Working trials

[Tedsmum]

Does anyone here do working trials?
I am thinking about it with Ted.
We have just got back from obedience and it seems he will get his Advanced Certificate, which is the highest award the school gives.
We could continue to go but we would have nothing to work towards and just be repeating what we have already done.
Working trials has been recommended to me but I am a bit worried that Ted has not got the high working drives he may need to do well.
I have never tried tracking and would love to have a go. His agility is good but he is not a born worker and I wonder if I would be expecting too much from him?
Any opinions would be appreciated. x

[Caryll]

I've known lots of people who've done working trials & they've all loved it. They haven't necessarily done brilliantly, but they've enjoyed it & so've the dogs.

Go for it - if you don't like it you can stop!

[Shrap]

You can always try! It depends how you train the dog, make the work a game and he'll love it.

[wildmoor]

what about gundog training?

[Vislor]

Never done Working Trials but know people who have and from what I hear its quite pet friendly.

[Moobli]

I used to train with a guy who competes in working trials, and I quite fancied doing it myself. However, I live out in the middle of nowhere and to get to any of the competitions would involve a lot of travel. I have a young family as well as the dogs and so that wouldn't have been fair at this stage.

So I basically learned the tracking from this guy and also some of the more advanced obedience and now just train at home. I would really love to get hubby to build me the WT style jumps and scale etc - and will try to persuade him by the time Spring arrives

[T.C.E]

Bailey started working trials about two months ago, great fun and Bailey loves it. I made my first tracking video this week, difficult when your own

[mambrino]

Hi,
For anyone interested in starting working trials,I would suggest that the most important thing to consider when deciding if a particular dog & handler would be suitable,is the following.
Does the dog like to play with YOU and YOUR toy. Ie Ball,Stick,Rubber ring etc.
If not ,then it will be a bit harder (but not impossibe ) to do well at W/Trials.
Rod Boyd.....

[nickmcmechan]

Originally Posted by mambrino

Hi,
For anyone interested in starting working trials,I would suggest that the most important thing to consider when deciding if a particular dog & handler would be suitable,is the following.
Does the dog like to play with YOU and YOUR toy. Ie Ball,Stick,Rubber ring etc.
If not ,then it will be a bit harder (but not impossibe ) to do well at W/Trials.
Rod Boyd.....

Yes and No.

It depends on the Dog.

Lady works for the possibility of food reward and I was competing in TD until she was diagnosed with Hip Arthiritis. A lot of GSD handlers train with the toy.

To the OP. I do WT and I love it. There is no better feeling than a qualification. If you want to know more then google working trials world. Trials folk are more than happy to give their expertise to newcomers.

The best weekend I've ever had was when Lady qualified and won WD at Ballater. Those memories are awesome and I look forward to competing with Max. I love doing WT and look forward to competing again.

[Blitzen]

If you are not sure whether Ted would enjoy WT but you like the idea of it, why don't you give it a try and see? With the right training and motivation (for the individual dog), dogs don't have to be extremely driven to qualify, or enjoy the training in its own right.

A lot of the exercises stimulate the dogs natural drives anyway (e.g. search square and tracking).

With his advanced certificate in obedience, you should have all basic control in place to progress to the WT exercises.

I am currently training a field trial bred Goldie for WT, and loving every minute of it