 phase three in tracking. Let's summarize what we've learned in phase two. The dog first of all, so three major things that the dog needs to learn. First and very important, we still want to make sure the dog is happy and it's a very positive exercise. Even if it doesn't go too well as you wish, you still have to keep the positive attitude and know that the dog enjoys this. This is very important. It will be plenty of forcing and making the dog do what they don't want to do later on, but for now the dog needs to be excited, that you're going to do something, it's tracking and it's fun. So that's the first thing. Second thing, in phase two we started introducing a little bit of a structure. So if you remember in phase one it was just all fun. We would do the circle any time during the day or we just during the play we would do a circle and the dog would search for food. That was in phase one. In phase two it is a bit more structure. What I mean by that is that first of all I tell the dog that we go in tracking. So the dog learns the marker command for things that we're going to do in the future. So at home when I'm preparing my bait for the truck and I'm not feeding the dog in the morning, we're skipping the meal because we go in tracking. I'm telling this to the dog. I say we're going tracking so you have to wait with food. We're going tracking and I keep repeating this. Then we go into the car and by the car also let the dog in the car and I say we're going tracking. When I start the car and we start going driving I'm also saying we're going tracking. So the dog learns this and then eventually when you get the dog out of the car to actually go tracking you repeat this again. You say you're going tracking, tracking, tracking. So the dog remembers that's the structure. And then also what I started doing because now it is more set up exercise than just fun random exercise it was as it was in phase one. So now we also introduce equipment. So I track my dog in a certain color with a certain leash and so he knows if I take this color out with this long leash it's 100 feet leash for tracking it's also kind of triggering this marker for him he knows oh okay so if we were in this means we're tracking aside from the fact that I'm saying this. And another structure that we add is that this exercise became always in the morning and so now he knows that in the morning when I feed the rest of my crew I have a cat and an older little dog and I don't feed him and I tell him we're going tracking so he knows exactly he'll eat on the track. And then another structure is that and the third piece of it what I started doing in phase two is that I started tying his meals to the success of the track. So when we do tracking and he did well I tell him good track good track good track and we get to the car and I reward him I feed him by the car or if we're driving home when I get home I still say good truck you did a good job tracking good truck and then I give the dog food and so again this kind of connects okay I did something good now I'm feeding they feed me. Though they don't understand yet that it might go away they don't track right but for now I'm just setting it up and that's very important because later on when we go to a little bit advanced tracking and the dog doesn't want to do that it has to become clear to the dog that unless they track they don't get to eat right and so that's later in the stage so stage phase two again three major things it has to be happy for the dog we add a little bit of structure so the dog knows the routine learns the routine and third is that the dog starts to connecting his feeding with doing a good job on the track that's three major important things that the dog learns during phase two now how did we do phase two if you remember last in the last video I explained that we set up short tracks two three short tracks with little reward circles at the end or in between and so that's how I started but you have to learn your dog quickly I learned that my dog figured this that he has to the truck goes straight pretty quickly and so that was the reason why we started this way because he was on the circles and then I had to teach him to go straight he learned this very quickly so I stopped doing short number of short tracks with the rewards in between but I started doing tracks that are 30 40 steps long and we have a reward at the end and we did about 20 of those when I realized that my steps that I was doing very close together is no longer enough for the dog so he figured that the truck goes straight I no longer need to connect my steps and now I need rather to put my steps wider and further apart to teach the dog to go from left to right left to right and so that's what we've done kind of in between so probably another 10 15 when I start making normal steps but they're wider a little bit more apart so pretty much just regular steps just make sure they're not too close together because then the dog goes only on one foot and so I interchange that so sometimes I do regular steps and I see that the dog zigzagging but if I see that sometimes the dog just goes on one trucks only one leg then next time I go again I go closer together and so I want to make sure that the dog kind of learns to weave again and when he did the weaving the next time I'm spreading it again or sometimes you do it in one track you start like this and then you go wider wider so the dog learns to weave and then go from left to right left right so this pretty much the purpose of phase 2 to teach the dog to go straight and understand that it has to sniff every step so left to right left right all the time and so that's kind of the main purpose of this phase per se and so once the dog learns this we are ready to move to phase 3 so what do we do in phase 3 what are we trying to teach the dog first the dog