See Spot Grin

03/08/2025

JOIN US! Registration is now open for The Emotional Nose Work Team, a two-day seminar with Megan Wallace, B.S., CNWI, CCUI.

REGISTER HERE: https://forms.gle/EwpWh2MrDjKvviHx7

EVENT INFO:

Your dog loves Nose Work, and so do you, but it's likely that you have both had some other feelings about the activity at times! Most of us get into this sport because we've heard that dogs love it, and then along the way, we get sucked in by the joy and enthusiasm our dogs exhibit when practicing this activity. If you love it so much you decide to trial in this sport, sometimes the game starts changing for you and the dog. Suddenly there are outside pressures on your teamwork - Find all the hides, don't time out, call finish at the right time - we all feel it! We spend a lot of time focusing on training the dog, and not a lot of time reflecting on how our own attitudes and biases can affect our ability to show up as the best handlers we can be.

This seminar will give you the chance to do just that. On Day 1, we will focus on ourselves, the handlers, and how our minds and bodies influence the search. On Day 2, we will discuss how to build and maintain the maximal level of joy and enthusiasm for both you and the dog as you search together. Working teams and auditors will walk away with new ways to think about the relationship and connection we build with our dogs through Nose Work, and creative exercises to solve even the trickiest of miscommunications between us.

Lunch is included, and CNWI CEUs are pending.

COST:
Full Auditor (Sat & Sun) - $275
Partial Auditor (Sat OR Sun) - $145
Working spot - SOLD OUT (waitlist open)

03/04/2025

03/03/2025

Introducing RIZ, who started this morning and is officially See Spot Grin’s Littlest Sniffer, weighing in at 2.5 lbs! Is he adorable or what?! GO TEAM RIZ! ❤️

03/01/2025

Come out and learn from lots of teams. No experience needed!

This is the volunteer sign up form for the Westminster, MD Trial Weekend being held by Red Huskies in March 2025. Please note that we NEED to fill certain spots (timers, parking lot, etc) so I may need to ask some that have signed up for these roles and if they cannot do them, then we need to swap w...

02/25/2025

What’s your dog’s favorite reward? The answer to that question is golden, in so many ways. For Kyber, food and toys don’t always matter. In nose work class he often found sniffing where other dogs had been more rewarding than searching. So we decided to use that interest to our advantage.

Armed with a collection of animal fur and feathers, we started using the samples as a reward for finding the hide. One good sniff deserves another!

Then his handler decided to take it one step further, and let Kyber decide what he’d like to work for. He was quite pleased with this development as you can see in the video below.

Listening to the dog and giving the dog agency is what relationship is all about. Kudos to Stephanie Berry for putting it altogether for her little guy. ❤️

02/20/2025

You want to create respectful, joyful relationships with dogs.

You want to avoid triggering a dog or pushing them over threshold.

You want dogs to feel safe and comfortable, physically and emotionally.

You want to recognize when a dog is showing us discomfort, pain or trauma.

You want to help.

YOU want to do the best you can for each dog.

But no matter how much you care, you can only work with what you can see. This is why OBSERVATION SKILLS are the most important tool any trainer has.

Suzanne always reminds us to SEE THE DOG. Those three words inform everything she does, and why she has spent so much time developing her observation skills. And now she is teaching YOU those observation skills with three fascinating courses.

- Miss a signal or warning sign? You may push a dog over the edge into reaction or a fearful response.

- Think a sloppy sit just means more practice is needed? The dog’s physical discomfort or pain may go unnoticed and untreated.

- Misunderstand subtleties in the dog’s behavior? Your timing will be off, leading to confusion, training difficulties, and frustration.

However good our intentions, we need sophisticated observation skills to be a better trainer.

Suzanne's exciting, eye-opening approach to developing observation skills has helped trainers around the world understand and see dogs in new ways. Join us this April and find out why students of any of her Observation Skill courses find themselves forever changed.

Observation Skills Part 1 – Developing observation skills: https://relationshipcenteredtraining.thinkific.com/courses/observation-skills-part-one-2

Observation Skills Part 2 – Further observation skills (pre-req Part 1): https://relationshipcenteredtraining.thinkific.com/courses/observation-skills-part-2-landing-page

Observation Skills: The Physical Dog – In-depth exploration of how to observe any dog’s physical movement and structure (no pre-req): https://relationshipcenteredtraining.thinkific.com/courses/observation-skills-physical-dog-2

Save $50 with Early Bird Dog Pricing available now through March 16th, payment plan options also available!

