All About Scent Work Podcast

In this Spotlight Series episode, we have the opportunity to speak with Dr. John Strassner, an Expert AKC Scent Work Judge and former AKC Field Representative. We delve into John's admirable enthusiasm for the sport of Scent Work, his desire to give back, grow and continually learn all while having a fantastic time with his own personal dogs. John's love for Scent Work is contagious and we are thankful for all that he has done, and...

You are taking a Scent Work class, attending a working or webinar, reading a blog or listening to a podcast and you hear the phrase, "break it down". What does this even mean?! How can go about "breaking it down" when training or practicing Scent Work with your dog?

We delve into the meaning behind this phrase, discuss the various factors we can play with when training Scent Work and highlight why identifying the smallest pieces of...

Have you ever felt as though you were being smothered by a blanket of doubt when it comes to Scent Work? Are you second guessing every little thing you do, paralyzed with fear of making a mistake? Perhaps you are making excuses not to trial, go to class or even practice or train. As an instructor, do you feel your confidence absolutely shattered, concerned you will be found out to not know anything at all?

If this sounds familiar, ...

There exists a world of opportunities in the days immediately before and after a given trial. What we choose to do with our dogs during these days can have an immense impact on our performance on trial day or how we rebound afterwards.

In this episode, we discuss some of the things to consider when deciding what to do before and after trial. This is an enormous topic, so this discussion is more geared toward getting everyone thinki...

Consequences are all bad things, right? Not necessarily. When training, consequences are merely results, not inherently good or bad. By embracing the concept of consequences, we can make more informed decisions of what we will train, when and how.

We discuss ways we can do just that in this podcast episode.

Additionally, Dianna mentions Judith Guthrie and Michele Ellertson, both of whom are excellent instructors and trainers. Be ce...

Each of us have certain "hats" we wear pertaining to Scent Work. Dog owner. Handler. Competitor. Instructor. Trial official. Trial host. Volunteer. Each "hat" brings with it unique experiences, viewpoints and biases. We can broaden our experiences, push passed blind spots and deficiencies by attempting to experience as many viewpoints as possible.

Own a super fast moving dog? Borrowing a classmate's more methodical dog for a class ...

Training Scent Work offers us a multitude of choices. What training approach, school of thought or tools will we use? Each of us has our own preferences. However, this sometimes leads us to label the options we discarded, or chose to pass by, as "BAD".

In this wide-ranging episode, we dive into why this happens and how it can be an issue. Instead, the argument is made that we should learn as much as possible, recognize the effectiv...

Choosing to trial with our dogs requires that we ask some questions. Would trialing be the best thing for us, our dogs and our team, right now, at this point in time? The answers will differ from team-to-team, but the act of the purposefully practicing honest advocacy is something everyone participating in Scent Work should do.

This approach allows us to better determine which paths or decisions will work best for ourselves as hand...

When tackling your searches, are you keeping your dog's perspective in mind? Meaning, how they are perceiving the space or environment? Doing so can be harder than it sounds, since we as people are oftentimes desensitized to the normal happenings of a human world. Yet these may be the very things which make a search exponentially more challenging for our dogs.

In this episode, we discuss the importance of viewing our searches from ...

Do you feel as though you are running at top speed on a hamster wheel and unable to get off? There are many of us in the sniffing community that may feel this way!

Handlers who are doing all of the things all of the time, running themselves, and their dogs, ragged. Trial hosts, who after spending months working tirelessly to prep for an event, find themselves receiving requests to host even more events before the current one is wra...

When it comes to trialing in Scent Work within the United States, there many competition organizations to choose from. This variety grants us an incredible opportunity: to be strategic. This is true for new and seasoned competitors alike. We can more fully realize the potential of mindfully leveraging our choices, deciding which organization we compete with, when and why and even carefully choosing which classes we sign up for.

In ...

Why are we doing Scent Work in the first place? What drew us to this activity? We are all so incredibly busy, stretched ridiculously thin, constantly rushing from one thing to next. Why then are we still squeezing searching into our already jam-packed calendars? Is it really all about the titles or ribbons? Or is it something else? Could it be the addictive joy that our dogs exude as they rush around working a space? If so, wouldn'...

There are many moving pieces when it comes to the activity of Scent Work. A common misconception is that Scent Work is easy: train dog to find thing, hide thing in area, dog finds thing, give dog cookie. Yet, to accomplish even this watered down version of Scent Work requires concentrated work and focus. Otherwise our searches will be messy, lackluster and ineffective.

In this episode, we discuss how Scent Work is rather complicate...

You're tackling a search with your dog. They have found a few hides and there are one or more hides left. Suddenly, they stop and look back at you. They are not near anything, they are not alerting...no, they are asking a dreaded question! Now what?! Is this the end of the world? What does mean?! What do you do?!

In this episode, we discuss the meaning behind our dog's asking questions in Scent Work, what this can look like and how...

It is far too easy to develop blind spots when training or trialing with our dogs, working with clients, designing searches as a trial official, finding or running trials as a host or evaluating rules or regulations as a competition organization staff member. Our perspective may be rather limited, causing us to not see the fullest and most accurate picture possible. This skewed perspective may then color the decisions we make, the ...

Instructors are tasked to share their knowledge and expertise with their human clients in such a way that the client can then internalize, understand and interpret that information for their dog. This is no easy task! However, it becomes close to impossible if the way this information is packaged causes the client to not want to receive it. 

In this episode, we discuss the art of giving and receiving information. Tone, facial expre...

It is all too common to find ourselves making statements such as, "At this stage, I should do THIS" or "After this STEP, I follow this STEP and then that STEP." What's the issue you may ask? Well, this line of thinking is rather concrete. Individual needs of the dog, handler or team, unique factors for that given search, environment or training session or trialing search are not taken into account. 

In this episode, we discuss the ...

In this spotlight episode, we have the distinct privilege to speak to Kayla Dever and Samantha Winslow of Every Dog Nosework about how they plunged into helping build the Nose Work community in their area. This includes developing their training skills, competition accolades, hosting trials, workshops, seminars and more.

An amazing example of doers who are giving back to the sniffing community and sharing their love for all things ...

It is interesting how when it comes to Scent Work, everything is seemingly viewed through the lens of the dog's ability to hunt and source their hides. If something doesn't go well, that means we must do more searches, right?

In this episode, we discuss how there are so many skills a dog, handler and team need to be successful in Scent Work, many of which have absolutely nothing to do with hunting or odor! Thus, there are times dri...