Sniffing Around Scent Work

Yeti on the trail

I get up before dawn, and when I open the back door to go out and load up the car, I breathe in cool air. It has come. The cold front has arrived, and with it, Fall. I have been waiting months for this event, and now it has happened. And on a Saturday, It is like opening a wonderful present on Christmas morning.

I load Yeti into the car, grabbing my gear bag on the way, checking to make sure I have enough treats for him and water for both of us, and then go back into the house to dig a hoodie out of the closet. Outerwear! It is cold enough for outerwear! I feel like dancing with joy.

We are headed to one of my favorite parks, to meet with our small mantrailing group and their dogs (Note: you can read more about Mantrailing here: https://sniffingaroundscentwork.com/2022/11/23/mantrailing-the-newest-scent-sport/) .  It is a beautiful area, very old trees and well marked paths for hiking, and best of all, has not been crowded when I have visited in the past. When I get there, the horizon is breaking out in beautiful pale shades of orange and yellow, and I stop to take it in, giving Yeti and chance to stretch his legs, explore the area, and mark various trees. The day is glorious, and I am freed from the frustrations of the work week.

One of the gifts of mantrailing is that it motivates me to get out to the parks and nature preserves, which is an  immediate cure for any of the bad moods/feelings that I have accumulated during the week. This week was haunted by tiny micro frustrations, and aggravated by the ongoing hot weather.

When I am trailing with my dog, all of the world drops away. I am no longer a desk worker, one of the cogs in the wheels of big business. I am no longer a “woman of a certain age” prone to aches and pains. I am Diana the huntress, following my hound. I am my dog’s partner, reading the signs on the wind and following his lead through the trees. “Onward!” He sings, and I can tell from the tension in the line that the scent is fresh in his nostrils, and I follow his leaping body in search of the prey ahead.

Never mind that the prey is one of our training group who has hiked ahead, and hidden himself in the brush. Never mind that the end of the trail will come with a tame reward (tasty treats from the sausage section of the grocery store!) and verbal celebration instead of the killing of an animal. It is the chase that matters to my dog, and it is thrill of the hunt, and the mystery of it all that matters to me.

How on earth does my dog do it? Find the path, through the air, and the ground, the invisible marks left by a passing person. The magic and the mystery of it all never fails to thrill me.    

I see that magic in scent work also. I love the rush of a successful search, I love the drama of competitions. But when I am trailing, I feel like scent work pales in comparison.

Of course, we are still a beginner at the sport. There are darker days ahead, I am sure, with frustrations caused by bad decisions on the path, lost scent cones, and failed expectations. But we will be buoyed by Yeti’s drive, and by the overall enjoyment of being outside, among the trees and together with friends.

Although I have only been teaching mantrailing a short while, I am impressed by how easy and natural this activity is for all of the dogs. I have been teaching nosework/scentwork for the last eight years, and while many dogs enjoy it, I have to say, it is a bit more of an effort to get them searching in all of the environments that we want them to search in, and get them to give a consistent indication, which is so important in communicating where the hide is.

With Mantrailing, we start with an easy game of hide and go seek.  It generally only takes a very few repetitions for dogs to “get” the game. Hide and seek seems to be as natural and obvious a game to dogs as it is to humans, and from there, we just have to work at them using their nose to find the human target.

Yeti taking scent from an article

I theorize that this “hunt” is more natural to dogs because they are looking for an actual animal (albeit a human animal), which is much closer to hunting for prey than hunting for an inanimate object. I also suspect that dogs find following human scent very instinctive. They have evolved alongside of us for thousands of years, and there are many examples of dogs seeking out the odor of humans—the dog that chooses the toy that was last handled by their owner, or the dog who sleeps on the shoes of his owner while the owner is on vacation. Our smell is familiar and comforting, and in many ways, fascinating to them, in a way that essential oils or other detection odors are not.

Of course the dogs do get rewarded at the end of the trail. There is lots of high quality food given for a successful find. But I have also observed that for Yeti, it is not so much about the reward as it is the hunting and the finding.

Mantrailing as a sport for all dogs has only recently been introduced into the US (although the Bloodhound folks have been doing it for years), and there are not many certified instructors. It is not a sport in which competitions are held and placement awards are given, though there are tests given by assessors and “levels” achieved. Will it grow? Will it be successful on a national scale? Only time will tell. And in the meantime, Yeti and I will be out there trailing at every opportunity.

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