Friday, August 22, 2014

It's Been a LONG time

First of all I'm so sorry for abandoning this blog.  Life has been so hectic that I haven't been able to do much to even report on the blog.  I ended up becoming President of my Search and Rescue team,  Volunteering my time with my local CERT (Community Emergency Response Team), becoming a trainer for that, doing lots of trainings outside of the dogs, then personal family issues that I barely have time to even think anymore.  I've started a few blogs but never had time to post them.  I'm going to try to make a point to post once a month but bear with me.  Times are tough!

What is up with the Nuts you ask?  We not a lot.

Nubs:
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Nubs turned 7 this year and while improved drastically, had a small set back this past week with his knee.  He was off of pain killers completely since June up until last week and was doing fantastic over all.  Some nights he felt his age but he's been tearing around the yard like a nut that he is.  He's still my cuddle buddy and while he's showing his age ever so slightly he's still a pup that can keep up with Peanut.

Nubs
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Peanut:
While we've been doing a lot, we haven't really done a lot.  That makes sense doesn't it?  This year I decided since it's about impossible to find anyone to hide for me for tracking that I would make use of her nose and start cadaver work.  Yes this means I have blood, bones, and teeth in my house which is kinda creepy but it's a lot of fun to watch Peanut do the work.  With us becoming a big part of our Emergency Services department (Someone has even been elected as the team mascot!), Peanut got herself a nice fancy new search vest for working.
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We also did the big Cereal Festival downtown, and for the first time ever we got to be in the parade!  Peanut did FANTASTIC in that parade with dogs freaking out around us as we walked down town.  We even made the local newspaper online.  That was awesome.
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And here are some photos of her first time out in the field doing cadaver work.  She's come a LONG ways and is doing fantastic.  That night I took her 6 tubes and threw them in a large field (so that way she can't track my scent to find the tubes).  3 tubes had scent in them and 3 tubes were dummy, empty tubes to insure that she wasn't looking for the tubes but for the scent.  Well I can confirm she was on the scent.  She located the 3 tubes of scent, ran past 2 empty tube with no indications on them.  Then I spent the next 30 mins searching the field for the last empty tube because she wouldn't alert on an empty tube.  That was hard to find and made me respect her nose even more.  WTG Peanut and keep up the hard work!

"I found it!"
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