02/15/2025

My own measure is to watch for “spatulate tongue.” When the tongue begins to curl which, in my experience, usually happens before any of the below. When you see it, it’s time to take a break or stop altogether.

Fatigue starts long before your dog is laying down panting heavily, squinting and with their tongue on the ground …
Understanding and recognizing early signs of fatigue is key to keeping our dogs successful in training, and their bodies safe.
The longer you train, the higher the chance that your dog will experience:
🏋️ physical fatigue (tired body)
🤯 mental fatigue (tired mind - too much information)
❤️‍🩹 emotional fatigue (tired mind - too much stress/excitement)
Or often a combination of these!
The subtle signs can be easy to miss. And if we don’t stop training when our dog first tells us they had enough, things usually go downhill fast …
Be observant and look out for the following:

1️⃣ Disengagement
If your dog has been happy and enthusiastic during your session and suddenly disengages, sniffs the ground or wanders off, chances are they had enough. Do not keep pushing them to train … it will likely not be successful.
2️⃣ Overarousal
Your dog was in a focused state of mind, but suddenly “spins out of control”? Even though over-excitement may look like excess energy to us, it can actually be a sign that the dog needs a break! Some dogs “stress up” (become MORE crazy as they get tired).
3️⃣ Fidgeting
Your dog was doing well (for example by staying in a Sit Stay), but suddenly starts adding “random” behaviors? Stepping in place, scratching, sniffing themselves etc. are all signs that your dog is getting tired.
4️⃣ Regression
Your dog was doing well at the beginning of the training session, but seems to actually get *worse* as time goes on? This is a very common and often overlooked sign of fatigue.
We see it especially in reactive dog training, where dogs are fine at the beginning of a session, but exposure near their threshold and trigger stacking makes them more and more stressed throughout.
Don’t ignore these first signs. If you try to push through it, your dog will not magically recover (mentally, physically or emotionally) … but is much more likely to keep making mistakes, rehearse unwanted behaviors or even get injured!
Which of the above signs of fatigue do you see most often in your dog?

02/05/2025

So easy to let our goals and expectations or fears or needs close down the aperture of our hearts and minds.

The other day, I got really annoyed with my big guy Baloo. He was trying to climb into my lap, which already contained my laptop. Our business and livelihood depend in no small part on this computer, and so anything that risks damaging the computer alarms me. But I was focused on a goal, finishing a project, and so kept telling Baloo to back off, to stop, and - finally - to "STOP IT!"

In his eyes, and in my own ears, I recognized how much anger was in that "STOP IT!" Taking a deep breath, looking into the eyes of this dog I love so much, I was shocked to feel how angry I was. Really deeply angry. WTH? I realized Baloo was worried and trying to tell me that he was concerned about the snow and ice sliding off the roof.

And then I realized it was all about fear. Yes, there was fear that 85 pounds of Baloo might break the laptop, but it was more than that. It was the cumulative stress of watching the world spinning in bizarre and truly frightening ways while trying to stay functional and even hopeful. I was shocked to realize how deep this fear is.

Taking some deep breaths, I apologized to Baloo, shut down the computer, got him some meds, made myself a cup of tea and got me some meds for my now pounding headache. I did the dishes - something I *could* do something about. I made some bread. I listened to a Donna Leon audiobook, and talked to the cat.

Laying awake in the middle of the night, Baloo stretched beside me, forgiving, kind, warm, I realized the ripples of chaos and fear are not just international in scope, but right here affecting me in immediate ways that I need to guard against. This is going to be a long haul.

So easy to let our goals and expectations or fears or needs close down the aperture of our hearts and minds. Working on keeping the quality of my attention where it belongs: first on those who matter most to me, and then outward in the world to do what I can with what I have. I think it is harder in the moment to do this work, but the long term benefits and ripples in the world outshine anything driven by fear.

02/03/2025

Substitute “dog” for “horse” and you’ll find a lovely training philosophy here…

A recipe for liberty 🤔

- 3 cups of patience ⏳
- 2 cups of observation 👀
- 1 cup of action ❤️

Do less, watch more, mainly wait.

The biggest mistake iv made as a horseman is always assuming I needed to know another way to ask a question.

Training horses is all about communication. As is any conversation between two people.

