Gail McCarthy Workshops

Name: Gail McCarthy Workshops
Start: 2024-11-09T10:00:00-07:00
Location: Washington State School for the Blind, 2214 E 13th St, Vancouver, WA 98661

Schedule

Sat Nov 09 2024 at 10:00 am

UTC-07:00

Location

Washington State School for the Blind, 2214 E 13th St, Vancouver, WA 98661 | Vancouver, WA

Sign up now!!!
Gail McCarthy Nose Work Workshops
Nov. 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 2024
Vancouver, WA and Portland, OR
Sign Up Link: [https://forms.gle/TZFaEQ7zFkNfk3578](https://forms.gle/TZFaEQ7zFkNfk3578)
Workshop Details can be found here: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/15y_xfQM2FEEiJXFo2VgKbjp8xPPgVw4xz6q4mMKMvGM/edit?usp=sharing](https://docs.google.com/document/d/15y_xfQM2FEEiJXFo2VgKbjp8xPPgVw4xz6q4mMKMvGM/edit?usp=sharing)
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NOSE WORK WORKSHOPS
GAIL MCCARTHY, CNWI & NACSW JUDGE
NOVEMBER 9 – NOVEMBER 13, 2024

Saturday AM (11/9/2024)
9:00 am - 12:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW3, Elite
Auditors, all levels

Working Close Proximity Hides, Skill Building for NW3 to Elite
One of the common challenges favored by Certifying Officials in Trials are “Close Proximity Hides.” Often dogs come off one hide and do not start hunting until they are 20 or so feet away. If your dog does this, you might miss finding the second or third close hide. This training starts to change the dog’s expectations that they are to start hunting right away. You will help your dog learn to do this by practicing on “Close Proximity Hides” combined with Repetitive Drills. By utilizing these training techniques, you should start to notice that your dog is able to much more quickly come off one hide and immediately start to hunt for another hide.

Lunch 1 hour with Gail Q and A, 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm
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Saturday PM (11/9/2024)
2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW2, NW3, ELITE
Auditors, all levels

Working Inaccessible Hides, Developing Confidence in the Dog
Another olfactory challenge favored by Certifying Officials are “Inaccessible Hides.” In this training, you will learn techniques to introduce your dog to “Inaccessible Hides” and then to develop in the dog an understanding of how they should respond to a hide that they cannot access. You will start to understand the difference between a dog “sourcing” a hide and a dog “bracketing.” If this training is continued after the Workshop ends, you should start to see your dog developing a more positive, assertive, confident, tenacious, willing to try, problem-solving attitude when solving “Inaccessible Hides.”

Dinner 1 hour with Gail Q and A, (Time TBD)
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Sunday AM (11/10/2024)
9:00 am - 12:00 pm
Working Dogs, all levels
Auditors, all levels

Lingering, Channeling & Pooling Odor, Exercises For Sourcing
Dogs “smell” scent like we “see” color, but they often do not understand that they are to tell you about “source” and not the “odor” coming off the source. Initially, "going to source” is a grey area for the dog and he may need help learning to work through large "pools of trapping odor" or long "plumes of channeling odor" that may develop around a hide, especially when that hide sits in place for several hours during a Nose Work Trial. Overcoming such challenges is a learned skill for the dog and the exercises that you will do in this Workshop will help educate your dog to work through “Lingering, Pooling and Channeling Odor” and go straight to source!

Lunch 1 hour with Gail Q and A, 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm
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Sunday PM (11/10/2024)
2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Working Dogs, all levels
Auditors, all levels

Working Elevated Hides, An Incremental Education
One of the most difficult hides for a dog to work is a “High Hide.” This Workshop will show you how to “educate” your dog that hides can be found up by utilizing incremental training steps. This also will help build your dog’s assertiveness when solving elevated hide problems. And, because a dog can become “obsessive” about working “High Hides”, you will learn how to balance your training to avoid this pitfall. After applying the training you will receive in this Workshop in the weeks following this Workshop, you should start to see your dog be willing to both search “up” with no loss of your dog’s sourcing accuracy.

Dinner 1 hour with Gail Q and A, (Time TBD)
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Monday AM (11/11/24)
9:00 am - 12:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW3, Elite
Auditors, all levels

Exterior Searches, Advanced Levels
This is a wonderful training location with oodles of Outdoor Search Options! Focus of this Workshop will be on Exterior Searches leading to many olfactory challenges! If you have a Trial in your future, this will be an opportunity to expose your dog to real world search environments, work competitive hides and get constructive coaching comments from an experienced instructor for you and your dog at advanced levels.

