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JUDGES CORNER - October / November 2000, Hunting Retriever magazine by Tim Gibson At
the risk of sounding redundant, I want to once again thank those of you who
continue to offer input to the Judge’s Corner.
By taking the time to e-mail, fax, or phone with your comments,
questions, suggestions, and scenarios you are doing much more than merely
providing material that helps me write this column.
You are giving the field reps, HRC executive committee and UKC an
accurate picture of issues judges and handlers are concerned with regarding
our hunt test program. You’re
also providing many judges the luxury of learning from other judges’
mistakes.
Another media for submitting your thoughts on HRC is the web based; UKC
sponsored Hunting Retriever Club Message Board.
I’ve gotten a few direct questions for the Judge’s Corner from the
message board, and a couple of ideas from just monitoring the discussions and
messages posted. For instance,
someone asked if we could offer some scenarios discussing good decisions
judges made in a test versus focusing on mistakes and problems, as we often
seem to do. (I think this reader
might be suggesting in a kind way, that I’ve been a little hard on some
judges lately.) Going with that suggestion, I asked the field reps to send me
some scenarios showcasing outstanding efforts and decisions by judges in their
regions. I have not received any
responses to date (I’m just kidding).
Realizing that it’s probably more effective to learn by being shown
the right way, I will try to offer more examples of quality tests and
conscientious decisions by our fine HRC judges.
Someone also asked if HRC could develop a list of common “handler”
errors. I’ve asked the field reps, and I’m inviting you readers as well,
to send me your thoughts on mistakes you’ve made as a handler, or watched
someone make that lead to a failure. Don’t
be embarrassed. You know I never
reveal the names of the guilty in this column.
I’ll try to assemble the list and post it in the future so new
handlers can perhaps avoid learning something the hard way.
If you’ve never made a mistake as a handler, please keep this to
yourself. If this fact is
revealed, you will be deluged with requests to run peoples dogs!
In this issue, we’ll be re-visiting the subject of “quads”
(throwing four marks) at the Finished level.
There has been some e-mail flying around lately between some handlers,
field reps, and experienced judges, all about what does or does not constitute
a “quad”. We’ve discussed
this subject briefly in some past articles, but it may be time to expand our
discussion, and try to shed some new light on the matter.
Setting aside the normal scenario, question, and answer format, I’ll
be giving you some examples of Finished level tests, and asking you to decide
if a quad was presented to the retriever.
As promised, I also have a scenario where the judges made an excellent
call in a touchy situation. I’ll
tell you what happened, and why they made the decisions they did. Finally, our last scenario is something that has never been
discussed in the Judge’s Corner, and to describe it with one word, it’s a
“delicious” scenario. Let’s
get going on the quad issue.
This discussion of quad marking tests started with an e-mail sent to the executive committee and myself. It came from a handler in a hunt test who was of the opinion that the judges had, in his words, “perpetrated a quad upon the finished dogs”. I thought his choice of words was interesting. Besides being an experienced handler, he has been a licensed HRC Finished level judge for a long number of years. He carries a low HRC membership number, has judged the Grand hunt, and is a frequent contributor of scenarios to this column. Knowing he has a keen eye for scenarios, and a firm understanding of what judges should expect from our hunting retrievers, he got my attention when he mentioned that this was the third time this year that a Finished test appeared to him to contain a quad. We know our rulebook states that “triple marks” are allowed at the Finished level, not a quad, which is permissible for the Grand dogs. The puzzle over the quad issue comes from the fact that there is no definition in our rulebook for a quad. Before describing the scenario in the handler’s e-mail, I want to ask you readers a couple of questions. Are any of you seeing tests in your region that you might consider to contain a quad? Do you think you know what constitutes a quad marking test? I first
addressed the issue of a quad at the Finished level with a rather simplistic
scenario in an August-September, 1995 Judge’s Corner article.
The scenario had a working dog handler shoot a triple, then the honor
dog handler shoot at the blind, and a single thrown.
We concluded that this test unarguably contained a set of “quad”
marks. I stated that in effect,
since the working dog had no idea how many birds it was supposed to pick up
(the dog missed the handlers meeting), it was being presented a quad by seeing
four birds thrown “prior to being cast from the retrieving line”.
We expanded on the subject somewhat with another scenario in a
June-July, 1997 article in which the honor dog had one mark thrown for it, and
then the working dog got a double. On
the way to pick up its first bird, the working dog had a diversion thrown.
For some reason, several dogs were having trouble with this test.
