Heather Donnelly

My thanks to Karen Denton for asking me to judge and organising a very successful third trial consisting of three levels. My co judge was Nigel and Karen had it all worked out nicely that we would share some of the indoor and the outdoor searches.  Well unfortunately it didn’t happen that way as the grass cutter arrived to cut the playing field so both the L3 outdoor searches had to start first. Nigel then went inside to judge the first indoor search and managed to stay in the nice warm village hall for the rest of the day, whilst I was stuck outside doing all the outside! (Actually it wasn’t like that really in that it was a beautiful warm Autumn day outside and village hall was pretty chilly, hehe!)

I thought that the standard of the L3 searches was really good especially regarding team work. People often forget to look back, always looking to improve their performance which they should,  but the contrast between the L3 and L1 handlers was quite noticeable. The winner of L3 was Heather & Timmy who won the L1 under me almost a year ago. Timmy isn’t the easiest dog but was very impressive with his systematic vehicle search the best of the day. Heather just seems to accept the way this little dog is and with just  a little bit more trust from Heather this team will be complete.  Also to mention coming 4th, gaining the last points for L3  ‘Excellent’ title, was Dave and Nican with Sally coming all the way from Norfolk. Nice enthusiastic searching as usual from both Nican and Dave but just not quite the systematical search pattern on the vehicles that we normally see dropped this team a few points.

We then followed with the ‘Exterior Search’ with the L2’s. Alison had entered both of her B/C and showed two different excellent handling styles with both her collies. Alison approached both search areas with a very well constructed plan and at the same time gaining good control. Alison’s handling style was different with both dogs as she knows their individual characters so well. A well deserved 1st & 2^nd place for Alison and I would recommend beginners come along to watch Alison with her dogs.

Winner of the L1 was the well deserved Nicky & Peppa who have gone from strength to strength. Nicky has had to adapt to teaching Peppa as her indications are so different from her other dog ‘Ellie’ who is Peppa’s mother. Nicky has struggled with this in the past and I can only describe their performance here today as outstanding gaining full handling marks from both judges. . Also a special mention to Carole Thornley for qualifying both her two dogs at her ever first trial. Carole has attended just one Scentwork UK’ course and trained both her dogs on her own. Carole now plans to run her own classes and l wouldn’t hesitate at recommending Carole’s training to anyone. Onwards and upwards for team Carole.

And finally thank you to Darren Carmell who thought he was just coming to watch until I grabbed him to scribe the L3 vehicle searches, Annette Leslie who is  so supportive in everything she does who staying behind and scribed the L1 searches for me and Karen’s sister Debs who is a fantastic runner and who doesn’t even work a dog.

Nigel Wilkes

I would like to thank Karen for inviting me to Judge at Belbroughton her Level 1, 2 and 3 Trials.

It was the first time that I had worked with another Judge Heather Donnelly as we had a very busy day and it meant that we would finish quicker.

I had a lovely drive up to Worcestershire through sunshine and mist and arrived at 9.20 to find Heather already there talking to Karen. Karen had everything organised and we were going to start with Level 3, with me inside judging the Boxes and Luggage and Heather outside with the Vehicle search.

Unfortunately we had a small problem as the grounds by the hall were being mowed, so to save having to move the external items, we decided that I would start outside so that when the field had been mowed the tractor could leave.

At this stage Heather and I were supposed to be Judging 2 indoor and 2 outdoor searches each, however, due to us both starting outside, meant that I did all the inside Judging and Heather the outside! (Sorry Heather)

It was nice to see such a wide range of dogs who clearly enjoyed doing Scentwork and with some people travelling the day before to attend the trial from Norfolk.

The dogs performed very well with the eventual winner Heather and Timmy working well as a team and thoroughly deserved to win, although some people had my heart in my mouth when their dog was indicating and they waited an age before alerting! Tina you know who I mean and one who forgot the rules!

The morning flew by and next we were judging Level 2 and this was the Alison and her two dogs, Dylon and Peppa show. Both dogs were exceptional and you could see that they were on the ball.  They came 1^st and 2^nd but were pushed hard by Peter and Dolly who was very quick in covering the area of search. I must also mention Sharon and Buddy who although they didn’t qualify worked really hard and you could tell that the handler really loves her pet and that they are a great team.

Finally we came to our Level 1 teams and again it was of a very high standard with all teams working well. Again we had a good mix of dogs, but the handlers were confident in their alerts and you could tell that the ones trained by Karen followed her way of working towards the find. In the end Nikki and Peppa with 100 points ran out winners.

I would like to thank Karen for running a great trial together with Nikki who scribed for me in the morning and Tina for the rest of the day as well as Deb who kept the teams on their marks ready to run.