10/04/2026
🌙 We had the perfect fall night last night for a night training! At the beginning of the week it was showing rain in the forecast, but the skies cleared and everyone got to stay dry for once!
🌄 Practice started as the sun was going down and very quickly turned to darkness. Working in the dark can be a whole different ballgame for handlers and K9s alike. Many times we don't get the call to respond to a search until long after the sun has gone down so its important to replicate that in training!
🌬 We faced quite a few extra challenges at this training! Some of the trails had been layed on a fourwheeler which can spread the scent out more along the trail and add some extra difficulty. This area also has a lot of wide open fields which allows the wind to move the scent around a lot more than if we were training in the woods.
🦌 One of the biggest challenges was fresh contamination from all the critters in the area! There were deer all through those fields from the time we got there until the time we left! Several of our trails went straight through areas that deer had just been seen feeding. Not long after dark the coyotes started talking on all sides of us, but everyone kept their heads down and their eyes and noses on the mission! A black bear was spotted by one of our handlers as she was leaving for the night so we know they were out and about last night too.
💯 Its practices like this that keep our training levels topped off and the smiles on our faces! Everyone did a great job at tackling the darkness!
🍕 We want to send out a huge thank you to Holben Farms and the Welsh family for letting us use their property, hiding for us, and even going in to town to pick up pizza for everyone! We appreciate your support!
***Its definitely a challenge getting good pictures of moving K9s in the dark so some of those pictures are a little blurry and we added a few pictures from a distance that also show that awesome night sky last night!