In the resulting discussion of the scenario, I made the point that
judges should think about how many birds they are asking the dog to try to
mark and remember, not necessarily retrieve, then consider this in their
evaluation. I also offered a
description of another test I had seen which, while having the appearance of a
quad, was presenting no problems to the dogs.
In this water test, the honor dog handler on the line shot a single
duck coming into the decoys while the working dog was coming down the hill to
the duck blind. The honor dog
retrieved the duck, and then the working dog shot a triple and picked it up.
In scenario # 1, I’ll describe the test the handler submitted in his
e-mail, and then give you a few more scenarios of my own.
Put your judges hat on, or your hunt committee hat if you have one,
(and your thinking cap), and ask yourself if you’d consider these Finished
tests to contain a “quad”.
Scenario # 1:
Dog
“A” was in the field at the retrieving line.
Dog “B” and its handler enter the field to join their friend in a
dove hunt. As dog “B” enters
the field, a bird is thrown and dog “A” retrieves it.
Dog “B” is then required to come to the line and pick up a blind
just off line and beyond where the first bird was thrown. Dog “B” then has
a triple thrown for it that must be retrieved (the middle bird lands exactly
where the first bird for dog “A” landed).
The handler submitting this scenario stated it was his opinion that:
“Dog B had to mark the fall of 4 birds before it was sent to retrieve
any of them”.
Scenario # 2:
Same scenario, but let’s say Dog “B” was on the bucket when the
test started, not walking into the field.
Scenario # 3:
Same scenario, but the bird for dog “A” lands in a totally
different location than any of the birds of the triple for dog “B”.
Does this make a difference?
Scenario # 4:
Same scenario as # 1, but let’s throw the first bird to the side and
leave it on the ground. Dog “B”
comes up to the bucket, runs the blind, (first bird becomes a poison bird for
the blind). Dog “A” picks up
the single, and then “B” gets the triple.
Scenario # 5:
New test. The working dog
comes to the line to get a clean triple, and then run a blind.
The last bird of the triple does not come out of the winger, so the
judges declare a “no-bird” and ask the handler to bring the dog back three
dogs later. On the re-run, all
goes well and the triple comes out clean.
But, have the judges asked the dog to mark and remember five birds?
The handler who sent in Scenario # 1 asked in his e-mail if there was a
way HRC could define a single, double, triple, and quad mark to clear up the
confusion in our tests. He
offered his definition of these marks as: “a maximum of (either one, two,
three, or four birds respectively) being thrown in view of the dog before the
dog is released to retrieve one of those birds”.
What do you think? I
apologize for asking more questions than offering answers or explanations up
to this point, but I wanted to give you a good picture of how confusing it can
be for judges to determine what type of marking test they are asking the dogs
to complete. Let’s try to sort
through some of the confusion.
I must respectively disagree with the handler who submitted scenario #
1, and say that in my opinion (and that of the field reps I discussed this
with), this situation does not constitute a “quad” set of marks. In addition, I can’t go along with his proposed definition
of marks. I’ll try to explain
why. Understand that while I can
certainly sympathize with the handler’s concerns over the testing he is
seeing, I believe his real worry should be judges who are not recognizing what
they are setting up, and their responsibility to judge accordingly. I feel that rather than attempt to put a precise definition
on quad marks, (and perhaps take some flexibility in testing scenarios away
from our judges) which we have no real mechanism to do at this time, it’s
probably more productive to help judges focus on understanding what they are
doing with their marking tests. I
don’t believe most judges are trying to intentionally perpetrate a set of
quad marks on the dogs. I think
many times judges don’t realize they are giving dogs the illusion of having
more than three birds to mark and remember.
I want to offer the following suggestion to judges. Anytime you are
throwing more than three marks in a Finished test, a mental flag should go up
reminding you to stop and consider what the dog is thinking it has to do.
Consider that most dogs, being both eager to retrieve and perhaps
somewhat greedy, believe they should get every bird they see thrown in the
test. To do that, they will try
to mark and remember what they see fall.
One of the field reps made the statement that in trying to define a
quad mark, we should perhaps consider how many birds are on the ground when
the dog is sent. This is probably
a better definition than the one I described earlier offered by the handler.
The rep then went on to mention a test with an outbound diversion on
the first bird after a triple. He
said that to him, this was more of a quad than scenario # 1.
I personally tend to agree with him.
Why do you think he felt that way, and do you agree?
I believe what he was trying to explain was in the example of the
outbound diversion the dog had no opportunity to clear its head, break up the
test, reset itself, or whatever you want to call it. Think of it like this.
