# LE opinion on SAR trailing dogs



## Misty Wegner

I'm curious what LE's opinion on trailing SAR dogs is elsewhere... Here, there is a prejudice against them. Probably due to claims made by those who feel their dog can do things above scientifically likely (or possible) and or hasn't been trained well... Once bitten, twice shy and all.. 

An area search dog is not faulted for going to ground if odor is there.. Unfortunately, a trail dog is often critiqued for going nose up should conditions change and odor rises or winds prevail... Now, in a search, few LE are going to call at the end of the day how the dog found the person just as long they find the person.. BUT, getting them deployed in the first place is the issue 

Police dog tracking is different and yet the same in many ways. The POD is much less due to the circumstances, and in all honesty, probably training (bite training is more fun then hoofing it behind a fast moving k9) in which the team gets deployed... Anyhow, I'm curious to how others view this and the success or failure having trail dogs in SAR have worked for them


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## Bob Scott

I think a lot of the negativity is from to many wannabes showing up at search sites.

That's followed up by many smaller, maybe les experienced law enforcement agencies not knowing the good from the bad.

The team I was on only responded when called but the FBI, Highway Patrol and other more knowledgeable LE groups. 

I saw my share of teams that just showed up and disturbed much of a search scene.


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## Tom Connors

What a LE thinks is going to be based on their experience with volunteer handlers. Since most volunteer teams use air-scent, not trailing dogs, not sure if that helps or hurts a trailing team.


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## Howard Knauf

Bob pretty much nailed it. In my county alone we have at least 40 dual purpose dogs and 6-8 bloodhounds. Depending on geographical location of the search...surrounding counties are just as well equipped. I've gone to different counties myself to assist other agencies. There's no need to involve civilians in the search as our resource pool is pretty deep. In smaller agencies that are more rural I could see civilian involvement but they would likely have had to prove themselves in the past through training examples and first hand experiences judged by police handlers previously already. Not saying that police handlers are the gatekeepers and are flawless, far from it especially in rural areas but, the stakes are too high to have unproven people mucking around when a life is at stake. It is what it is.

Not long after 9/11 some guy comes to our PD with an SUV that had all the cool stickers and crap on his vehicle. He even had a cool monster photo on the hood depicting a pic of his two dogs in the foreground with the twin towers burning in the background. He said he was at ground zero and recovered many bodies,,,alive and dead. Turns out he was just a huge wannabe. It only took a 5 minute conversation to vet him out and expose him for what he was. It's people like that who give good SAR folks a very bad name and cause law enforcement to be very wary of civilian handlers. Now, if any of of our handlers personally knew a person and could vouch for their skills we still couldn't use them unless approved by the brass. That would never happen at my agency, I almost guarantee.


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## Misty Wegner

I appreciate all the replies, thank you.. I will clarify a bit.. The team I am on works well and is respected by LE, and we are called out by the Sheriff's department and elsewhere.. Totally agree and understand about wannabee and ill equipped and especially ill trained (or no training) people showing up.. 

I've been told that "... I wish all dogs were air scent dogs (on the team)" by someone in the sheriff's department.. A good trail dog will operate in odor be it on the ground or in the air (as a good air scent dog would) but is scent specific and defaults to ground over air (in general)... In an urban search an area search dog can't be used but a trail dog could efficiently and effectively be used - but in our area, are rarely called upon.. 

Now, that being said, my dogs are proving that themselves over and over as is the other certified trailing team on our team and that perception will hopefully change soon.. But I've been curious as to what causes it (beyond what has been already voiced).. 

Also, while age on a trail, especially urban is fickle and dissipates or becomes hard to read/find quickly.. The perception on le'LE'S siis that scent is not viable after 2hrs so why call a dog team... I know this to not be true as I run double blind tracks urban on older trails... So again, wondering where the confusion lies..


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## Howard Knauf

Misty, where are you located?

You are one of the lucky ones to get your foot in the door. You obviously took that opportunity and impressed the right people. Enough so that they continue to call you. That said...city, and rural agencies usually have a different mindset. Meaning, sheriffs (elected position) or police chiefs (can be easily fired) likely is the driving difference. Small agencies will capitalize on free resources due to their lack of funding. Should that resource be a huge benefit well, good for them....as long as nothing goes wrong.  I'm sure the people in charge of those decisions have already thought them through...to include how to justify them or talk themselves out of trouble. 

Regarding the wish list of "all dogs being air scent dogs" well....that person likely doesn't know dogs well enough, or their multi faceted application in police work.

Count yourself as one of the lucky ones. Don't mess it up!


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## Misty Wegner

I will go as far as to say I'm in WA and a decent sized city. Im definitely sure alot has to do with self protection, which I can understand... The trailing teams especially, work exceptionally hard and always are aware that this has less to do with us and our dog and everything to do with the finding the lost soul... So ego is really not what drives my question... 

What drives my question is they why? The only way to help alleviate a fear, concern or misconceived idea that may hamper a call out... I do appreciate the response and insight


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## Bob Scott

Howard said

"Not long after 9/11 some guy comes to our PD with an SUV that had all the cool stickers and crap on his vehicle. He even had a cool monster photo on the hood depicting a pic of his two dogs in the foreground with the twin towers burning in the background. He said he was at ground zero and recovered many bodies,,,alive and dead".


Classic red flag from start to finish and outright BS on the 9/11 thing.


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## mel boschwitz

I'm K9 LE that started in the SAR world. I still regularly go to SAR seminars for extra training. I've seen some teams I would gladly call. And others I never would. I see handlers that are unfit with unfit dogs. Their dogs are lazy and unathletic. When I see stuff like that why would I want to call them? Where I'm at bloodhounds are very popular. But not every hound can work but try telling them that? 

Then add to it teams who make outrageous claims? Or downright lie? There's a team in my area that straight up lied to me. They are in my countybut they will never get a call out from us. How sad. 

I think too many LE have gotten burned by stuff like that. I know people who have fabulous trailing dogs that won't get called because LE has been burned by other people. 

Add to that the lack of standards to do anything in SAR and it's no wonder legitimate SAR people have trouble getting call outs.


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## Nancy Jocoy

The sheriff departments vary wildly in their own performance but I think the best way to have that respect is to simply train with them and let them see what you have. 

We do have a few trailing dogs because of the focus on contaminated aged PLS or LKP but figure you only need "so many" and our focus is to have the bulk of dogs air scent. Typically, we use the trailing dogs to establish direction of travel and focus the air scent resources. 

We actually do use a scent article for our air scent dogs and have never had a problem securing one - even to the point of being allowed to secure our own. Training is a lot like splits and crosstracks with a trailing dog. Only the right choice pays. 

It is a paradigm that is out there and has a following though not accepted in some parts of the country. You can deploy in an urban area but need enough ground support and obedience control on the dog to ensure the dog's safety. The bulk of searches here are rural or urban. Not as many people taking to the woods these days and those that do tend to be savvy and cell phone coverage improves every day........

We have the same trouble here with cadaver dog wannabees. I swear it is like "cadaver dogs" are crawling out of the woodwork and there is a great disparity in the quality of competency among them. It always feels good to get a callback on later searches after you work for an agency though! Have heard some interesting stories.


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## Joby Becker

off topic. I did some short term work for a guy with all the cool stickers and top of the line SUV with dog cage setup, real tool bag IMO, a "friend" of mine pawned him off on me..lol

was told his dog was ready to pass IPO1, first send into the blind the dog tried to chew my balls off..

Also ran across the guy at later times at training various places, always talked a good game until you asked him some questions, he was a real wannabe, had the K9 stickers and shit all over his car, richer guy, paid everyone else to train his dogs, got one dog narc certified and pretended he was a cop mostly, the time I knew him. He did like to put his pups in his basement and unknowingly scare the crap out of them with his "agitation"..lol poor dogs...

I would feel sorry for anyone getting stuck in a car with that guy for more than 3-4 minutes, let alone calling him out for any kind of work.


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## Nancy Jocoy

I think the number of stickers on a vehicle is inversely proportional to the quality inside .


