Amigo Search and Rescue Dogs

MT MARCY SEARCH

karamackenzi — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 04:51:57 +0000

Well today was quite a search. Last night I check my phone and see missed calls and frantic text messages to get home. Jen Culver a friend and K9 Handler from Eagle Valley was waiting at my house for a search in the Adirondacks. ( she lives 5 minutes away from me haha) My dad took my brother and I when we were kids and it was amazing. We were even staging at the ADK lodge were we parked when I was a kid. I have been on the team for about 2 years now. I have had a lot of experience watching Federation dogs in action, it’s amazing especially on a real search. Watching the dogs body language. They can all tell you about the same thing but each dog tells you slightly differently. Each dog and and even handler are so unique.

The best part about a search. It’s that rush of adrenaline knowing you may save someone’s life or even provide closure. Also to know that all the classes, seminars, trainings, map and compass work, money and time have made a difference. Making a difference is what its about anyway right?. Having that shaken, worried sick daughter look at you and say “thank you” just for showing up and looking is worth it really.

Jen and I went out around 9am. We ended up finishing up with both the dogs around 3 just as the subject was located by ground pounders in another area. The dogs worked fantastic and cleared the area very well. We did about 7 miles in the wet beautiful wilderness of the Adirondacks. However, nobody told us that all the bridges were out! We made due by throwing logs in to walk on and hopping rocks.

Another good search and more to come. I will always enjoy flanking but I can’t wait until the countless hours of work with my kids finally pay off. Felix has been steadily improving with a solid indication and his scent work is fantastic. Mika has been doing a lot of cadaver and she has been doing great. She has learned the “paw” indication. I have improved a lot on my navigation and am looking forward to getting them certified. Team work makes dream work!- Kara Schaeffer GO PLAY WITH YOUR DOG! :-]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrhlxDcpdvY <– video mika cadaver indication!

Winter Fun

Amigo SAR Dogs — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 01:09:59 +0000

Buddy and Dick completing a winter problem at Bear Spring Mountain-http://www.flickr.com/photos/amigosardogs/5651303163/

Oct 2010 Diaster First Responder Class

Amigo SAR Dogs — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 00:06:07 +0000

Oct 2010 K-9 Disaster First Responder Class

Oct 24-26th Amigo hosted a K-9 Disaster First Responder Class with Teresa MacPherson instructing. The class was made possible by a grant from the AKC CAR Canine Support and Relief Fund

Over the course of the 3 days attendees from Amigo, Eagle Valley and NJ SAR, learned important knowledge and skills about the differences between disaster response and wilderness response so that the teams are now better prepared to respond should a local disaster occur.

Skills practiced included:

Agility Work

Agility Finds

Bark Indication Work

Directionals

Rubble Pile Work

Amethyst

purplepup — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 01:21:42 +0000

Amanda has long been after us to blog so here I am finally. Two years ago I caved in at the last minute and chose a Ripley X Quax puppy. Two high drive search dogs. Purple was her ID color at the time and so I decided on Amethyst as her name. Once again I began an adventure of growing and learning with a new puppy in SAR training. Each dog is different and comes with their own set of challenges for a handler to deal with. The first year it was unclear whether Amy and I would blend together as a team. Having lost a K9 partner who was a soul mate made the transition difficult. As much as you try not to compare, it is still human nature to do so. As we worked through the training process we had the support and sharing of ideas from both Amigo team members and Eagle Valley Search Dogs. Several of Amy’s siblings were also training for SAR. I began to see the glimmer of a search dog emerge in Amy but we had a long way to go in becoming a team. Trust in each other was a definite work in progress. It seemed like one step forward, two steps back but progress was actually moving ahead. We began to work through our on team certifications and as each of those were passed our trust grew. By April of this year I expected we could pass the off team night certification. Amy worked it beautifully and responded as she should. In subsequent trainings my heart swelled with pride as I watched a true search dog unfold and put her total trust in me as her partner. I in turn began to trust her as well. I made the decision to go for the last certification that would make us operational. We accomplished that in May and during that certification I could see that I had a solid partner in Amethyst. It seems that in the last couple of months we had indeed become a team. Amy and I attended our first search as a working team in July and I was excited to watch her working efficiently and with confidence. I have a partner again. My collection of all things purple began as a way to integrate this puppy into my life. A symbol of hope that I could accept this small life while losing another so dear to me I wear purple now as a symbol of pride for the partner that now stands at my side, Amethyst.

Pat Thompson

Trailing Article Evidence Collection

Amigo SAR Dogs — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 19:26:11 +0000

Libby and I started doing a little bit of trailing work after we became an operational air scent team. I thought it would be good to make her well rounded and teach her how to trail although her primary mission and focus would always be airscent. I’ve seen her use some of her new trailing skills to solve her airscent problems more quickly, so I think this was a good decision. I didn’t count on her being smarter then me though!

At a recent training, I found I didn’t have any bags handy to put a scent article in after it was collected. The vehicles were quite a distance away when we decided to run the trail and I got lazy. I didn’t want to have to go back to them to get a bag.

Pat collected a glove scent article from the subject. The plan was when we asked Libby to trail the subject, we would turn the glove inside out so it would have the subjects scent on it. Pat’s scent would only be on the outside of the glove.