When the dog sees a bird thrown, it puts the mark in its memory “queue”.
In computing, a queue is used to sequence multiple demands for a
resource until they can be processed or executed.
Your computer printer for instance stores jobs sent to it in its
printer memory “queue” until all the documents can be printed.
This is why you can send a document to the printer, close the
application the job is running in, and the document will continue to print.
In the same way, the dog is putting the mark(s) in its mental “to do”
list. Something like; see mark,
remember mark, go pick it up when sent. In
computing, you can physically clear the printer queue with a few simple
commands should you wish to stop a print job or clear it from the printer
memory. In our testing, I think
the opportunity for the dog to mentally “clear its queue” so to speak
might come in the form of leaving the retrieving line (in the case of a
re-run), changing locations (seeing a bird while walking into the test, then
watching a set of marks from the bucket), picking up a blind (making a
retrieve) between seeing a single, and a triple as in scenario # 1, or any
number of things. In the example
with the outbound diversion going for the first bird of a triple, a good judge
would understand that what’s important is not what they intended a bird to
do (the outbound diversion after the triple was not intended to be a “mark”,
or be judged as one), but how the dog is thinking of the bird (it has to see
it fall, and either pick it up now, or later, with three other birds remaining
in it’s memory queue). I’ve
always said that learning to set up good, honest, fair marking tests, and
understanding what you are really asking the dogs to do in your test is one of
the most difficult things for a Finished judge to do.
I hope this discussion of quad marking has helped provide some food for
thought. If you have another
perspective or more thoughts on the subject, I’d be interested in hearing
from you. Let’s look at another
scenario where two judges made an excellent decision at a recent hunt test.
Scenario:
The
handler coming to the line at the Finished land test was 82 years young, with
a very nice, fast dog. The test was a straightforward triple, right to left.
One judge was watching the dog and the other was watching the marks.
The judge watching the dog saw the dog swinging from bird to bird
(probably hearing the sound of the wingers releasing), but no shots were being
fired. Shortly, all the birds
were on the ground. For some
reason, the handler had either forgotten to take the safety off or couldn’t
get it off.
Question:
How
would a very good pair of judges handle this situation?
Answer:
This
is probably one of the most enjoyable scenarios to write about that I’ve
covered in the Judge’s Corner. It
actually happened at a very recent hunt test and came to me via e-mail.
One of the judges involved is a field rep who was replying to me about
some other issues and mentioned this incident almost offhand. I think there is a good lesson for a lot of us to learn in
this scenario, and I believe how the judges handled the matter is an
outstanding reflection on the quality of all judges in our HRC program.
I also thought that I have about 35 more years of running hunt tests
just to get to the line at that age!
The two
judges talked the situation over and decided to offer the handler a re-run,
figuring he had a “senior moment”. One
of the judges commented that they would be very happy to be able to
participate in the hunt test game at the age of 82.
I’ll let the judge describe in his own words how they handled the
matter when the handler came back for his re-run.
Please read these words slowly and carefully and think about what they
did. The judge stated:
“I talked to him and tried to get him to focus and slow down. I
told him we were going to do this thing by the numbers. Sit on the
bucket, get the dog squared away, load the gun, take a deep breath, relax,
signal you're ready, bird comes out, gun goes up with the safety coming off,
shoot, follow the bird to the ground, swing, eject the shell, etc. He
was very appreciative”. I’d
like to report to you that the dog passed the test, but he did not even though
the handler had no problems shooting the gun the second time around.
I think what’s more important than whether the dog passed or not is
the fact that these judges slowed everything down and gave a helping hand to
the handler. This consideration
proved to be in no way detrimental to their job of evaluating the retriever. Talk about putting things in the proper perspective, these
judges quickly realized their role was more than simply recording how the dog
did on the test. The brevity of
this scenario in no way diminishes its importance as a lesson that judges
should strive to retain some compassion for the handlers running under them
who are experiencing difficulties. Having
the ability to consider things from the handler’s point of view is as an
important a skill for a judge to possess as an understanding of dogs, the
rules, and good hunting test scenarios. I
hope you think the decisions these judges made are as commendable as I do.
I won’t violate my own rule about divulging judge’s names in the
scenarios I cover in this column but I will say this much.
The judges could have been any number of outstanding judges we have on
our judge’s list. And to steal a line from one of my favorite movies and put an
HRC twist on it: “Never ask
a bunch of handlers if a judge is outstanding.