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## Misty Wegner

Nancy you brought up some excellent points thank you... A little more clarification.. We train with the sheriff's department, well at least the deputy sheriff in charge of SAR comes to our trainings and helps with the dogs, etc... It is his particular opinion and the departments stance that I am curious on... My dogs, as well as the other certified trailing team he has no problem with in general other than that they are a trailing dog.. 

The bulk of our searches are urban and rural as well, but our area search dogs are not scent discriminate so ineffective for aa call out on an urban case. Our team has not had trailing dogs for aa LONG time, and I am sure that he has been burned at some point, OR, he is basing his opinion off of police dogs common results - which is a totally different setup then a search and rescue (for the most part... And of course each department can have more success with their tracking k9 teams.. Our department isn't as successful I guess) 

We (the trailing teams) have certified through ASCT, which is basically a police organization (most of their clientele is police and military and they train k9 police departments) and science based.. We do have good relations with our sheriff's department and (we the trailing department) have told him we will happily test in any way he chooses to help him have confidence in trailing dogs (not us as individuals as I believe he has the confidence in us the human and our dog as a trained dog, just not a trailing dog).. 

In my opinion (and it is just that so no offense is meant to any other discipline, especially as my dogs are training for HRD right now and then area), the trailing dog is the most versatile (in our area as our air scent dogs are not scent discriminate) as they can do urban, rural, and wilderness.. They will go to ground and air for scent (as an air scent dog does) but are safe(r) in urban and rural areas and are scent specific (so to speak)... One of my dogs (not certified yet) has a refind alert, so could go off line if necessary. The certified girl could as well, but her refind alert isn't solid... 

Anyhow, I appreciate the responses and the thoughts into the situation... Ultimately, our training and end results will be what either aids in changing the standing opinion on trailing dogs, or solidifies it more (we train exceptionally hard to make sure that never happens, it is someone's life in jeopardy after all). I've just wondered if it was a prevailing line of thought with LE. (We) test and train in true double blind scenarios (my ASCT tests were/are double blind: trail is laid and aged to appropriate time, k9 team is transported to PLS/LKP and told to start when ready, no flagging, nothing but a scent article laid somewhere. We run the test solo, you find the person within the time allotted or you don't) which is what he has suggested doing as an 'in house' test of sorts. I look forward to doing this  

My questions in all this is just understanding the point of view that trailing dogs are ineffective. Knowing that once bitten twice shy, especially when a life hangs in the balance, is a very possible and legitimate reason to be leery. But when I have talked to him, it has seemed his basis for concern has been on what he has seem from LE k9's results, as he can discriminate between the poser's and wannabe's and the real deal. As said before, my concern is for the victim, the lost soul, not a reputation/prestige (although a reputation for being a good searcher is important for callous but not for ego reasons) but if a good asset isn't being used for a reason that can't be quantified or qualified I want to know why so I can help change the perception, if possible.. 

Thanks everyone! Please keep the ideas and insight flowing, it helps to understand and help me when I talk with him to be aware of where he might be coming from.


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## Nancy Jocoy

Some of the failures I have seen in trailing dog performance have been:

-Not training age and contamination
-Not training where subject/family has contaminated the area and you have to find the freshest correct trail
-Not even learning how to properly cast the dog for an unknown starting points
-Bad scent article collection/handling
-Missing subtle cues like headpops and not reading the dog in general 
-Not training with aged scent pools
-Knowing dogs limits with weather conditions/time of day etc.
-Inadequate training on hard surfaces/around buildings


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## Misty Wegner

Those are excellent examples of poor preparation and training Nancy, thank you. I'm sure these are more common in bulk and probably go with a poor or naive training program.. That would definitely make LE apt to not call out, as would an over inflation of a dogs ability.. And handler's ability, which is probably even more important as dogs while not infallible are extremely capable... If read correctly


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## Sarah Platts

Nancy Jocoy said:


> Some of the failures I have seen in trailing dog performance have been:
> 
> -Not training age and contamination
> -Not training where subject/family has contaminated the area and you have to find the freshest correct trail
> -Not even learning how to properly cast the dog for an unknown starting points
> -Bad scent article collection/handling
> -Missing subtle cues like headpops and not reading the dog in general
> -Not training with aged scent pools
> -Knowing dogs limits with weather conditions/time of day etc.
> -Inadequate training on hard surfaces/around buildings


Where's the 'Like" button. This is sooo true. If I had to select one from the list as the biggest problem I would put lack of realistic urban hard surface training. The next one would be inability to establish a direction of travel if unknown. I can't tell you how many times 've heard that the trailing dog was unable to leave the subject's yard. And it's not just SAR, it's state police BHs, prison BHs, as well as the volunteers.

I can speak from personal experience that it can take years to build up a rapport with LE agencies. And I can go months or even years between them needing my help. A lot of times it was that one great breakout case that puts you on the map with that agency. And you need to stay in contact with that agency. The turnover or lateral movement is some departments is just unreal. Make it a point to do regular meet and greets.


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## Joby Becker

OFF TOPIC AGAIN 


Nancy Jocoy said:


> I think the number of stickers on a vehicle is inversely proportional to the quality inside .


you would think, but his guy deals in off-breed (non-herder) and is piped into all the rich people (EASTERN BLOCK IMMIGRANTS) and supposedly has popular "quality" dogs..
.

I dumped him on principle, at a monetary loss. I could have made all the dogs look great in videos (edited) or pictures (selective)

I am not sure who is wrong or right, capitalistically 
(I am Capitalist Conservative)
but 4000 for a pointy nose (prone to bouncing off bites) black and rust semi mature european show/working line dog that will hide from me when I am trying to boost his confidence in an empty building sounds like wrong to me personally.
JOBY


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## Bob Scott

I'll add another to Nancy's list.

Folks that join SAR teams because "My dog can find it's lost toys in the yard".](*,)

The dog should be chosen for the job and not the other way around.


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## rick smith

re : "Add to that the lack of standards to do anything in SAR and it's no wonder legitimate SAR people have trouble getting call outs."

maybe off topic too, but this puzzles me ...
is there a problem with SAR standards and certifications in the states when they work with LE ?

would seem to me mutual aid agreements would be worked out WELL in advance of the requirement to deploy a SAR canine with LE, and that would eliminate the cert level problem when the teams muster up. 
- either they are certified or not
- too simplistic ? the reality is different ?

is it different when SAR ops are controlled by FEMA or other fed agencies ?


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## Nancy Jocoy

The problem of standards exists for SAR AND LE - In both cases there is a hodgepodge of organizations who write and test to their own standards. FEMA does have a more standardized national approach.

Some states have stepped in and see the need to standardize and specify certification practices for both. Others have none. My own state just in the past few years decided LE bite dogs need to be certified but drug and tracking dogs do not and we have no requirements for SAR dogs. Quite a few states do have SAR councils and rigorous certification requirements, though and many SAR and LE see the value in training and certifying to standards and do so voluntarily. 

Even with a certification, though....A certification is a baseline competency assessment. Nothing more!

It is not a comprehensive evaluation of the team's experience. That is another problem. There are plenty of people who pass a basic 40 acre daytime area search test and think they are mission ready for a 100 acre night search in bad weather with safety hazards. People train their HRD dogs to the tests and only work 30 minute old 1-2 acre problems when the reality may be several hours and 20-30 acres..not to mention sources that have been out for days maybe years as opposed to hours (and the associated complexity of working out the odor) Any drug dog handler knows a truckload of drugs is not the same as a baggie of drug. Same thing with HRD. People train only on stuff in a small jar then expect to find a body.....on and on and on......You have to start somewhere but you need to be aware of your limits and make sure you train to scenarios more extreme than you work.

One of the pressures LE also faces is wannabees show up (usually in full view of the press) and raise a stink with the family and press if they are not deployed. These folks can do more harm than good. And then you cringe when you see the outstanding things they claim their magical dogs can do


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## Misty Wegner

Nancy brings up excellent points... Our state has decided that state wide standards need to exist and are in the midst of implementing them. Our team only accepts certain organizations certification standards and rely heavily on performance during training, and training logs. 

