Dee's Dogz Trailing & Scentwork

17/12/2024

It was great to be back tracking with Squid at the weekend 🐾
We were put through our paces by Wesley Visscher of Scent Imprint For Dogs with some testing tracks and working blind for me 🙈
A big thank you to for hosting 😊
Also massive kudos for the organisation and track laying throughout the day from Joleen , Kathryn and Liz
Here is a little video of Squid starting one of his urban tracks 🐶

17/11/2024

It felt like we had all four seasons in one session yesterday 🌧️ ☀️ ☁️ 🌬️
We had newcomer Arlo join us for his introduction and boy did he do well, even in the rain 🤩
We played with some scent transfer starts and a couple of handshakes too 🤝
As always the ruins play havoc with the scent and challenge the dogs to really get to the source to find their person 🐾

15/11/2024

Dark nights with flashing lights 🌚
Retail parks are always a great place to trail in, lots of distractions, busy road crossings, multiple options of directions and big open spaces 🐾

06/11/2024

New collaboration for 2025 🐾

*Update*

We have been overwhelmed with the response for this course. Thank you so much to those who have emailed. We'll be back in touch with everyone Friday evening late on after we've sorted dates, and sorted through the emails.

Yes we will also offer limited spectator spots for the weekends as well throughout the course. More details to follow on that.

,.....................................................

2025 is going to be exciting!

(Buckle in, it's a long post)

Ilkka Hormilla is back and the opportunities for knowledge have expanded once again.

We are excited to announce that the Human ID Scent Tracking course is back for 2025.

Human ID Scent Tracking for Civilian Dogs - Taught by K9 IlMa Global Human ID Tacking Course Graduates Kathryn Jones (Trailing K9s ) and Dee Atkins (Dee's Dogz Trailing & Scentwork ), alongside Master Instructor Ilkka Hormilla.

Ilkka Hormilla needs no introduction. Anyone who has been tracking or trailing in the UK, and doing scent detection knows Ilkkas name.

Known for his career in the Finnish Police as K9 Handler and working with SAR Dogs, he has amassed a lifetime of knowledge which he freely passes on to the students he is working with.

He is an internationally recognised and respected lecturer on scent detection, tracking, SAR, and much more, travelling across Europe, the UK and the USA to share his knowledge on courses or conferences. His 40 year career in the Police saw him create his own method of low stress training along with protocols and data, these methods that are now used by teams Globally as he founded K9 IlMa Global.

The course is designed to teach your dog human scent discrimination, and teaches you as a handler the skills and knowledge to achieve this.

An ID search dog distinguishes the specific odour of the person from all other options in the environment. The dogs learn to follow the specific scent, as unique as a fingerprint or DNA in any involvement with accuracy and calmness.

The dogs will learn how to select the correct human scent from many in a line up exercise. How to accurately follow a track with or without a person at the end over multiple surfaces, but especially focusing on hard surface tracking with articles, and select a single trail to follow over others which are the same age.

Like Mantrailing you will be teaching the dog to find a specific person, but this is a real deep dive into the geekery of the scent match and breaking down the learning for the dog, and yourself as a handler.

We have been invited by Ilkka to work onlineside him in order to deliver his Human ID Tracking Course again in the UK. Ilkka will join us for the first weekend to assess the teams and set out the course expectations. He will start off the theory and get you started on your journey to pass the Human ID-Tracking Handler Certificate. Subsequent weekends you will train with Kathryn and Dee.

Kathryn and Dee are two of the seven K9 IlMa Global course graduates in the UK, with Dee being the only person in the UK to pass the Human ID-Tracking Handler Certificate with her Labrador Squid.

They both learned a lot from the course in 2024, and are keen to share the knowledge with others. Both Mantrailing Instructors and Dee also teaches Scent Detection, and Kathryn also teaches Tracking. They are the perfect pair to enhance your skills as a handler and team.

This is currently the only course in the UK specialising in Human ID Tracking and breaking the specific components into bite size chunks for the dog and handler to build a reliable and accurate team.

This course is also about building a bond with you and your dog, learning how they work and how to get the best out of them when working as a team.

This course will be over 6 weekends (Friday - Sunday) during 2025/26, over a period of about 10 months to provide you with time to practise in between the days we meet. We will meet on a monthly basis for three months and then every other month after that. (Dates to be confirmed and sent to those interested in the course. We are aiming to start in September 2025, but this may change)

It will consist of 126-hours of workshop learning with Kathryn and Dee, with Ilkka being there for the first weekend and last weekend, but we will have webinars with him during the course. We will also have a group with Ilkka, where students can post comments, videos and questions.

We will provide you with your kit for the course to help you get started straight away.

At the end of course handlers will get Human ID-Tracking Handler Certificate of K9 IlMa Global Training.

(Providing they pass all exercises, complete all homework and have completed their training log to analyse their learning process.)

We are offering this course to just a handful of handlers, all wanting to increase their skill level with their own dogs and learn not just about tracking, but how to get the best from their dogs.

The course will be run around the area of Shrewsbury. Locations may change on need each month, but you will know in advance.

The pre course requirements are:

A Dog which is over 10 months old at the start of the course, as this is a very taxing course on the dogs brain.

A non-human reactive dog. Due to the nature of the course and working in busy locations for later parts of the course, the dog must be comfortable in public around people.

A dog which can settle in the car between working sessions.

You do not need to have done any mantrailing, tracking, scent detection prior to the course, or be a trainer. Just have a keen interest in learning more and working towards a long term goal as a team.

