How to Easily Break Down Elevated Hides

Step 1: Find the Baseline

When setting elevated hides we want to start at the beginning. Set an elevated hide that requires the dog to either extend their neck or lift their front feet off the ground, but still accessible to them. Breakout a tripod or a chest mounted camera holder so that you can reliably measure the progression. Now record how long it takes to find the single elevated hide.

Step 2: Measure the Baseline

When measuring the baseline I’m looking at a few variables. First, what is the total length of the search in this case its about 68s. This gives me an indication of his overall speed in the search, but lacks specificity. Second, I measure the time it takes him to get to the productive area and whether or not he leaves the productive area before finding source. In this case he first enters the productive area at about 20s and by 35s has been pulled out to the far outer edge of the odor cone on the right. It then takes him till 62s to get back into the odor cone and push towards source along the ground. In the last 6s he goes from the far edge of the odor cone nearly straight to source. My goal over the course of this session is to decrease the 30s it took him to find the far edge before working his way back to source.

Step 3: Reverse the Picture of Elevated Hides

With this dog I know that he is very proficient with close to ground level odor that is blowing towards him. My choice in this case was based on knowing that information about him. It could be that the easiest height for your dog is nose level. I chose the same stretch of chain link fence and the only variable that was changed was the height.

Step 4: Measure the Easy Version of Elevated Hides

In this video the total search lasts only 19s. He moves directly to the productive area, likely due to pattern recognition from the previous search in 6s. Then once he is in the productive area he doesn’t need to move away from the odor to get to source. Ultimately, it takes him only 13s to get from the edge of the productive area to source. I want to close the gap between the baseline and the easy search.

Step 5: Set an Intermediate Search for Elevated Hides

In this case I determined that the intermediate search is slightly above his eye level. He doesn’t have to lift his feet off the ground (a behavior that he doesn’t love) but he does have to lift his head above the topline to find odor.

Step 6: Measure the Intermediate Search

In this search it takes him 11s to get to the productive search area. He gets pulled out to the edge of the productive area, but not as far off as his first search. He turns back towards the odor at 19s. At this point he stays in the odor cone and brackets back and fourth until he indicates odor at 40s. The time it took him to commit to the odor pool in the baseline search took him nearly 60s whereas by this search, he was able to commit to the productive area in 20s. Once he is in the productive area, the time it takes him to get to source is not meaningfully faster than the baseline.

Step 7: Set the Challenge Search

To change the picture a little bit, I chose to move the hide slightly left of center and place it above nose height to the point where to access it he has to lift up on his back legs to get to source.

Step 8: Measure the Elevated Hide Search

In this search he does get distracted by some kids in the middle, but I don’t think it has much impact on his working here. The total search time is 45s, which is 23s faster than the baseline search. He gets to the productive area at 8s and he brackets the chain link further back from the last search. This is likely due to the wind lofting the odor a little bit higher before it falls to the ground. He hits the far right edge of the odor cone at 18s. 23s is where he gets a little distracted by the kids. At 35s he gets back on task and re-enters the odor pool at the place he left on the far right hand side. From 35-45s he goes almost directly to source. He is absolutely the best boy.

Step 9: Take Another Baseline for Elevated Hides

In this setup we are using one chain link fence east of the one we used yesterday, this is due in large part to the fact that someone was parked in front of that fence. Grrr.

Step 10: Measure the New Baseline

He begins searching at 2s, moves directly towards the fence. This is likely due to pattern recognition. He brackets back and forth along the chain link, and alerts at 13s. to be completely honest I did not think that he would remember what we were doing yesterday and I’m impressed that he totally got how exactly to solve the puzzle. I’m guessing that as we work on other contexts of elevated hides and other types of searches generally and specifically in this location he will slow down a bit, as there will be more potential things that could happen here rather than just elevated hides.

Step 11: Change the Picture

In this search I selected an east facing chain link fence, and used 1 birch scented q-tip. In previous searches he was looking for 1 anise scented q-tip and searching on a south facing chain link fence.

Step 12 Measure the New Picture

In this video he begins searching at 4s. At 10s he has moved directly towards the productive area (the chain link fence). He gets close to source at 27s when he jumps up to check the pipe fitting on the left. He them moves to bracket the chain link fence. Finally he sources the odor at 37s. Impressively, this is still faster than his challenge search from yesterday.

A note: you will see that I hardly ever reinforce at source, that is because the learner decides what is reinforcing. For him the reinforcement strategy that we almost always use in training is treat tosses. He feels about treat tosses the way that some dogs feel about balls. Treating at source is honestly just not as reinforcing for him, so we don’t do it very often.