Certification is a snap shot of the overall viability of a team.. As Nancy stated, many train for the test and not beyond for real life calls. Many let down on their training once certified as they feel that the certification is proof their dog is ready - always... Training is for both human and dog, neither of which are ever so good training is not necessary.. 

Certifications that are above board (not fly by night, standards so low or tested in handler favored ways) do reflect training practices up to that point. And at the very least allow LE a snapshot of what the team may be capable of.. But I think it is most important for LE and the SAR team to have good communication and clear knowledge by observation of the team(s) ability, so they can deploy with confidence.


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## Howard Knauf

Misty Wegner said:


> . But I think it is most important for LE and the SAR team to have good communication and clear knowledge by observation of the team(s) ability, so they can deploy with confidence.


 Of all that's been said I think this is the most important. Seeing is believing. Convincing the brass is a whole different matter.


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## Nancy Jocoy

We put this together as a tool for agencies - I think it has some pretty good information.


http://scsarda.org/Agency_files/Deployment of K9 SAR Resources.pdf


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## Sarah Platts

My state has a sar council and a set of standards. They are nice but looking at them from an LE approach - the standards do not adequately address LE needs. As one sheriff's deputy told me about state resources: ".... they are all trained but the way they are taught to do it is wrong". It was further clarified that they [state sar] do it their way but not the way WE (meaning LE) want them to do it. So does this stop LE agencies in my state from using state resources. Yup! 

Just because a state is organized does not mean that the way they do it is right. Some states or groups do not encourage their members to seek outside certs or attend outside workshops. Some agencies do not want the liability of using volunteers or have had bad experiences. Teams are not consistent. Some teams train enough to pass the certs and maintain a very basic level. I've extended invitations for several years for some of the state cadaver dog handlers in my area to take the VPWDA cadaver test with me when I go to cert. All have turned me down because their state cert is good enough (and all they need) to get called out. For the majority of the calls the state standards are perfectly adequate. But for some of LE's specific needs, I would say most standards are lacking.


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## Bob Scott

Many "teams" also set their own standards and do their own testing. 

I've seen so called "certified" SAR dogs/handlers done this way that have absolutely no business doing more then playing fetch in their back yard......IF they can get the dog to do that.


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## Nancy Jocoy

I am on a team that has a mix of requirements for certification and live find dogs are tested internally and strongly encouraged, but not required, to certify externally. The HRD dogs must test annually to a police organization (NAPWDA, IPWDA, LETS, etc). The live find dogs who have tested externally have passed the external tests. without much ado...the challenge is not so much taking the test but getting to /scheduling.

That said, I have seen it both ways on other teams as well and think the real proof is in the training records and ongoing observation of them working in scenario based training.

I recently requested another resource do a boat search in a river because of a glitch I have had with Beau on the boat.....Beau has passed his NAPWDA HRD certification with flying colors 3 years in a row but I felt he needed to work through this problem before I put him back on a boat. Any body who does SAR needs to know their and their dog's limitations and work within them. 

If you have someone who is doing this for the wrong reason, taking shortcuts, etc. no certification is going to guarantee quality.


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## mel boschwitz

Nancy-so glad you were confident enough to request another resource to do the search. I know of a team that refuses to call in other resources, stating that what would stop the requesting agency to just call that other team directly the next time. 

After the search was over, did it turn out that Beau's glitch would have affected things?


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## Nancy Jocoy

mel boschwitz said:


> After the search was over, did it turn out that Beau's glitch would have affected things?


No, it would not have affected the final outcome but at the time we did not know what that outcome might have been. We all have to be honest - you face an issue - you deal with it - fortunately he is jam up on all the other HRD disciplines.

Honestly and egos can be a real problem. I met someone who never documented false alerts in their training records. WTF? You document your training issues and show what you did to fix them and that they remain "fixed". I have also seen people claim (in the press no less) that they "made the find" when everyone else knows they did not.


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## mel boschwitz

Florida v Harris anyone? Lol
I know someone whose training logs consist of marking on the calender that they trained that day.
And people wonder why SAR has a bad rep with LE.


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## Sarah Platts

mel boschwitz said:


> Florida v Harris anyone? Lol
> I know someone whose training logs consist of marking on the calender that they trained that day.
> And people wonder why SAR has a bad rep with LE.


This was an issue I just discussed with another trailing handler (not from my team) and their records consisted of the sign in/out sheet from the training day. No log book or anything. My state's standards do not address or mandate training records be kept. That's always been a handler responsibility. So going back to the OP's question about using trailing dogs, why would LE in my area request or even consider using such a team unless they *know* that they absolutely will not use anything this team does? I know when I run my dog, I never know where we will go or what we will find along the way. I'm not sure how I would feel knowing I just did a bunch of work for the RA only to know they can't use any of it in court? Or they could try but pity the handler during the defense's cross exam.

There's also the feeling that only HRD folks need to keep training records. I could be wrong but I'm not sure they even do that.


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## Misty Wegner

LE has confidence in our team. LE watches and aids in our team trainings, BUT, the prevailing line of thought is that trailing dogs aren't efficient enough (I'm guessing).. Our team has not had trailing dogs for years, so perhaps that fuels the fear of using them... That's where my question lies... 

The reasons brought up for why LE is suspicious of SAR (all disciplines, as lack of training or poor training can flow through any discipline) are legit... Ego, laziness, deceit, are horrific due to the consequences when on a search (and potentially anytime). 

I will change my question slightly as I believe we have successfully covered the reasons why LE would not call out unknown or untrained teams very well (thank you for everyone's insight).. 

What has LE's opinion been on well trained trailing teams for SAR? If their are reasons why you wouldn't call them out (outside of what has been previously covered due to lack or poor training),why? For the trailers in SAR, do you find you have to overcome any stigma or preconceived notions of what you can or can't do?


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## Sarah Platts

From the SAR standpoint:

I usually have to explain the difference between a trailing dog and a police tracking dog. Ranging from using a scent article to working a trail past the time that most police would even consider using a dog.


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## Misty Wegner

That is exactly what I'm talking about Sarah! Perfect point.. I'm told scent is only good for up to 2hrs and that being iffy and I know that isn't true (obviously conditions being viable) as I've run double blind way longer than that.. Police dogs work fear scent mostly and the site can be horribly contaminated and polluted with fear scent by the victim, the perp and the bystanders witnessing the crime.. No wonder there is such difficulty and amazing job to the dogs that are successful in such circumstances... SAR is not like that... Fear scent is rarely ever at the PLS and trailing is what we train for, almost exclusively..


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## rick smith

just saying....
- but it would be more productive if we had more LE responses to LE questions....glad Howard is here and thankful that Mel weighs in
and a few others now and then

- in my opinion that has been a weakness here ever since i've been a member

maybe because of the assinine threads about cops shooting neighbor dogs or 'PSD bites innocent' youtube trash ?

i tried to get a K9 LEO to join/participate a couple years back
donated a thousand dollars sight unseen to get an operation for his retired PSD
....never even got a pic of the K9 from him and he never started participating 

- if that ain't "leading a horse to water", nothing is


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## rick smith

i think the problem is also a basic pack mentality kinda thing

being a Navy diver, had to stop serious diving operations to treat a bent civilian diver dumped on the scene .... happened many times

had to deal with MANY media inquiries that were not looking for 'news' and just wanted to stir the pot ](*,)

working with marine mammals we had to waste time and resources to 'deal' with a Penthouse mag article titled something like "Nature's deadly killers"

when you are a member of a tight knit professional group there is a natural tendency to get an "Us versus Them" attitude

guess it's part of human nature, but doesn't foster good relations with "civilians" and others 'outside the pack' //LOL//


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## mel boschwitz

There is defiinitely an Us v Them mentality. Like most groups, cops like to keep things "In House". An old LE trailing dog handler I knew told me that all SAR people are nuts. That's not quite the case I've learned. 