You must be able to arrange your own self study between the dates we meet to practice the skills, and progress yourself alongside our guidance.

You must be able to commit to the six in person weekends (Friday to Sunday) (~Dates to follow once we have confirmed interest)

You can only work one dog throughout the course, as you will be assessed as a team.

Because of the nature of the course being over so many months and being a need for deduction to the course, we are taking interest in the course only currently. -To add your name to the list as interested please email [email protected] with your full name, experience if any (none is needed) as well as dog details and optionally a reason why you want to the course. The emails will be added to the list and further details will be sent later in November to those interested. (There will be payment plans available)

29/10/2024

We did a thing!!!
I'm super pleased and proud to say that myself and Squid have now passed and certified as a canine team for Human ID Tracking through K9 Ilma Global Training with Ilkka Hormila
We are the first and only team to achieve this in the UK 💪
We missed out last weekend on one assessment but thankfully Ilkka gave us the opportunity to try the assessment again 🙏
I think I was even more nervous this time: having let Squid down on the first line up test 🤦 I knew i just had to stick to my plan and wait for him to settle and indicate properly 🐶
Massive thank you to Georgie for giving up her time to do the test for me Endeavour Canine
Huge thank you to Ilkka for the opportunity to achieve this 🙌
Looking forward to advancing on our journey and developing our skills even further 🐾

25/10/2024

The face of a dog who encountered his first deer 🦌 chased said deer across the field and came back with his tongue nearly dragging across the floor 👅
Wonderful sky tonight ☁️

20/10/2024

This weekend we had our final assessments for our Human ID Tracking course with Ilkka Hormila from K9 IlMa Global Training 🐾
It has been a journey, starting back in February, with a very young Squid just 5 months old. I am super proud of how far he has come and he is such a an awesome dog to train. I have enjoyed the course very much, it's been challenging, felt impossible at times but such an achievement to get through 🧠
We had five assessments over three days. Me and Squid passed four out of the five which is a good achievement but we missed the certification as needed all five 😕 but his tracking was on point and his ability to discriminate was excellent 😊
A massive thank you to all the volunteers who gave up their time to make the assessments possible 🙏
thank you for all your time, knowledge and patience and thank you to Georgie for making it all happen Endeavour Canine

16/10/2024

We had a lovely time at the weekend trailing at Mereside 💦
This venue is busy with children's football playing, dog walkers, ducks, geese, bike riders and basketball 🏀
The teams all trailed well without at second glance at any of the given distractions, well maybe just a peek at the football ⚽
Great fun had, well done teams 🐾

28/09/2024

Day one over already 😯 day two is so much fun 🐾

22/09/2024

We beat the thunder storms on Saturday to have some fun training at Colemere 🐾
Little Pickle had his first go and was full of enthusiasm and quick to pick up the game 🐶
Some challenges for our other two teams with some blind ends really making them watch their dogs body language to find their person 👀

01/09/2024

Last week we tried to beat the night drawing in for a rural challenge across the fields with a few sheep as distractions 🐑
It was a real challenge for some of the dogs to stay on track all the time but they did continue on to find their trail layers 👀
Unfortunately it is definitely head torch session already 👎

26/08/2024

Happy International Dog Day 🐕
A day to celebrate all dogs across the globe, as if we need an excuse to 😁 show me your happy dogs 🐶

20/08/2024

We rounded up our trip south with a workshop at a super cool venue with Positive Connections
Jo gave us a great mix of straight forward and more challenging hides to help build Squids confidence in an unusual area searching planes and helicopters 🛩️🚁✈️
Squid worked well and wasn't too phased about the planes, the manikins were a bit freaky though 👀
Thank you Jo for also keeping an eye on the human end too 😆
# ***codog

17/08/2024

We mixed it up covering both urban and more rural trails with our five teams last week 🐾
It was a challenging environment to trail in with a lot of human distraction, running club 🤦, as well as a popular dog walking spot 🐶
Teams tried some split starts, split trails and walking finds 🚶

09/08/2024

We took to the town Wednesday night for some technical trails in a busy urban environment 🧠
We challenged the dogs through busy human traffic areas, highly contaminated and with lots going on 👀
We also did some road crossings over the busy main road onto islands and off again 🐾
Super trailing from the teams, excellent progression made and a good chit chat too 🧡

05/08/2024

What a weekend had with the super Jenny Deliverance Dogs and fabulous Jo Positive Connections
This was Squids first proper outing on his target odour, to***co and the boy was awesome 😎
He had lots of firsts this weekend, first time staying in a B&B just me and him, first time settling in the new van waiting his turn, first solo long journey, first time in a farm environment, first time doing a blind search for both of us 👀
While the dogs got to work and do their thing, the main focus was really on the human element and how we as handlers interact, influence and often interfere when the dog is working 🐶
We peer reviewed each other and it felt like a safe space to be able to learn from rather than being criticised 🧡
As always lots for me to do to better myself, always learning, but lots of positives for me too giving me confidence I am setting Squid up well and on the right track 👍
Didn't get any pictures or videos as too busy so here is Squid in the B&B enjoying his yak chew 😋
***codog

28/07/2024

Working on new concepts!
It isn't often we hide our trail layers in vehicles but it is a fun concept for the dogs to learn 🤔
Here Opie goes straight past the car but then stops knowing that the trail has gone cold. We give her space to come back on herself to explore the area further 💡
It's a much better lesson for the dog to learn if they work it out by themselves rather than being shown. This is why we have the door open a little to allow the scent to escape setting her up for success 👍
Excellent work team 🐾