needs to learn clearly but unless it does well on the track it does not eat and that's I think very important moving forward because the trucks become more difficult longer and you need to motivate the dog and some dogs are not very food driven so it has to become clear to the dog this is your meal for the morning and unless you find it you don't eat if you find it then you get either additional food depending how much food do you put on the truck I don't put too much I have very small little pieces and so it might not be enough for him so if he did well I also feed him either in the car or then at home a little bit but if I see that he's not too interested in truck I don't reward it so he whatever he found he found it but if I see that he's not too enthusiastic to truck I don't give him the extra meal and so he goes without food till dinner I normally don't deprive food from my dogs but if I see that the dog is not motivated I simply give them smaller portions I don't deprive in general but for example the night before I would feed him only half of the portion and then in the morning we go trucking and I if I see this is not enough then I feed the day before I feed morning half the portion dinner half the portion and then in the morning we go trucking and see if that motivates this dog that I have right now at us he's a little bit I think I feed him too well I feed him meat and vegetables and so I guess he's not hungry in general so he's not too motivated with food on the track and so I started doing this kind of smaller portions for two days before we track and this seems to help because today in the morning he was obviously watch your dog and make sure that this is phase 3 is when you try to find how you have to set up the dogs the dog does well and successful on the track that's number one number two is that now my trucks are about hundred steps long and they're no longer straight I either do serpentine or I do half circle and what it teaches the dog that the truck can run away from you so you need to follow it and so the dog becomes a bit more attentive and also later on it helps me start making corners because if the dog knows how to go on a half a circle so eventually you kind of start making them shorter and sharper and that's how I introduce the circles eventually but we'll get to that it it's later in the phase for now it just we move in the truck it's serpentine and it's longer or half circle and it's longer it's about hundred feet long steps long and if I see that the dog does not take hundred steps well in one truck then the next time I would do 50 so I don't consistently do 100 because you need to give the dog kind of excitement right here so they don't know when it's going to end and if you see if it's too much for your dog then the next time do half of the length to to help the dog also sometimes what I do I still go back to the little circles you can see behind my back here that's my kind of reward patch so you'll see in the video later you'll see my half a circle with with the truck and it was a hundred steps long and he was not too motivated he didn't really do well but I'll still show you because I had to correct him and then after that I did a little patch and you'll see how well he did on the page because it's like he remembers that it's a good memory when we start tracking and it's excitement so you'll see how well he did this and so you start introduce corrections a little bit on the track and again you'll see it in the video next after this when we truck I had to correct him because he was rushing and skipping and then I if I pull on him a little bit to let kind of let him slow down and figure out that he's standing on the bait on the treat he would just lie down or he would just wander off or stop tracking so not enough motivation in him and one other thing that I'm going to share is that looks like he has enough meat for his meal and I've been tracking for also meat or hot dogs and that hasn't been going well for him and so I've realized that so I start changing bait and funnily enough he likes kibble and I realized well it's a lot easier for me than chopping hot dogs and buying them so I bought kibble and you'll see in the patch he has kibble on the track he had meat and so with meat he was not too motivated for some reason so from now on a few times I'll try to find a very large kibble because kibble is usually too small for trucking but I'll try to find larger kibble and from now on I'll try a few sessions and see if he would truck much better for kibble but for today's session he had half portions for two days half portions of his meal for two days and I fed him a lot earlier last night than I usually do so he was pretty hungry in the morning like I mentioned he was eager to do that but looks like the bait meat doesn't get him too excited because he gets it for free at home and kibble is something that he never gets and so that got him excited and so from now on what we focus in phase three is tolerability the dog needs to tolerate a larger track so we try to push that's our goal if the dog doesn't did well on the long we do the short one but still keep coming back to 100 steps maybe 120 steps if your dog does well I'm at a hundred step right now second the dog needs to understand corrections on the track because you need to help the dog a little bit and it doesn't mean that the dog needs to quit so I'm introducing very very gentle corrections you'll see how I've done it in the video and the third thing the dog learns that the truck no longer stays straight as a line the dog the truck can move away to one side to another side and so the dog needs to look for it so those are three major things that I want my dog to learn in this phase three and you'll see how we did today with the hundred step track and with the reward patch at the end happy tracking