It was lovely seeing some old (as in well-known to me) faces at the trial. Pauline and I started on time with a welcome and shirt briefing. We had a car and a wall for our first search, which all teams found both scents. Even with the wind swirling in all directions, the dogs found the scent in the car door seam “bang on”. Some dogs seem to take their handlers for a stroll and gourmet grass eating foray, so I ended up deducting some marks for “not searching under test”. It was noticeable that the dogs had to work harder to locate the Gun Oil scent in the door.
We then moved to the way warmer Table/Chairs and perimeter, where cloves was hidden on a door and GO on the front of a chair. 2 teams didn’t find either scent, with Liz and Mist working their socks off (but not indicating on the items) and Millie (and Jane) not working at all, but going into a tug-of-war with her lead. It was lovely seeing a lot of dogs get the clove scent across the room, with an ear flick from Sundae (and Debbie) and a “come with me mum” from Sage (and Fiona).
Next was exterior items, where my lovely flowerpot (in shape of a dog) was the most scariest item in the world (who’d have thought!). All teams managed to find both hides (wheel GO and banner C) – in record times (thankfully, due to the cold, easterly wind) and set all teams up for passing provided they had 2 finds in the last search.
In the boxes and luggage search, the hides were in 2 boxes and all teams, apart from Millie (and Jane), who worked her socks off found both.

It was a lovely trial with a number of dedicated helpers (how does Pauline do it?) and thank you Pauline for having me judging again and Rachel-Rebecca-Bridget for being such a great scribe!