stone wall on another. This kept the dog thinking and allowed me to push her a bit. The longer runouts showed me where her comfort zone currently is and I finished the day on a high with a couple of shorter ones. The video shows what a run out is and was taken at the start of the day today.
This weekend has been an assessment weekend and congratulations go to all of the handlers and dogs that have passed and many, many thanks to the bodies.

Tuesday 10 November 2009

Getting the sequence


The early stages of search dog training are quite exciting because things are moving quite quickly. This week Skye has progressed with her game of hide and seek to the point where she is now coming back to tell me she has found - with a bit of prompting.

I have had a few days off and also been practising in the evenings on the days that I have been working. This weekend saw the whole family (we have 4 kids) plus Skye heading off to Warwickshire for a family wedding. Skye slept in the van and we enjoyed some training in the grounds of Ettington Park, a fine manor house that is reputedly the most haunted hotel in England!

The game has now progressed so that when Skye arrives at the body they ignore her and I hang back. She began to get frustrated at this as she wanted to get on and play with her toy and so started barking at the body. I praised this as it is no bad thing, continued to hang back and then recalled her to me. Once she arrived I prompted her to speak and then ran with her to the body asking her to show me.

A couple of days of this and she is getting the idea. This is the really important part of the training so I will continue at this for a while now to get it nailed. I am doing the run outs into the wind to get her subconsciously scenting for the body and I am varying the distance and location as much as possible.

Sunday 1 November 2009

Wild camping and daily training


I took Skye wild camping with some clients of mine last weekend, we had heavy rain and 80mph winds - typical rescue weather! As you can see from the photo she got very wet but was very well behaved in the tent, sleeping quietly in the porch all night.

This week we have been continuing with the very early stages of the search dog training. We have been making the most of my kids each evening doing short 10 metre runouts. This weekend we have progressed the game so that Skye now has to wait until I am at the body with her until the game starts. This very early stage is really important as we are teaching Skye that finding a body means a great game with her toy. She is having lots of fun although we do get some funny looks from other dog walkers!!