I got libby in harness and told her to sniff the scent article. Libby took a deep whiff of the inside of the glove. Then I told her to trail. She looked at me and then she looked at Pat. I said come on lets go get her. Libby promptly lays down at our feet. At this point I was a little bit confused. Usually when I tell my dog to trail she immediately gets to work. I told her to sniff the article again. Again she lays immediately at our feet. I try a third time. Finally she starts casting for scent and off we go.

Later we stopped for a water break. Thinking it would help her refocus since we had come off the trail to get to the creek, I asked Libby to trail and gave her the scent article again. Again she downed at my feet. I asked a second time and she finally took off, picked up the trail again. We were training in a public location and we ran into a stranger. Libby ignored him after giving him a quick sniff as he wasn’t who she was looking for. She got to where the subject had left the trail, hit airscent and went flying to the subject. As we rewarded her, I pondered her strange behavior with laying down at the start of the trail.

Turns out when I thought about more I realized that my dog was trying to out smart me. Pat was always standing right next to me when Libby did the down. Since Pat’s scent was on the glove as well as the subjects, Libby was saying but the subject is right here. What do you want me to do? After repeatdly insisting she trail, Libby would then “say” “ok I’ll go for the older scent on the glove if thats what you really want” and used that to run the trail.

It was an interesting lesson in trailing and the importance of always being prepared for collecting your scent article.

Looking back on 2009

Amigo SAR Dogs — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 18:26:02 +0000

2009 was an exciting year for both Amigo and for me. 2009 saw us get two new airscent dogs and handlers. I certified with my K9, Libby and Dick certified with his K9, Buddy. As operational handlers that means we are eligible to test our team mates on the first 3 operational search dog tests. 2009 saw Dick and I certifying Amy and Pat on their first 3 on team tests. In 2010 we are looking forward to Amy and Pat completing their last two off team tests and becoming operational. Amigo was also able to host an awesome HRD seminar with John Valvardi and Linda Murphy coming up to train Amigo and Eagle Valley K9s in Warren Center, PA in October.

2009 brought us some interesting searches we were able to help out with. I found it’s a big difference between being a K9 backer and being the K9 handler on a search. All went well though. Dick and I did ok and both Libby and Buddy preformed well on their first searches. We are looking foward to having our dogs help on more searches in 2010.

Over and over again we see how effective the dogs are on searches. There have been trainings where I would just start to enter my search area. When the wind was right, my dog would have the subjects scent at the very beginning and go off and make a find before I’d hardly even started my search pattern. One of the teams big goals for 2010 is to work on getting the word out on our resources and capabilities to other agencies in our area. The dogs are a great free resource for search missions. With so much effort into getting them trained, certified and keeping them mission ready, we’d love to see them used more especially around our home area.

For me personally, 2009 was an extremely exciting year. Libby became an operational search dog for in both live find and HRD in the Spring. In June we certified on HRD with the Eastern Police K9 Association. Dick and Buddy also certified at the same time. In the fall Libby and I started on some of the intermediate K9 certifications. We also started doing some small scent specific trailing problems after we became airscent operational. It’s been interesting to see how Libby is starting to put her new found trailing knowledge to use for what we try to setup as her air scent problems. (Libby’s primary focus will always be as an airscent dog.)

Especially exciting for me in 2009 was Libby’s drastic improvements in water work. Water work from a boat is difficult to set up and time consuming so we don’t get to practice on it as much as we’d like. The first two years I tried doing water work with Libby, I found she was so excited about being in the boat that it was difficult to read her boat excitement from her HRD excitement. She was so happy about being on the boat and having people near her, that she was all over the boat instead of laying calmly in the bow ofthe boat trying to get scent.

Libby’s on land indication is to bark , however she didn’t want to bark for me at source when we were in the boat. It was discouraging. Especially the second year as she had developed into an excellent search dog for land based problems. It was like she couldn’t grasp the concept that someone could be hiding under the water for her to find. I was given a few ideas of ways to work on the problem and I resolved in 2008 to work on these drills and see what happened.

They say a year can make all the difference and after 2009 I believe it. The differences in my dog between 2008 and 2009 were astounding. In 2009, when we got on the boat and Libby was given the search command she immediatly became focused on finding scent. Instead of running all over the boat and paying attention to the people on the boat she was on the edge of the boat trying to get scent. When the boat passed by the source she would jump to the side of the boat that had source making it easy to tell that we needed to turn around and go back. When we were right over source she kept slapping the water with her paw. It was like she was screaming it is right here- listen to me. Our team had a busy summer, so unfortunatly, we were only able to get on the water once during 2009. In 2010, the team is hoping to do more water work so that we can get Libby certfied. We are also hoping Dick’s dog, Buddy, will be ready to be certified in water work in 2010.

With an exciting 2009 and a promising 2010 ahead we are looking forward to the new year.

Winter Training

Amigo SAR Dogs — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 02:31:23 +0000

Winter is here yet again. And the dogs love playing in the snow. Libby especially loves the snow as she spent some of her formative years growing up north of syracuse. Snow piles up there are much bigger then we get now that we are in Owego, NY.

Libby, Buddy and Amy did their first snow burial problems last winter up at Bear Spring Mountain in Walton, NY. It was interesting to see what the different dogs did with finding their buried subject. I’m sure they thought that these silly people hide in the strangest places sometimes.

Since Buddy and Libby became operational search dogs in 2009, they are now eligible to do the snow burial certification this winter. Of course we need to get more snow before they will be able take the test! The snow burial certification is considered an intermediate test and is completed after a search dog passes the first 5 tests and becomes operational. Libby and I are looking forward to having someone get lost in the snow for this soon.