I'm on several SAR fb pages and I've seen several posts where SAR is criticising LE. That's probably not the most intelligent thing they can do. Word gets around. 

I know one team in my area that's huge. 30+ people. And they all show up on a call out wearing brightly colored clothes. And when you're a small department and suddenly you have more SAR folks then LE in the entire county it can feel a bit weird. We want a small, quiet and professional response. Not everyone and their brother in clothes we can see 3 miles away. In recent times they have started to restrict who goes to calls.

I know a guy in my area (now retired), that has a fabulous reputation with LE. They ended up calling him for criminal cases (evidence recovery type stuff, nothing in progress). He is a confident and quiet guy. He lets his hounds do the talking. He keeps excellent records, doesn't overstate his dog's abilities. He's ended up testifying in court several times and has helped with many convictions. His successor (handler) is much louder and boisterous. He's not quite as popular from what I've heard.


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## Nancy Jocoy

I also wonder how much damage is done by ridiculous claims - for example a group who claims the dogs can trail months old trails and car trails-compared to police who are used to working hotter trails.

So does that cast doubt on teams who train and test to 12-24 hour old trails?

And, talking about searches. We actually told folks on our team they have permission to share news articles, but not to discuss ANY search on ANY social media. Not even to say we are going on a search. It is one thing to generically talk about search experiences without posting enough info to link to the actual search but another to talk about a specific search. It is just not professional.


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## mel boschwitz

Good point about the social media. Also be careful what you say to your team. You may hear some stuff that's not directly related to the search. Sometimes cops forget to keep quiet. Lol. That doesn't mean you should talk about it. You may think you can trust your team, but they talk to spouses who might mention it to a friend and then. ...

I think if you're gonna claim the dog can do what typical LE considers "aged" trails, have the double blind certs to back it up. 
LE likes the typical LE certs but they don't test aged stuff. But I would have those too if you are up against an agency that doesn't trust SAR. 

Building trust amongst LE is a long process. We do NOT share, we don't play well with others and we hate other people playing in our sandbox.


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## Sarah Platts

I've done some of the 'ridiculous' stuff. My results back up my claims. In fact there are ALOT of trailing handlers out there that do this type of work. Its just we catch a lot of flack from airscent handlers who don't have a clue about trailing dogs jumping on the bandwagon saying what they can and can't do so most keep quiet about it now. Doesn't mean its not being done, most just go ahead and do it. 

I did a walkaway case for my local PD. I was assigned a K9 cop to flank me and the dog. It was a walkaway that turned into a car trail. When the dog gave me the indication and I told the cop the guy had been picked up and was now in a car, he laughed about it with the police base on the radio. I wanted to know how long he wanted me to continue it. He told me to keep going if I could. We did. Dog worked and then we came up to the spot where he had been dropped off and the trail switched back to walking. Dog was pulling hard and we were jogging down the sidewalk when we got the word that the man was located a quarter mile ahead of us (trail was at this point around 4 miles long) and the cop gave me a lift to the end of the track. He was pretty silent on the way back to base and told me he owed me an apology. See years earlier he had talked with a guy named Ted Hamm. Ted had told him about car trails and what the dog's behavior looked like. Cop told me that he pretty much laughed Ted off as a crazy old man. But then he saw my dog to EXACTLY the distinctive behavior indicative of walking to car to walking. Said it really opened his eyes and made him a convert on what Ted had been telling him. I ran into this same K9 cop just recently. He still remembers that track and always brings it up about how it changed his thinking on things.

In fact at one of the latest workshops in my state, the instructor had car trails set up for the trailing handlers. So its finally hitting the mainstream training venues and hopefully, we can move this out of the closet.


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## Nancy Jocoy

Did anyone every take up Andy Rebman's challenge on car trails- wasn't it like $10,000? 

I will be open minded but a lot of folks that make these claims cannot back them up.

I would like to see a robust set of proofing protocols (double blind of course) to demonstrate them
Planning to also work on this for scent specific air scent - something I know works but a lot of folks don't believe it....


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## Sarah Platts

Nancy Jocoy said:


> Did anyone every take up Andy Rebman's challenge on car trails- wasn't it like $10,000?
> 
> 
> 
> it wasn't Andy but the "prize" was a dog who's value was estimated at 10K. No money involved.
> 
> I've done several blind tests for requesting agencies normally with regards to a case. I know another guy who has a similar challenge and a handler took him on it. That handler is still waiting for their money.
Click to expand...


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## Nancy Jocoy

I would love to see a good collection of training scenarios based on real world experiences though. People have put together stuff like that for competition tracking. It would be nice to do for SAR. That would be way too extensive for a "Test" but would be great consideration for training records.


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## Misty Wegner

I'm sure the ones that make outrageous claims (ones they have never done themselves, just read about, or the ones they did were known trails and they basically, lead the dog there: I've seen a lot of this, which is why double blind is SOOOO important, imho) are often the ones that make it so hard for those of us who train hard, do double blinds often and aren't looking to make world records.. 

Changing the brass, not likely... Hopefully, changing the LE we work with attitude towards trailing dogs an their ability... Air scent discriminate as well, although we don't have any on our team unless you count my dog that started air scent discriminate but has gone trail (not certified yet) 

Ironically, the certification organization that the trailing team uses is the only double blind cert used amongst the teams (air and hrd). We have good air and HRD teams, the HRD get called on alot.. Much rarer the air dogs.. Which is why the trailers are so important, there is a huge void and we could be a major asset.. We will prove ourselves, as we are determined to be the best we can be with double blind proofs, if not for the event we get a call out.. Hopefully sooner than later ;o)


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## Sarah Platts

Misty Wegner said:


> We will prove ourselves, as we are determined to be the best we can be ......


This attitude will carry you and your team further and with greater successes in the long run. Keep the bar high. Challenge train. And never be afraid to try something new.


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## Sarah Platts

Nancy Jocoy said:


> I would love to see a good collection of training scenarios based on real world experiences though. People have put together stuff like that for competition tracking. It would be nice to do for SAR. That would be way too extensive for a "Test" but would be great consideration for training records.


Now this would be worthy of a thread of it's own.

For trailing, 

the abducted baby is a good one. An unknown person lifts a child out of a buggy and walks away with it. You scent your dog on the _baby_.

Child leaves home on his bicycle and goes missing. Start at the house on the child.

Child goes missing but does not leave the home/yard area but hides within the scent pool of the home. Scent your dog on the child.

Busy parking lot, Daughter leaves her Dad (who has alzheimers) in the car while she ducks into a shop for an errand. Dad walks away from the car to parts unknown.

Drunken party out at a house in the country. Everyone is taking a turn driving the 4-wheeler around the ATV tracks. Man leaves the yard on the 4-wheeler. 4-wheeler later found but the man's not there.

Man goes to check on his despondent brother. Finds a note but the brother is gone. Assume it's a suicide.

Woman found dead in a vacant lot. Was last seen leaving to wash her clothes at the complex laundry. Can you backtrack the subject? Or forward track from the PLS.

Mom's at work but Dad reports their 2 year old child is missing from the home. Last seen wearing a diaper.

A woman who has ALZ is know to take walks all over the neighborhood. One morning she doesn't come back. Family reports her missing 6 hours later.

A family goes to a state park and have been there for several days hiking the trails. One of their sons has autism and is nonverbal takes off down a trail ahead of the couple and disappears. Family and friends have been searching for most of the day before you get the call.

Man with ALZ last seen at 0800. Reported missing by family at 8pm that night. However, no one knows if he was last seen at the wife's house or the daughter's house that's 4 blocks away.

Group of children playing by a pond. One leaves to go back home. Several hours later when the rest of the children come home, it's discovered the first child never made it home. 

Hunter leaves to go hunting and reported as overdue by his wife when he doesn't come home that night. Still missing by the next day, the sar team gets the phone call. His parked truck is found but no one knows exactly what area or where he hunts at.

Two small children last reported playing in the yard. Discovered missing when they didn't come in for lunch.

Each of the above are events pulled from cases worked or from news articles.


