I Smell a Rat

When Vicky was one she participated in some FastCAT competitions and earned her first ranking of B-CAT. FastCAT is a lure chasing event managed by AKC. A plastic bag lure is pulled in front of a dog leading them on a 100 yard dash as fast as they can go. Vicky ran 19.6 mph in her last race. Kaitlyn was two days too young to participate the first time, but she was able to take an introductory class and seemed to love it. During one of the fun runs she pulled or tore her CCL. We decided that perhaps racing our dogs as fast as they could go was not such a great idea!

However, while we were at the events holding FastCAT there were other AKC competitions going on, including Dock Diving, Agility, Obedience and Barn Hunt, to name a few. Both the Mister and I were intrigued by Barn Hunt. In this competition dogs must find one or more hidden rats (housed in sturdy PVC containers with air holes) hidden in, on, or around hay bales. I thought Kaitlyn would love this task. 

Wednesday we took both dogs to an introductory session at a training facility about an hour from us . The trainer showed each dog (individually) a rat in a cage and I was to praise the dog for 'engaging' with the rat. The trainer moved the caged along the floor and encouraged the dog to follow, again earning lots of praise and pats and scritches from me. Then the trainer draped a little straw over the cage, having me ask the dog to find it, praising and showing great joy when she stopped and sniffed, or pawed at the cage or assumed 'play' position in front of the cage. The trainer had each dog do this a few times, then gave them a break to 'think about it'. 

Each dog had two other opportunities to find rats. The second and third time there were two rats; one in the cage and one in a tube. On the third experience for each dog, one of the rat cages was placed up on a hay bale. It had already been suggested that I encourage the dogs to go through tunnels formed by the hay bales, and to climb on them. Both dogs are familiar with tunnels as we have played with some agility equipment before, and jumping up on the hay bales was not an obstacle for either of them. I think Kaitlyn actually enjoyed going through the various tunnels. 

There's a rat in the tube below Vicky's nose.

You can make out the PVC plug at the bottom of the picture, on the left.

Nope! No rat here!

I didn't see either dog demonstrate much enthusiasm for this 'sport', but they are still trying to figure out what it was I was asking of them. I'll continue taking them to some more training sessions and see how it goes. The "Mister" is ready to get a rat, make a tube for it and make some mazes with hay bales in our barn! I think the tail may be wagging the dog....but wait, our dogs don't have tails, so that wouldn't work!!