Lunch 1 hour with Gail Q and A, 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm
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Monday PM (11/11/24)
2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW3, Elite
Auditors, all levels

Interior Searches, Advanced Levels
As with the Workshop on Exterior Searches, this is a wonderful training location with oodles of Interior Search Options! Focus of this Workshop will be on Interior Searches. If you have a Trial in your future, this will be an opportunity to expose your dog to real world search environments, work competitive hides and get constructive coaching comments from an experienced instructor for you and your dog at advanced levels

Dinner 1 hour with Gail Q and A, (Time TBD)
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Tuesday AM (11/12/24)
9:00 am - 12:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW3, Elite, Summit (Group A)
Auditors, all levels

Building Hunting Duration in the Absence of Odor
One of the hardest things for a dog to do is to search “in the absence of odor.” Hunting “in the absence of odor” takes two forms: 1) Where the odor of the hide is not readily available to the dog; and 2) Blank Areas. This Workshop is geared toward educating the handler how to build up the dog’s willingness to hunt “in the absence of odor” and how best to push out the times that a dog will hunt for you. This is very important when you move up into the Elite and Summit Levels of NACSW. This Workshop will give you an understanding as to how to do that in the weeks following this Workshop.
Lunch 1 hour with Gail Q and A, 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

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Tuesday PM (11/12/24)
2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Working Dogs, NW3, Elite, Summit (Group B)
Auditors, all levels

Building Hunting Duration in the Absence of Odor
One the hardest thing for a dog to do is to search “in the absence of odor.” Hunting “in the absence of odor” takes two forms: 1) Where the odor of the hide is not readily available to the dog; and 2) Blank Areas. This Workshop is geared toward educating the handler how to build up the dog’s willingness to hunt “in the absence of odor” and how best to push out the times that a dog will hunt for you. This is very important when you move up into the Elite and Summit Levels of NACSW. This Workshop will give you an understanding as to how to do that in the weeks following this Workshop.
Dinner 1 hour with Gail Q and A, (Time TBD)
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Wednesday AM (11/13/24)

PRIVATE COACHING: Two 1 ½ hour blocks, 9:00 am -10:30 am, 10:30 am - 1:00 pm
3 hours working with dogs and handlers in groups of 3 handlers
Groups divided by NW1/NW2, NW3/Elite

Interior Searches
The focus of this Workshop will be on Interior Searches leading to many olfactory challenges! If you have a Trial in your future, this will be an opportunity to expose your dog to real world search environments, work competitive hides and get constructive coaching comments from an experienced instructor for you and your dog.

Lunch 1 hour with Gail Q and A, 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

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Wednesday PM (11/13/24)

PRIVATE COACHING: Two 1 ½ hour blocks, 9:00 am -10:30 am, 10:30 am - 1:00 pm
3 hours working with dogs and handlers in groups of 3 handlers
Groups divided by NW1/NW2, NW3/Elite

Exterior Searches
The focus of this Workshop will be on Exterior Searches leading to many olfactory challenges! If you have a Trial in your future, this will be an opportunity to expose your dog to real world search environments, work competitive hides and get constructive coaching comments from an experienced instructor for you and your dog.
Dinner 1 hour with Gail Q and A, (Time TBD)

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About Gail McCarthy:
As the instructor at Scentinel Nose Work Dog Training, I have worked with horses and dogs all of my life. I rode Hunter/Jumper horses and Three-Day Eventing horses professionally for many years after graduating from college and I gave horseback riding lessons up through the advanced levels in dressage and in eventing. When I moved to Massachusetts to go to law school, my training interests shifted to working with search and rescue (SAR) dogs and, over a 25-year period of time, I attended over one hundred workshops and seminars from some of the most preeminent detection dog trainers in the country in my quest to learn how best to train independent, focused, reliable and efficient detection dogs.

While I have retired from canine SAR, during my career I trained and certified 3 dogs as wilderness live find search dogs, 2 dogs to the State Advanced Level. One of these dogs I also trained and certified twice at the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Advanced Level Live Find Disaster Dog Evaluation. Another dog I trained and certified twice to the State Advanced Level in Human Remains Detection. I was the founder and former Training Director for the Massachusetts Rescue & Recovery K9 Unit and I was a founder, former Chairperson and Canine Evaluator with the Massachusetts State Search and Rescue Federation. I also was a Canine Handler with the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) Urban Search and Rescue, Massachusetts Task Force 1 as well as a FEMA Lead Live Find Disaster Dog Evaluator and a FEMA Human Remains Detection Evaluator. In these capacities, I worked with numerous SAR dogs over the years and I freely shared my knowledge and experience, helping many people achieve their SAR certifications. In recognition of my consistent dedication to the promotion of volunteer canine SAR in Massachusetts and to the training I gave my dogs and to my fellow handlers, the Massachusetts State Senate awarded me a “Massachusetts State Senate Citation,” a legislative award of distinction.

As a NACSW Faculty Member and a Certified Nose Work Instructor, I have instructed at many of the K9 Nose Work Training Camps held in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Colorado and Oregon. Currently, I serve as a NACSW Judge for NACSW sanctioned K9 Nose Work Competition Trials and have given several webinars for NACSW. I have been teaching Nose Work classes for 15 years and I bring my past training experience to my students, many of whom now are among New England’s top title holders in K9 Nose Work. As of April 2021, I am the instructor of 26 canine teams who have obtained their NW3 Elite Titles and 9 of these students have achieved the coveted Elite Championship Title. My current Nose Work dog, Saoirse, achieved her Elite Championship Title and then went on to obtain a Summit Title in her first Summit Trial this past Spring. Please see the “Accolades Page” of my website [http://www.scentinelnosework.com](http://www.scentinelnosework.com/) for a listing of my students’ successes in K9 Nose Work.

I look forward to working with my fellow Nose Work Handlers in Oregon!