Using the Mantrailing App

Last week, I had a great days mantrailing with some fellow instructors, who have all been instrumental in my development so far - Jane, Emma and Lynn. For me, it was a great opportunity in practising laying trails for advanced dogs, giving feedback ( all the dogs were awesome) , asking the questions one didn't know one needed to ask, and getting advice and feedback on the above!. My dogs each had an easy trail, but the real learning was for me. Clarifying what feedback people want during the trail, ensuring my body language doesn't ' give ' the game away ( it is soo easy to hang back when the team is searching away from the trail , even though I knew I shouldn't!).

On all the trails I used the mantrailing app - and recorded as the runner and then the dog . I don’t use the app all the time at all, but I did find it useful to aid in telling handlers what happened where, with a visual reference. Two trails were also done on a similar route so one could compare where the different dogs too different routes to find the misper.

For anyone not sure what I mean by the Mantrailing app -it is an app where one can record the trail of the mister, and then record the handler and overlay the trails on it. The trail of the misper though, may show where the ground scent started off, but doesn't show the drift of any scent from the trail.

An example of this is from a trail I had done previously. The second half of the trail was in an open airfield. You can see the divergence of the trail ( the trail goes from top to bottom) where the scent has shifted.