How to condition blood tracking puppies

Yesterday we exposed puppies to a short blood line, and they showed a lot of interest in the scent. Since the line was very fresh, pups actually were licking drops of the deer blood off the grass blades and ground.

The picture to the left is of Olana trying to get to the blood.






Besides "working" puppies on a short and fresh blood line, we also played with puppies by dragging a deer liver on our front lawn. First we actually teased them with a big chunk of deer liver. They certainly liked it and got fired up.

Then John dragged the liver in front of the puppies. This kind of exercise stimulates and awakens puppies' prey drive .



Finally pups had to use their noses to follow the scent. We do not consider this kind of exercise as a serious training but rather conditioning.




After were were done with the blood, pups spent some time playing. There is a lot play fighting going on these days.

Here we can see Olive dominating Ollie. Even though she is the smallest, she is quite fiesty and dominant.


















Oak could not resists and got into the action too. He is a very laid back pup but at the same time he is quite possessive. We will be learning more about the pups' personalities in the next few weeks.

Now that pups are six week old this week we will be working on:

crate training
isolation conditioning
human-dog socialization
tracking exercises

This week we will start taking pups on short car trips.