Firstly, thank you to Naomi for inviting me to judge the Level 4 trial and for Sarah scribing and time-keeping.
It has been a pleasure judging such great teams at a lovely venue.
We started with the interior search Table & Chairs. All teams found the hide on the stacked chairs easily, the second hide in the bottom corner and just at the border of the search area proved to be difficult. Most handlers called or pulled back their dogs as they were heading towards this area and missed to search this particular area in more detail.
The next search was Exterior Search. There has been some brilliant handling and all handlers worked their dogs around the items in a calm and focussed manner. In this search the distraction scent caused some issues given that a number of dogs clearly indicated on the item with the distraction scent resulting in a false alert.
Back indoors the next search was boxes and luggage. All teams did well and found both hides. The standard of handling was very high and the teams searched all the items focussed and in a systematic manner.
The last search was a wall search. Both hides were placed at the far end of the wall. All teams did really well and were not discouraged by the fact that no hide could be found in the first half of the search area.

Well done everybody – the standard of handling and teamwork with your dogs was great and very enjoyable to watch.