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## Misty Wegner

What were the outcomes of some of these cases Sarah? We're trailing dogs utilized? Cases like the atv group where one leaves group atv found but not him, I would think air scent dogs would be used most likely.. Perhaps direction of travel gathered from a trailing dog... 

Great examples!


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## Nancy Jocoy

Those are some good examples. We have some where the trailing dog did not cross the scent trail but did an ocassional head pop in the direction of the missing person who was some distance away in another area because they picked up air scent.

Wind up putting other resources upwind to find subject. That would be hard to stage but is real world.


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## Sarah Platts

Misty Wegner said:


> What were the outcomes of some of these cases Sarah? We're trailing dogs utilized? Cases like the atv group where one leaves group atv found but not him, I would think air scent dogs would be used most likely.. Perhaps direction of travel gathered from a trailing dog...
> 
> Great examples!


Each of these are/were/could have been potential trailing dog problems. Yes, some could be airscent team problems.

1. child recovered
2. child recovered
3. child found sleeping in parents bed; child found hiding in attic space of shed; child found hiding in cushions on couch under blanket; child had made hole in boxsprings under bed - found hiding up in the boxsprings; child found hiding in a suitcase in the basement; child found hiding under old clothes in the closet
4. man located 4.5 miles away
5. man's body recovered by a fisherman the next year just down from where the ATV went into the water
6. man found hanging up in the tall pine tree just off the back door one year later
7. outcome still pending
8. dad had tortured and killed toddler, body located in shallow grave 4 miles from PLS
9. woman found in trapped in some bushes 2 miles from her home 4 days later
10. Child recovered
11. man recovered 12 miles from PLS
12. child recovered 
13. hunter located deceased
14. children found deceased in the trunk of an abandoned car on property 3 days later

Some of these cases, trailing dogs were offered and refused. Some were trailing dogs only. Some were worked only by ground teams, some only by airscent teams, some a combination of both.


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## Howard Knauf

Had a case last night wherein a woman damaged property in our downtown area then ran from an officer. Pursuing officer lost her (we ribbed him had for that one  ). I come in with my dog and cast in an area where only the officer and suspect had contaminated the area. Dog discriminates the officer and starts hard surface track through crowded Galleria, then down a sidewalk along busy street to a local business 2 blocks away. Patrons tell us a woman ran into the business and is hiding in a storage room. Woman is taken into custody.

This is primarily my type of tracking. Our dogs will trail as well given the circumstances. I've successfully completed tracks over an hour old that has been contaminated by officers, civilians and traffic. In training last Wednesday I did double helix tracks (DNA style pattern) on hard surface with 2 officer decoys and a scent article at start (my boy will do it without scent article BTW). I've also ran successful discriminating training tracks utilizing the primary track layer and 4 other contaminant track layers on hard surface. 

One of my guys attended a tracking seminar in south Florida a few years ago. When he showed up there were only bloodhounds. He had the only GSD and it was dual purpose. He was alientated right away because it was a trained biting dog, and it had pointy ears. The trainers and handler all downed the GSD as an inferior tracker. During the school tracks were laid and aged for 24 hours. That GSD held his own and even made some of the bloodhounds look bad. The slobber dog handlers were none too happy. 

We've all heard of this vehicle trailing thing. I know dogs are amazing creatures but I sure would like to see it first hand. In the case stated above where the person entered a vehicle, then got out again (I mean, when do you call the track...subject is in a vehicle and who knows how far they are going?). That sort of scenario very rarely happens. And if it does, we have numerous mobile units and air support to assist. We have so many training venues for our dogs that we just don't have the time to train one to the level of trailing a subject in a car. We would rarely, if ever do that for real.


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## Sarah Platts

Howard Knauf said:


> We've all heard of this vehicle trailing thing. I know dogs are amazing creatures but I sure would like to see it first hand. In the case stated above where the person entered a vehicle, then got out again (I mean, when do you call the track...subject is in a vehicle and who knows how far they are going?).


Good job on the woman hiding in the store. 

When I get the indication from the dog that the person is now in a vehicle, I always stop and ask the agency how far they want to take it because with the person in a vehicle they can now travel soooo much further faster. The distance is doable but dangerous because you are working in the roadway and must have a marked unit or some other vehicle behind team to protect them from traffic coming up from the back. Depending on the type of roadway there are things you can do to shortened the distance (leapfrogging and/or jumping track) but it's a slog and takes stamina from handler and dog to do. I did have a dog one time (a Lab) who absolutely refused to do car trails. When she hit the scent gradient difference due to the car travel, she would stop, do a circle, and sit. I scrubbed her because, although it was nice to know the person is in a car, I needed a dog who could do the trail.


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## Howard Knauf

Sarah Platts said:


> When I get the indication from the dog that the person is now in a vehicle, I always stop and ask the agency how far they want to take it because with the person in a vehicle they can now travel soooo much further faster.


 I have to give you big kudos for even attempting to train a dog to do this but...IMO the juice isn't worth the squeeze. There's just not enough of a success rate to do it even if I had the time. The variables are huge wherein time/distance is not your friend. Now, trailing a person on a bicycle would be more realistic to me but seeing as SAR is not my forte I can't truly appreciate this without successfully training the car/bike trail. I truly appreciate your commitment to it though.


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## Sarah Platts

Howard Knauf said:


> I have to give you big kudos for even attempting to train a dog to do this but...IMO the juice isn't worth the squeeze. There's just not enough of a success rate to do it even if I had the time. The variables are huge wherein time/distance is not your friend. Now, trailing a person on a bicycle would be more realistic to me but seeing as SAR is not my forte I can't truly appreciate this without successfully training the car/bike trail. I truly appreciate your commitment to it though.


And you are not wrong. For most LE and SAR, that is totally correct. The amount of time and energy you spend doing it is huge because once the person goes that mobile you will never catch up with them unless they stop or you have that much time to follow them. For cops, (and ground sar) this just does not make for good resources sense. Easier and smarter to turn it over to investigators to work or wait for further developments.


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## Misty Wegner

Sarah, do you work your long aged trailing dogs solely on long aging, or do you keep them 'sharp' on hot or warmer tracks? I've read so many conflicting things on how long scent is viable. I know my dogs have alerted a week out on old scent (running a track on the sister of the person who had run nearby and sat on a large stone.. My dog ran along and stopped at the stone and wagged her tail then continued on the correct path. It was during summer and directly in the sun, and 72hrs in urban during winter),but I haven't worked anything older than 36hrs (successfully I might add; in the shade during summer)...


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## Sarah Platts

No, I work all ages. I do try to not rely on hot tracks because, unlike cops, I'm not driving around with my dog and can get to the scene in 10 minutes. In fact if you work aged work a lot you find your dog having problems with hot tracks the same way that only doing hot tracks makes the aged trails appear harder. Also by mixing up the ages, you prevent your dog's nose from getting 'fixed' to a certain age of track.

Since I belong to my city's sar team (and field my dogs with them) those trails are the "typical" age you see with sar call-outs of 3 to 6 to 8 to 12 hours old. Normally they are less than 36 hours old. The aged work usually happens when another jurisdiction calls because they have someone missing and they've been looking for the last 7-10 (or more) days and are out of options. Some call it a "hail, Mary" type of request because the agency has exhausted all their old leads and are trying to generate new ones. I never guarantee or say that I can guarantee a track but what I am is willing to give it a try and see what happens. Either the dog goes someplace or they don't. The dog determines what they can or cannot work.


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## Misty Wegner

Either the dog goes someplace or thy don't. The dog determines what they can work or not (paraphrase) 

Excellent assessment... I've always found it puzzling for those that assume scent MUST be in the footstep or a certain place (or can't be a certain place) when we have difficulty distinguishing basic smells and only for short times (in general) let alone distances and so specific...if we knew where the scent was we wouldn't need the dog, lol.. I learned that if I work aged trails alot that my dog tends to ignore hot trails, so I mix it up, usually doing a 10 session of progressive aging, starting with hot tracks and getting colder... This keeps the dog focused on the scent presented be it hot, warm or cold.. 