It doesn’t matter how brilliant your question is if you ask it at the wrong time. Very few people will stay engaged with a conversation where the other person is just waiting for their turn to speak without truly listening. And everybody hates being interrupted or having their train of thought disrupted while processing what’s been said in order to answer correctly.

We know these things like we know the sky is blue. We navigate the subtle nuance of communication everyday.

It’s no different with horses.

Very often the reason our training doesn’t deliver the results we desire is not that we are asking for a movement incorrectly or poorly applying a methodology of horsemanship during the active asking portion of interaction.

We rush. We concentrate on ourselves and on how we felt. We fail to hear the other side of the conversation.

Let’s break it down 💪

3 Cups of Patience ⏳

Journey before destination. Fall in love with the process and treat the achievements that appear along the way with surprised wonderment.

I’m sure you like me don’t instantly master new skills. I like to take a pause once given information to process before acting. In my experience horses are the same.

Wait after giving signals to allow time for delayed or unsure responses from your horse.

Pause and praise between attempts even when we see minimal or no progress.

Your horse doesn’t know nor care that it was your 2025 goal to achieve liberty circles in canter by the 1st of March. They will progress in their own time, it’s your job to make the most of that time.

And above all to make sure your horse feels they are being given the time to flourish

Give it ten minutes and it will take an hour.

Give it an hour and it will take ten minutes.

2 Cups of Observation 👀

You most likely are asking for spanish walk correctly but are you moving slowly enough with your signals to genuinely see the effects they have on your horses mind and body?

Do you watch your horse intently when asking them for a movement or is your focus internal on your body and how you feel?

The more we watch, the more we learn.

In this instance take things slowly genuinely means move your arms, legs and aids (whip, rope, flag) SLOWLY. This gives you more time and a better chance to notice the flick of the ear, that slight tilt in the rib cage or the change in their breathing.

Every interaction with our horse is a chance to observe and gather information. Things don’t have to go the way we planned for us to learn valuable lessons about our horse and how they interact with and respond to the world around them.

Rush and you’ll miss it. Miss it and miss out on connection.

1 Cup of Action ❤️

Of course you need to know where to point at, when to step and how to best utilise your aids.

No one is pretending you can teach a flying change or a bow without knowing the process or the method ( www.benatkinsonmethod.com I would recommend 😉) but let’s link this back to the idea of communication and conversation.

The method we learn to train our horse is the equivalent of a child learning to speak. First it’s sounds, then words and finally sentences.

But the conversations that leave us feeling connected with others are so much more. They’re bolstered by empathy and emotion.

A person we can spend all night talking to knows when to back off or avoid a topic we aren’t ready for. Equally they know when to push to help us grow or discover aspects of ourselves we never knew existed.

By harmonising our method (action) with a hunger to listen (observe) and a default setting to take things slowly (patience) we can achieve anything 🙏

Photography credit to JShpicture

01/31/2025

*Update: this offer has ended, we hope those that were able to take advantage enjoy learning more about CARAT.

Want to learn more about CARAT? For today only we are offering the Introduction to CARAT Webinar FREE today only for the first 50 people with the coupon code SEETHEDOG.

According to our students, "Understanding dogs on the level that CARAT provides is a game changer in terms of how we interact with them, support them, and teach them." This webinar is the perfect introduction to the assessment tool.

Register here (and do not forget the coupon code SEETHEDOG) https://relationshipcenteredtraining.thinkific.com/courses/recorded-webinar-introduction-to-carat

**Update: Due to the excitement and positive response, we are extending the offer to more than the first 50. Please enjoy and share!

01/21/2025

It is possible to have a relationship based on mutual respect, free from anything that remotely resembles sensory deprivation, and still have a dog who will work his heart out for you and even more importantly, with you.

01/18/2025

A fun visual representation of what your dog sees (smells) every day. Look at how noisy it is and how many tracks there are intertwining. The different animals, people, and dogs movement in just one area. The snow lets us humans see the history of this area and what animals and people have passed through. A dog will smell this every day and know who and what animals have passed through. Smellavision!!!!

Dogs are incredible.

Imagine tracking and detection dogs needing to filter out all this noise and track a single scent down. Amazing!

(Note this is a fun representation, not accurate)

01/17/2025

Ever considered volunteering at a NACSW event? Check out this guest blog by fellow Grinner and upcoming nose work instructor Jessica Daggit.

Written by Grinner, up and coming nose work instructor and guest blogger Jessica Daggit.

01/11/2025

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