If he or she is, they’ll tell you, and if they aren’t, well, you
don’t want to embarrass the judge!” I
promised you a new and tasty scenario, and here it comes, courtesy of UKC’s
Michelle Morgan, and a question that she forwarded to me from the message
board. It concerns feeding a
retriever “treats” during the hunt test.
Scenario:
The handler had used a training method that encouraged giving the dog a
treat as a reward for a good performance.
This handler arrived at the hunt test with a pocketful of treats for
the dog, intending to give the dog the treats while it was running the test.
Question:
Is it acceptable/legal to
give your retriever treats while in the holding blind, at the line, after
completing a retrieve, after completing the test?
Answer:
After receiving her e-mail
asking for my opinion, I promised Michelle I would think about this issue and
reply promptly to both her and the concerned handler.
After a short deliberation, I offered my opinion that the answer was no
to both acceptable and legal on several grounds, which I explained fully. I
also posed the question to field reps/national seminar instructors Bill Rath,
and Paul Ramponi as part of some correspondence regarding seminar revisions.
Both thought I was making this up and/or testing them in some manner.
I assured them the question was serious, and I was making a legitimate
inquiry. Only after receiving my
reply did Michelle tell me there was in fact an HRC hunt test in 1994 where a
Started handler was failed for giving their dog a treat. A formal complaint was filed, with UKC backing the judge’s
decision (the hunt committee concurred) to uphold the failure, determining
that no treats were allowed during any portion of the test, and basing the
failure on sportsmanship, calling the treats training equipment. There was a
lot of dissention about the complaint with several club members feeling a
warning was more in order. The
handler was pleading the case that since you can use treats in obedience, you
should be able to use them in hunt tests.
Apparently the handler was wrong, as treats are not allowed in UKC
obedience or agility tests. Maybe
I was the one being tested! Some
of you might have already read my reply on the message board, but many have
not. Here is what I said.
Keep in mind I sent Michelle my reply before learning about the 1994
test where the Started dog was failed.
I gave my opinion that in the holding blind, it mattered very little if
the handler wanted to feed the dog, but under judgment, it was a definite no
at Seasoned, Finished and beyond for several reasons which I will explain
shortly. I offered my opinion that while not pretty, and a poor habit
to get into; I might overlook a treat at Started.
Generally considering the four Started marks to be separate tests, we
allow the handler to touch the dog, pat it’s head, give it a kiss, or
whatever after each retrieve. I
guess I would have to fall into the camp that felt a warning for handing out a
treat was more in order than a failure at Started.
Bill Rath had an excellent point when he said that this falls into the
category of “we can’t put it all in the rulebook”, so the judge has to
use their head. He also said
that, “if this happened while I was judging and I wasn’t prepared for it,
I would probably warn the handler that treats were unacceptable. While the handler might argue, there would be no more treats
at the line”. While Bill and I
both feel a warning might have been in order for a first offense, especially
by a Started handler, I respect UKC’s decision to back the judges on the
formal complaint in the 1994 incident.
I
offered three points about the legality of feeding treats during the test.
I stated that I believed we could not consider a treat a “training
aid”, since it was not something used to intimidate the retriever. I did say that with a little imagination, it might be
considered training “equipment” (see the rules on Sportsmanship on page 20
of our rulebook), which is not allowed during a test!
I also stated that while the rulebook says a handler can use hand
signals, voice or whistle commands to encourage the retriever, it does not
mention treats. Finally, I
brought up a question about one of the five desirable traits of a hunting
retriever - desire. On multiple
marks, can a judge make a determination (should they have to) whether the
retriever is getting a treat for completing a retrieve, or getting one to
encourage it to go get the next bird? For
me, watching a dog get a treat to retrieve would be like watching the seals at
the zoo. I feel if a dog needs
treats to retrieve, it is not ready for our hunt tests.
How do all of you readers feel about this?
There
are two more things to consider. I
don’t have any problem with treats for the judge or hunt test marshal!
I like my donuts with chocolate on them and my coffee black, thank you.
And there is always the remote possibility of physical abuse of the
retriever to ponder if the handler is feeding any treats other than those
produced by Purina, our national dog food sponsor!
(Just kidding again).
Thanks
again for your efforts at reading this column to become better-informed
handlers, judges and hunt test participants.
I continue to be inspired by your good comments about the Judge’s
Corner, and I realize that while it’s easy to enjoy your compliments, the
hard part is to continue to live up to them.
We hope the “Judge’s Corner” will both entertain and inform you. |
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The Judges Corner - copyright
2006 All Rights Reserved Last modified: February 18, 2008 |