I had read that some that work the extreme aging cases only work their dogs on these (which is why I had asked you how you trained) and was curious... I agree training within the time frames you will be deployed at is the best way to ensure your dog is ready.. Thanks for answering


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## Sarah Platts

There is (or was) a state that the police worked the call and didn't request or have the volunteers come out and work until after the 3rd day. Team member told me when they trained it was only on trails 3 days old or older. It's didn't make sense to them to work anything less because their cases would never be of a lesser age.


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## Misty Wegner

That to me is an example of LE not using resources to the best of their ability.. I don't know the particular, could be they didn't have anyone they trusted and it was as you said, their 'hail mary' play last ditch resort.. But if they did have well trained resources not used, that is unfortunate for those lost..


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## Bob Scott

Misty Wegner said:


> That to me is an example of LE not using resources to the best of their ability.. I don't know the particular, could be they didn't have anyone they trusted and it was as you said, their 'hail mary' play last ditch resort.. But if they did have well trained resources not used, that is unfortunate for those lost..



Thus your back to the original question about...

"LE opinion on SAR trailing dogs."

The quality of skills and knowledge has to be better by all concerned.


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## Misty Wegner

Agreed Bob.. Between SAR being professional and having well trained effective dogs and LE having knowledge of these teams and how to deploy them.. An awkward marriage at times, but definitely needed. Some departments seem to be run so well and have great communication and faith in their SAR teams (or at least the other es they call on  ), others... We have good relations with LE and they know and respect our team... At least air and HRD. Since trailing hasn't been around for years in our neck of the woods, proving out is necessary...


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## Bob Scott

Sounds like your working with a good start. :wink:


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## rick smith

well established mutual aid agreements and MOU's (memorandums of understanding) seems like a great way to ensure communications between diff groups and take the guesswork out of who brings what to the table
- can't imagine how they could be well established if the parties never came together before they are needed for a SAR op


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## Sarah Platts

You would think that but go back to Mel's comment about not letting other people play in their sandbox. Also there is a rotation among the staff of any given PD. That's why volunteers have to keep reminding them they are out there and available to help.


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## Howard Knauf

Just out of curiosity regarding aged tracks.....where the hell do you start on a 1-3 day old trail that has already been contaminated by numerous emergency services personel if you have no scent article? Is it even doable? If it is doable, how does the dog determine which trail is the target if you have no scent article? Our tracking dogs are taught to go to freshest odor or discriminate a track if we have non targets available for scent inventory. They are also taught to ignore fresher cross tracks. With that mindset, working contaminated aged tracks is hard for me to get my head around.


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## mel boschwitz

For aged tracks or heavily contaminated tracks like you describe your dog must be scent specific. Technically you could do a missing man type start if you had EVERYONE who had been on scene and your dog could rule them out, but that would take a heck of a lot of training for the dog to understand that scenario. 4 or 5 people, sure, easy peasy. 20,30 or more? Hmmm...
For traditional missing person searches we can almost always get a usable scent article. Except for possible evidence recovery, there's not much point in running old criminal tracks like that.


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## Sarah Platts

What Mel said. 

Must have a scent article. And if using a patrol dog that is only used to hot tracks, you will still have some issues getting off the start unless you doing more scent article work. However if you work to much scent specific then it can "ruin" them for your felony tracks where there is no scent article.


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## Misty Wegner

Which is again where SAR tracking/trailing divides from LE tracking/trailing and the need for understanding and communication between the two.. Probably the main reason why LE in my area are so gun shy about trail dogs; they have the PSD knowledge of trailing/tracking and the time frames of aged tracks being useless to them, and difficulties they face without a scent article, fear scent etc... This is great everyone, really has helped me get some understanding behind their lack of faith in trailing dogs (again, not my dogs perse or our team, just 'trailing dogs' in general) and outside of obviously proving ourselves (which we are already), helping me in discussions with them/him..


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## Howard Knauf

I don't think it's a lack of faith. I think it's just a matter of ignorance. We train our dogs to be task specific for our particular application. Being an urban PD we specifically have no need for a SAR trailing dog. Our county is the longest in the State and there is a lot of woods and swamps but those areas are handled by the Sheriffs department. The S.O. has bloodhounds and choppers so I'm sure they believe they have it covered. I would think out west would be a bigger need for SAR teams.


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## Bob Scott

Mel bought up one of my pet peeves and one of numerous reason I left SAR.

Showing up at a forest/woodlands with air scent dogs and looking for a lost child.

At least 100 searchers already in the woods so how how in hell's name can air scent dog be effective?!! :evil:


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## mel boschwitz

I know many teams are training scent specific air scent dogs to try to combat this problem.


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## Nancy Jocoy

It is true about scent specific air scent but, like with trailing, the more contamination the harder it gets. I also know of one time when a helicopter with FLIR was turned around because all the 'helpful' self deployed volunteers in the woods made it irrelevant. Figuring out how to properly use the locals is important! Containment, door to door, tap into the hunters knowledge of area etc.


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## Misty Wegner

It takes everyone, SUPERVISED, to run a search well, especially a difficult and urgent one.. We just had a recent volunteer to our team who, he and his wife self deployed with dogs (trained in a competitive type tracking,... And a puppy (ugh)).. They really wanted to help but didn't realize they were causing more trouble and less aid then they thought... The deputy sheriff in charge of SAR firmly but kindly told them the steps they needed to do in order to become deployable and not be sent home... To their credit, they immediately joined our team and are going through the academy (map, compass, survival, etc).. 

Our team doesn't have scent specific air scent dogs, unless you count mine...both of mine started air scent with the team (but trailing with me) one has a very good refind alert, the other not as much but she ranges within eye sight (Shepherd, needs to keep an eye on mom). 

In woodlands/forest, base camp will be highly contaminated, and hopefully it isn't on or near the PLS/PLK.. Having trail dogs do hasty searches 75yrds or so away from the masses (ground pounders will spread out thus giving less layering of contamination and possible gaps where the victims scent may be undisturbed) and running in a large circle (it would be like a giant cast of the dog around the entire hub, but well outside the heavy contamination) to see if the dogs can grab a scent trail seems like it could be effective for such situations.. I follow IC's directions, not my own, so not sure if there are problems with this idea..


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## Sarah Platts

Yes, we follow IC's directions but when you work a trailing dog, the dog pretty much decides where it's going to go. We run the trail but it's not like standard airscent task of doing a sector search because you don't know where the dog will lead you.

When you go the perimeter casting, have you scented or pre-scented the dog yet?


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## Nancy Jocoy

If you are doing an air scent search and your dog takes off to work the odor you call the IC and tell them you need to leave the area-you don't pull a dog off odor to work a sector. You do document where you were at the time and what you completed/did not complete. 

Just like cast your dog for trailing and go where it goes.


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## Misty Wegner

Sorry, I should have been clearer.. Yes, the dog is prescented before the large perimeter cast.. Yes, the dog chooses where to go because he's a trailing dog (when I said we follow IC, I meant in that I've never seen this done and didn't know if it had ever been presented to them, and if it had, the team would abide by their rules.. Sorry, I didn't explain that part clearly) and follows the scent wherever it may lay... 

My line of thought is, that since a large area around command and the PLS is usually contaminated but that contamination becomes thinner as distance is attained. A large cast of the outer perimeter would give the trail dog a cleaner chance of hitting the trail with less pollution and being scent specific hopefully get a direction of travel at the very least.. I've just never seen or heard of it being done and wondered if their were reasons behind it..


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## mel boschwitz

It's done and obviously should be trained for. But sometimes the problem becomes are you working the freshest trail? Or the first trail the dog hits, regardless of whether it's fresh or not. When you work from PLS your dog is (should!) going to take the freshest trail. You also have to take into account the nose time for your dog. How long will your trailing dog work with no odor before it gets distracted? 75 yards out from your PLS is a verylarge circle to cast from. If your dog isn't trained to it, it may not have the ability to cast that entire circumference properly. 

