Buddy, NW3 and 2nd Overall: Amherst, NY

The Nosework Stars aligned for Buddy and me this weekend in New York at our FIFTH NW3 attempt! Buddy came away with his first NW3 title, a first place in our Vehicle search, and second place overall! Yes, I was absolutely losing my mind.

NW3 is such a fun (and challenging!!) level — I was revisiting my last NW3 reflection post and the progress since that trial in December is very much noticeable. We felt more consistent throughout the entire trial day and our confidence together is continuing to grow.

I wanted to focus on trusting his dismissals and not overworking our search areas a ton. Our past four NW3 attempts ranged between 10:15 and 11:45 for our total search time over the course of the day, whereas our total search time this weekend was just under 9:00. I felt more comfortable in the moment calling finish and it paid off for us!

Here are our searches in the order we ran them:

Interior #1: Stage — 2:30, 2 hides *Pronounced!

This was our first search of the day! This is threshold hide #1 of 3 of the trial day and I was really happy with Buddy’s commitment to the first hide. He moves on and catches hide #2 on the end of the curtain, near the timer. He sources both hide #1 and hide #1 in ~10 seconds each!
He clears the search area quickly and I ask him to recover it all. Signs he gives me that we’re all done: re-sourcing hide #1, quickly dismissing areas with no COB, nudging the timer’s hand. Mental notes were made by the handler!!

Our score card comments on this search were: “Good teamwork, good search!” and of course, a P!

Vehicles — 3:00, 1 hide *First place search & Pronounced!

Vehicle Searches are probably my favorite in a trial with Buddy — they are fun and challenging and I love watching him problem solve through all wind. We did this search immediately after our first interior search. A little stamina challenge! I LOVED this search coming out of it. The wrapping!!!! Absolutely beautiful. I love Buddy’s sourcing up to the hide. He has a clear COB and easy Alert call!

He then does more absolutely stunning wrapping work to clear the other two cars. He re-sources the first hide again (mental note from search #1) and I feel confident as he comes off the last car that we are done and I call finish. Good handler.

Our score card comments on this search were: “Superb search” — yes, yes it was. And, a P!

Exterior #1 — 0 hides, 2:30

This was our challenging search of the day! I was proud of Buddy work his work and commitment to searching here. I came in with some baggage as I knew he had to pee but hadn’t been able to make the mental jump to actually do it. He is trying hard to find odor here, and is trying to leave the search area to expand and hunt. In the moment, I am questioning whether him trying to leave is him telling me it’s blank, or him needing to pee. Mind you, this dog has never peed in a search or given me any reason to think he would do that. Trial nerves!

Good boy Buddy for not letting me talk you into that last table. My instructor Kayla was in my head in that moment — he’s a salesman! He needs to sell you! — he wasn’t selling me. I call finish (even if it is a little late). Good handler.

Our score card comments for this search were: ‘Blank. Worked hard for you.’ Yes he did!

Interior #2: Veteran’s Room — 1 hide, 2:00

Search 4! I was happy with Buddy’s enthusiasm and arousal here, over halfway through our trial day. Threshold hide #2! He sources it quickly and then works through some of the diffuse odor on the first table. I ask him to clear the room twice-ish and we confidently call finish. Good handler!

Our score card comments for this search were: ‘Good leash manipulation. Excellent confidence in dog. Great search behavior.’

Containers — 2 hides, 2:30

My nemesis! I need to deal with my container traumas this summer. I tried not to let my demons interfere here, but it was challenging as he made his first pass over the containers with no COBs — LOL!

We get our two yesses on the second pass and get out of there. Good boy, Buddy!

Exterior #2 — 3 hides, 3:00 *Pronounced

Our final search was a blast to end on — this felt very familiar to Buddy and me, as a big portion of our training is open exteriors like this. I was happy with Buddy’s work in our final search of the day. Our gold spot in FDSA class last term really helped our overall stamina. He takes us all the way to the back of the search area to get our first hide and works his way back up to the front, where he picks up threshold hide #3 of the day!

This was a really smooth search, and Buddy found all 3 hides in ~1:35.

Overall, we had a great trial day. It was a beautiful day outside, we had a fun site that provided a lot of opportunities to enjoy the campus and be outside, and we had the right mix of preparedness and luck.

Outside of the actual trial, Buddy is also turning into a professional road-tripper. He is such a joy to spend 1:1 time with!! He rides in the car easily and is very happy to chill in the hotel room. I’m just sick over him and I can’t believe this is how his life turned out.

Buddy has some time ‘off’ now as we prep for Dale’s NW3 at the end of June. Then both dogs will have July off before we get back to trialing in August.