Norwegian Buhund

Breed Notes 17th January 2025 Margaret Deuchar

NORWEGIAN BUHUNDS

Last week the notes were nearly all about shows, but this week they are more about Buhunds doing activities. Lillian has sent me details of Darcy aka Kata Syndattir Av Fjeldvidda At Wheatshade (Imp NL) mantrialing. “Five teams (dog & handler) gathered  on a  cold wet day just before Christmas at the outdoor area of the Solway Aviation Museum. Mantrailing is find a ‘lost’ missing person often referred to as a  ‘mispa’ using an article that has their scent on .Out first article was a Christmas Bauble left on a bench. Darcy was off  and found her ‘mispa’ at the top of some aeroplane steps. Happily, rewarded she rested in the car till her next turn .The next article was a dog biscuit Christmas Tree! Hmm, how to let her get the scent without eating the biscuit ? Tricky, but I manged, and she found her ‘mispa’ inside a piece of fuselage and was then allowed to eat the biscuit as a reward. Another rest before her last turn, a carrot was the scent article …she loves carrots! Again, she managed not to eat it and found her person inside a storage compartment in the fire engine, the carrot was duly demolished. Each scent article had  been held by the ‘mispa’ for less than a minute. The museum challenges the dogs in many ways. It is an open-air space, with various  different pieces of equipment and obstacles, a wire fence ,roped areas and gates for dogs  to indicate on as well. It is lots of fun to trial with you dog .Darcy amazes me every time and I am so proud of her .Ps she loves it well. It was a brilliant fun day, although the weather was atrocious!” Congratulations to Darcy on not eating the Biscuit and Carrot, shows finding the ‘mispa’ was more important to her.  Mantrialing  for pet dogs is relatively new, but the concept of Mantrailing  was used back in the 18th century where dogs were trained to track down escaped criminals, this has been developed into the modern Mantrailing where the dogs and handlers can also take part in competitions if they wish .There are  of course   search and rescue dogs who look for missing people, either when they have become lost or  after earthquakes ,and the police still use dogs to pursue criminals. There is another  scentwork sport where again the instinct of the dog to track scents is used and as with mantrailing any breed of dog or xbred can do it . In this  the dogs search for  scents on various hidden items , usually it  starts with cloves but as the dog gains experience gun oil and then truffle oil are introduced .When I started with Time someone said to me he was not a breed that you think would be successful doing  scent work. May be if you  just wanted to do scent work you would get a gundog, but as Darcy, Sarah Stonton’s Jack aka Ch Arnscroft In Di Ana Jack and her 9th month old Pixie aka Wheatshade Snow Dreamer  and my Time (aka  Rikarlo Gable JW)  have shown Buhunds can be just as successful as gundog breeds if trained properly. SWUK  which has been going for 10 yrs runs competitions that are  usually based in halls and starts with Tables and Chairs, Boxes and Luggage. Outside items such a hosepipe reels etc and Cars/Walls. Level 1 is the first level, if you  get 20points at any level you are awarded an Excellence at that Level. In the higher Levels you search rooms and an outside but still mostly hall based with a few venues that are stables /farm barns. The winner is the dog that finds the most hides in the quickest time, down to 4th place then you can just be a qualifier assuming the required  numbers of hides are  found in the time. Jack has a L7 ex and is now competing in L9 coming 2nd in his first L9 trial just 2 seconds behind the winner. Pixie who is Jack’s daughter and is 9 months, is in L2 has qualified in Level 1 and twice in L2 and Time had his L6 Ex before I  gave up going to SWUK to concentrate on NNA competitions, which started in November 2021,  just  over  3yrs ago . These are much more environmentally based, with  much larger areas to cover. When Time and I  first started there was just Entry, Enhanced and Excellent competitions, but it has proved to be so  popular that it now starts with Foundation and Pre-Entry then Entry, Enhanced, Excellent, Elite and Spirit with two more levels to come. Although  the dog that finds the most hides is the winner with a reserve, you mostly work to gain a badge by finding all the hides in one of the four searches in the lower  levels, so you compete against yourself with  three searches from Enhanced and above as the hides are more difficult for the dog to find as they work up the levels. Three Badges need to be gained  in each search area in  every Level before the dog can move up. Although the searches are timed, the dogs are marked on their indication, how the handler covers the area, and the confidence of the dog and handler so time does not really come into it, unless the same number of hides were found and the marks were the same, which is very rare. Jack is now in Excellent coming Reserve with  a Badge in his first trial and Time just needs one more badge to go into Elite having won a trial  and having two reserves last year in Excellent. The NNA divides their dogs into  their KC Groups plus a X bred group. At the end of each year there is an award  ceremony where the Top Dogs in each group win  an award and the top 10 overall also gain awards. Sarah and my friend Bernice Emanuel won the Pastoral Group with her Border Collie Jazz with Sarah and Jack coming second and Time and I third not a bad breed representation. Both dogs were also in the top 25 teams (dog and handler) out of 211 teams that  had  won awards over the past year. So together  with Darcy not bad for non-scent dogs!

On the show front, the weekend of the 11/12 January saw Wiveliscombe and District Canine Society hold their 264 class Winter Open Show, at Wellsprings Leisure Centre Taunton, this time Pastoral day was the Sunday along with the Working, Toy and Utility  Groups. No breed class but Millie Lambert’s Sturtmoor  Gon’n Dun It (Gunna), kept the Buhund flag flying by winning Best AVNSC & Best AVNSC Puppy and then Puppy Group 3 under  Judge John Steele (Saltcountry/Threadgold ).Congratulations again, I  hope you have a very large rosette board for him Millie.

Margaret Deuchar  margareteuchar@gmail.com

Any views expressed in Margaret’s Breed Notes are hers and hers alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Norwegian Buhund Club of the UK