All too often I've seen IC set up almost on top of the PLS. 
We train in Walmart parking lots at the busiest times to make sure my dog can handle the contamination he's gonna have to work thru.


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## Misty Wegner

Thanks Mel. I was thinking it a large cast (one I particularly train for as my dog is super eager to hit the trail and I like her to inventory the area a bit) but figured it could be split up if necessary... I train at Safeway, schools, churches - will have to try Walmart .. I want to know that I know that my dog is trained for as many avenues of change that I can think of.. Keeps the dog fresh and interested too..


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## Sarah Platts

The beauty of trailing dogs is they *should* be able to deal with the contamination you will find around the PLS. One thing you can do is educate your team (and the police) the need to set up the IC away from the PLS and NOT directly on top of it. 

I don't know the age trail you have worked up to but a simple and easy way to get good contaminated trails is to lay the trail in the morning at a shopping center or an athletic park on game day or similar and let those folks and cars walk all over your track and then go back that night or the next day to work it.


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## Misty Wegner

We've worked wilderness to 36hrs and 6hrs in urban and in congested areas... Have a training plan that increases aging over 10 sessions, so should be up to 12hrs urban soon (depending on success). Both dogs are pretty darn good at focusing on scent specific and not jumping scent (be it animal or human). Nuances of urban scent conditions are still being learned and refined. Contamination is always difficult, but I've found the buildings, especially during summer when air conditioners are going all the time make things more difficult with the scent being blown in and out of the buildings..


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## Misty Wegner

Was rereading this thread and really enjoyed it, probably more than the first time as I was better able to digest alot of great thoughts and suggestions made... 

Since my last post we have been deployed (successfully) on (for me) a very aged trail (about 73hrs was final tally). This was with a different County and LE was wonderful, as was the host SAR team (one I am now a part of as well).. I was also deployed on an urban (8hr aged) trail for the county I was asking initially about...

For this trail (which both dogs got correct DOT - subject was found by LE in a car 1.5miles from home where we deployed and where my dogs headed) we were left to our own devices.. Luckily I was able to find a flanker. I learned alot and definitely felt the cold breeze and skepticism.. But that is ok... I don't have all my eggs in one basket any longer... I've received some excellent help from (Sarah, thank you!) a great resource, and we are building a good reputation... This will take time and I will continue to train as hard as possible for every scenario I can think of... 

Honesty, the fear of having someone else's life in my dogs paws and my interpretation of their body language is, well scary! I've found the pendulum swings from total disbelief (in the dogs trailing abilities) to total blind faith... A happy medium would be great, lol... 

My urban trailing is up to 17+ hrs and 41hrs wilderness (training wise)... I train blind and double blind mostly, although technicals are needed sometimes to clean up areas I or the dogs are weak in.... Getting subjects to give me the scenarios I need to train for 'real world' situations is much harder, lol.. 

Very interesting to see the difference in LE response to trailing dogs... Truly was a breath of fresh air...


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## Bob Scott

Outstanding!

That's not always the case with LE because of to many wannabe "teams".


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## Nicole Stark

Nice update Misty, I appreciate hearing about the progress of others. I don't recall what type of dog you are working. Is it a GSD?


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## Misty Wegner

Thanks Bob  Yes, I can understand the gun shy behavior due to wannabes mucking up the waters... My original team has good repore with LE (outside of trailing dogs - skepticism) and the other teams I'm on are willing to give it a go either because of good results with other trailing dogs, watching trainings and log books, and because lack of resources makes one more willing to take a chance (they knew I had certification(s) which helped)... 

Lots of great suggestions here helped me process alot of my thoughts... I wonder if the knot in the stomach on a callout ever leaves? Lol.... Not sure if I take this too seriously, or I'm taking myself and my dogs too seriously, haha... I love it, but my mind is always on the 'lost' and the responsibility that comes with a trailing dog team... Not to lessen what everyone else is doing (LE, SAR volunteers and other dog teams).. It is most definitely a team effort (which is awesome to see work), but the responsibility to get DOT and/or follow the trail until it is no more or subject is found is daunting.. Get it wrong and one may have directed the search the wrong way causing unknown horrors to the lost and their family... At least how I see it... 

So, I train and train, to the best of my ability (and physical capabilities)... And I pray, ALOT, lol!!! 

Thanks again everyone for your insight and sharing experiences and thoughts!


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## Sarah Platts

Misty,

I'm totally proud of you. You might consider posting the email you sent me on your trail and what the final outcome was. 

Yes, it's a lot of trust to have in yourself and the dog that the dog will do what it's trained to do and take the freshest track and get the DOT. I think this is why many ICs are hesitant to work with trailers. Most don't understand them or tend to try and use them like airscent dogs. Never stop trying to educate or bring to their attention situations where trailers are beneficial. Just keep slugging away at it and never stop training for new situations or scenarios. You definitely got the brass ring on this deployment!


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## Misty Wegner

Thank you Nicole  Yes, GSD (the female) and a gsd/malamute (male), both have just turned 2..

Sarah, you are amazing! I sooo appreciate all your help and being willing to share your experiences and knowledge! Thank you!


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## Misty Wegner

Here is what I sent Sarah (again, who is amazing and great friend and asset) The end result was: our county calls it at 1700hrs,subject is mobile and continuing her hike and is in other County; the subject hit her located beacon at 2000hrs that night and crossed paths with her daughter at containment point; debrief confirms assumptions made during mission, the daughter tried to claim that mom wasn't where she was when she was as she was mad at us calling it and handing off to (a much larger, experienced and capable) new County team, although we stood at low range standby in case new information showed we errored... Despite asking to speak with subject we were not given that luxury... (human) mantracker also divulged that the tracks were like back tracks (hence my girl going up and down last trail.... Mission was deemed a big success and everyone worked very hard and we'll together.. 

I love trailing...

Here is a synopsis...

73yr old female, bad knees, but wants to hike the newly made Pacific North West Trails - many of which are very hard to read still and have many cow paths, and wildlife water trails that can be misleading (which is the initial assumption at IC)... She is walking with trekking poles and is a minimalist... Daughters begged her not to do this (119miles solo)... She has hit beacon every day until June 21st at 18:53 last beacon hit.. She hikes approximately 9-12 miles a day, from dawn to dusk (from 04:30 - 21:30 available hiking time)...

Territory - PNWT newly made, RUGGED RUGGED COUNTRY.. Steep climbs, while not overly elevated (highest peak under 6,00ft) it climbs fast and has shale rock, deadfall ,etc...

Weather: Day before 30mph sustained winds, 55+ gusts, downpours.... Yesterday, day of search, 44F, 14mph variable directions winds, and saturating, steady rain, fog (can you say "giant scent pool?")

Search... I arrive at 0800 to be caravaned to last beacon coordinates.. about 20miles deep in rugged country.. We arrive. I have a 68yr old flanker (although in good shape, this territory was HARSH) and 2 base camp people who are our relay for ham radios as the mountains and rocks reek havoc on signal strength... I am again briefed on above information... I allow Areli (my 2yr old GSD) loose to canvas the area while I pack up... This is a routine I do during practice often, and she pretty much does a 30m sweep in a circle, relieves herself and scent inventories... I then load up and as we are about to start, my flanker says 'what is that?' Well, it is a critter cam facing a tractor for protection of vandalism... Everybody kind of gets ready to get to work and I say, " Why don't we call in and see if we can snag the SD card and see if she crossed this way, and if so, time/DOT/health status, etc..." Yay! So they do, but of course this will take several hours to complete (lovely red tape and all).. So I harness Areli, scent her facing the opposite and about 50ft from assumed DOT, and she whips around, starts down the road, doubles back (blown scent I assume) sweeps the sloping end (drift scent - later found put she walked a portion of it) and starts down the trail... Her tail set and curl have moments of being tight and others being loose, she is working hard and focused....We have moments where I am totally confident she is in odor, and times where she looses it...With the wind conditions previously, the amount of rain pouring on us and moving the scent due to the steep incline and declines all around us, she is hitting scent pool and drift scent constantly, but on the actual trail the scent is vague... We work about a mile and change deep, get a radio call that a mantrailer has potential footprints and pole marks miles down the trail and they want the dog to check it out... So we head back to current base camp and discuss options...

