Should SV do away with Schutzhund and replace it with PSA? - Page 3

"There is a reason that the majority of tracking scores above the club level  are always the highest of the three disciplines and often are 98,99,and 100.  A lab or Cocker can score a 100 in SCH Tracking. Most dogs can be trained to do competition sch tracking, because it is not as much about the dogs natural ability as it is a patterned routine on nonvariable surfaces. It is about training and precision and hard work BY the trainer.....it really doesn't show breed worthiness. Now I am NOT saying PSA  should be in place of SCH, but lets not get it twisted....SCH is a showcase for training ability, and this has allowed SOOOO many marginal dogs to be titled and thus bred, thus watering down the breed or creating unbalanced drives or traits. Jmo"


The man is correct.
PSA is not the answer, but neither is IPO AS IT EXISTS TODAY.

so why has ther SV not built a program to develop the right type pf GSD??

what is the problen with the SV??

May I lay a track for that cocker spanial? I would love to see him out track my GSDs!! I will buy lunch for the trainer/ handler and dinner if that animal is HOT. The true ability of the dog in the track can not always be seen at the club level. I have had "Rain man'' once lay a track for me and Stevie Wonder has done a couple for me at competitions. If I lay a track for my own dog in IPO 1 you better beleive it is as near to a hundred points as I can make it. Take a look at that dog after maybe 10 or 12 times at the IPO 3 trials to know if he is just a ''paper tiger '' or if that dog can track. One person above complained that the IPO 3 work is always the same, never changes. Think about a detector dog. How many times is he thrilled by sniffing a car? How many building searches truely warrent a spiritual moment for the dog. Most dogs at work do the same job day in and day out. Same town, same airport, same handler, same dumb suspects. The best working dog will be ''high'' to work the real world and if you take the time to educate your own eye you will see it in sport. but this will take involvement with dogs and not the keyboard

The problem with schutzhund isn't really the sport, it's the people.  Even in it's current state I think you can use it to judge a dog if you apply it correctly.  now when you get some fluff that gets passed with easy helpers and easy judging, not really the sport that's the problem, but the people doing it.

people can bitch about it all they want, yet for the past 100 years it has and continues to provide the base for which the overwhelming majority of working dogs in the military and police come from.  PSA?  glad people have fun doing it, good.  I think helpers would wear out quickly for all that damn yelling they seem to think is so important :)  anyway, I don't think PSA tests anything any better than a properly administered schutzhund trial.

I agree it seems way more fun

Tracking for SchH in comparison to  S&R and LE and so on are completely different. I am not against SchH but I will say that unless you do just sport tracking in SchH sport  then this tracking is detriment at worst and waste of time at best for any practical use. Thus PSA is not using tracking. 
On the other hand I do not think that PSA does that much more then Schutzhund for the breeder,  except that PSA routines are variable in unpredictable pattern and thus it demands more training and better working relationship of the dog  and handler. But for breeder? Nothing.   
 Schutzhund  was developed as a testing of the breed for suitability for breeding. I firmly believe  that there is total void in our ability evaluating  breedability of dogs based on it's abilities without total  devotion of every free moment of your life for 1-2 years to  training precision routines. 
I am all for establishing some new system of   tests testing genetic mental and physical abilities and instincts of the dog on lover level and ability to learn and be trained on higher level.   
I am working on such system but mostly I am too busy to make living to spend adequate time on  developing and promotion of  such test system. 
I will also say that I have hit tremendous resistance to such test by European breeders and trainers which are afraid of losing their control over breeders  if such less time consuming test would be implemented. 
If such test would be implemented though then breed of GSD would benefit because now many excellent dogs are past for breeding because they are not tiled.
 I believe  that for 100 + on one side SchH is really the only game in town which does any good to breed  to speak of but on the other side it ads insult to any such  benefit  because it also causes many problem by omitting or actually eliminating certain valuable traits in the breed of GSD.
Prager Hans

Jim, I would respectfully disagree with your statement about tracking scores. Sure the training plays a role in the scores but it takes a dog with the right drive and nerve to score at the highest levels and on variable surfaces and conditions, i.e; age, heat, wind, rain, dry, dirt, gravel roads, etc... FH tracks with changes in terrain are examples. Look at the scores at all events and I think there are a lot lower scores than you think. My original point was PSA doesn't test any of these abilities in a dog. Yes any dog with a nose can track and scent hounds maybe better than any but all cannot handle the training or stress for precision.

Jim
I do agree that IPO is not an adequate test of breed worthiness of the German Shepherd and in most cases it is a showcase for training and handling abilities. However, at this time IPO is the only avenue available from a competitive perspective to evaluate all three phases of a dogs working ability. 

It,s obvious that the sport has contributed to the down fall of the test for breeding. Also has the breeding of weak show line dogs. The Sch1 was a breeding title not the 3 why do you think the only parts of the 1 that had any thing to do with the real courage and drive differentiation were taken out. The attack on the handler out of the blind nd the old version of the catch? Why do you think the vertical wall was removed completly ? these things made the dog work to a point.

It,s funny but in my opinion you can find good or better dogs that fit the the requirements for working k9,s more from small individual breeders then you can from top sport preformers and the like I believe small breeders take the dog more into account then the titlles they hold and are more ituned to strong dogs.

The sport is a sport and nothing more. Show me the dog before I read about him.   

Bob McKown- Absolutely!!! The dogs I am selling to LE are often  discarded SchH dogs or dogs not suitable for sport for same specific reasons which are exactly the  reasons which are valued by law enforcement.