It is decided, it is a good idea to go to another trail junction before the tracks the tracker (human) has spotted what he assumes could be her footprints (no idea what she is wearing or hiking in currently) (oh, I was given her laundry basket and shoes as scent articles. I chose a pair of underwear that could be easily packed for rescenting...worked well)... We travel 30 miles in car to go 9miles down the trail..I get a flat tire, yay... We arrive, and my 2 base camp/relay on comms become my pit crew and change my tire (good guys!)... I let my girl out, canvas, harness, scent and cast, she starts partly the way she would come, whips around and is moving with the speed I am used to for aged trails (a steady jog for me with occassional stops and walks) her tail set is tight and high (scorpion type tail)... We have basically moved up to a 48hr scent trail fresher scent... We cross the road and move up the trail, back down to the road (trail paralleled road and had steep drop off so scent roll was my conclusion), then back up to trail and on trail for 1.5miles or more... Up and down the STEEP and very debris (fallen trees, shrub, branches, basically snag, trip, and fall stuff) lined trail... Or what we thought was the trail.. 90degree slope, so lots of scent roll, plus downpour, then fog super thick... about that time, my flanker whom I have been telling to stay at top of hill and observe, if I continue to move the direction of trail he can follow, or if I holler and say that scent is down hill and continuing that way.. he was losing steam fast..... the scent pool conditions got extreme... scent is bouncing around her everywhere and while she is still moving forward, she is backtracking, circling, moving up and down all with obvious scent body language, and I know it is the conditions she is in.... so we reassess... We head back to base camp... I tell them I want to walk the road as Areli had alot of head pops downhill and I want to make sure that it isn't because our subject took a tumble downhill and is laying down there, or that it is just due to the conditions we are in... Once that is eliminated as a possibility, we will move down to the final junction where the tracker has spotted tracks and cast my girl to see if we can get confirmation...on the road Areli had a few sniffs, and went into bushes at end once, but nothing of strong odor, sooo... We head to IC first..(actually, got my tire fixed first)

My tire is taken in and fixed...At IC we dry out (water proof boots become aquariums when you are drenched and all water is rolling into the boots..fun, fun fun... not) and eat... We are given a bit more info.. The team has been working out time and distance and it all matches that if she is still upwardly mobile and ok, she could have made the distances that my girl is saying she did, and, where the tracker has spotted and taken pictures of the footprints and pole prints...The SD card arrives and pics are up... Perfect picture of our subject at the LKP and now PLS, also perfect pic of her moving into the area and DOT Areli took and the side area she highly canvased...yay! Also, the picture enlarged showed her foot size and boot tread... looks like a match...new information: found out she camped at the PLS, so my girl canvassing everywhere (even with the weather being as it was, I thought she was doing alot of it) now makes alot more sense (good girl!) 

Off to the next spot, which is now in another county... We arrive and I am lightly briefed on the general area (but not actual area of where footprints were found, actually was told about 50ft to left of trail - which I did not know, I thought that was LKP)... Areli comes out with nose glued to ground and I walk her to the LKP - what I believe is LKP... I harness her, rescent her (unneeded) and before I can cast her she has whipped behind herself and jogging over to the trail, I see the flagging tape and know we are now on the trail and where the footprints were.. my girl moves up the trail about 30ft, works a circle (probably working through the fresh scent of the tracker and his flankers) and jogs steadily back towards the cars, cuts across the grass and to the women's restroom (not the men's side), then skirts the grass heading towards HWY, sharp turn to a creek (where I am given more information: she was using the creek system and treating the water, as she was a minimalist... but I wasn't thinking about that, lol).. my girl pretty much at that point looks at me and shrugs her shoulders... I give her treats and praise her... (she was getting treats and praise along the way as well)... My group now also divulges that this lady was known to hitchhike to the next spot, which we believe she did... who isn't going to give a 73yr old hiker a ride when she says she is solo hiking 119miles of rugged country? Lol..... Since we are now in - County (WA) it is handed off to their SAR group which is much larger and skilled... The subject has 6 days more before she was supposed to be finished, so while the daughters got upset that our job is currently done, but on standby and it is handed off to the new SAR, the team is pretty confident that this is what has happened....Her mom is still moving along the trail system and is ok, and probably hitchhiked to next trail head, or to get dry and supplies as it was wet, wet, wet...

The daughter said she thought the dog was tricked by her mom... Since her mom doesn't know she is being searched for (and it is hard to trick a dog - takes alot of work and skill (and chemicals), that is highly unlikely... I am still guarded as I want confirmation the subject is ok and did what we believe via my dog and tracker and time to distance calculations, occurred... Just for my own processing of all that my girl did during the search.. Need to put in perspective, and answers need to be given... But, we believe she was ok up to the point we ended... From that point on we don't know... Also, we are on low grade standby, should some new evidence of situational happenings occur...i.e., did the subject double back on her trail at the last junction? I was told to only confirm she was there, and so I did not follow through with the initial northerly pull of my girl (although she doubled back to the restrooms etc)....I didn't stop her, or do anything that negated her drive forward, but I didn't actively move forward like I would if we were running the trail...hard to explain what i mean by that... I had been told by the Sheriff to just confirm or not, that subject was there... My girl I believe did.... But I want proof, LOL!!!!

After all is done, leaving for a 2hr drive home and I get pulled over... LE says I was doing 53 in a 35 by a school... 3 of my teammates were in same parking lot and pull right up and tell me IF I get a ticket it will be paid for (I was in a 45 zone, as was confirmed by my teammates and the sign, but was still speeding... trying to call home and make sure horses were fed etc.. my bad)... cop comes over and says "I have 2 tickets for you... One for 10% off donuts and the other 10% off coffee" at another shop... LOL... My (new, first time ever working with this team after only having one meeting with them) teammates were amazing, they told me and the cop how many days and miles worth of searching was saved... It was a nice experience, especially after what I have weathered with my other team....

GOD IS SO GOOD!!! To have my first (in that I was solely depended upon for DOT etc) in such conditions, with an aging beyond what I normally train for (although that will change, lol) and then to have a tracker with their own evidence (and of course the picture from the critter cam) validate what my girl said was... is nice... still want concrete evidence, but I am thrilled with the way things turned out....

my girl is EXHAUSTED!!! We probably only did 7 or 8 miles worth of trailing, BUT, the cold wet, STEEP STEEP conditions of that made a pooped out puppy...and handler, lol

Oh, was also told by the park ranger who took us to PLS that a wolf pack was nearby... Then, at the last place we trailed where the footprints were, I was told it was a kill field for a mountain lion as bones lined the area, and the tracker saw it... But while I was doing the confirmation process with my girl, my flanker heard it (I was to focused on reading my girl).. I am pretty sure I could have outrun my flanker


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## Sarah Platts

What was nice was that everyone worked together. Dog, Tracker, Ground teams, IC. 

Even better that based on what everyone did and the calculations by IC, the woman was intercepted right where she was thought to be. The daughter was upset but that's normal when people see teams shutting down and the person is still missing or not located. They want that person FOUND and they see it as everyone giving up when they leave.

I think the mountain lion thing would have been a bit nerve wracking as most don't know they are around until they jump out at you. Guess it was a good thing you didn't know about it....


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## Nicole Stark

Exciting story and fun to read. I agree, Sarah is a true gem!


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## Bob Scott

What a team!


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## Misty Wegner

Thank you Nicole, Sarah and Bob  It was awesome to see the team work so well and the sheriff's department so supportive.. 

Definitely glad I didn't hear the kitty.... If I had, it probably would have (greatly) disturbed my focus, lol... 

I am super happy it was a successful mission, even if we didn't have the walk up find, becket gave me (good) experience with a new team and LE and things I need to work on to become better... For me, this is hugely important because the next callout might be way more difficult...


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## Howard Knauf

Wow!=D>=D>


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