Person tracking
Person tracking is the dog following a trail a person laid on foot. The trail layer walks the route, the dog works on a line and the handler follows behind. It is blood tracking’s sibling — the same work, but the scent comes from a person rather than from game, and items are dropped along the way for the dog to indicate.
How it works in the app
- The trail layer records the trail on their own phone as they walk it, tapping the item button wherever something is left.
- The trail is shared with a code or a link to whoever is working the dog.
- The dog works the trail. Afterwards its track is drawn against the layer’s, with the deviation and a score.
The handler is not meant to know where it goes
That is the whole point of the discipline, so the app can hide the trail: turn on Hidden trail in settings and only the start is shown — not the line, not the items, not the layer’s notes and not the live score, which is a distance to a line you cannot see. All of it appears the moment the run is saved. The setting covers blood tracking too, for anyone who would rather not be able to steer the dog down a line drawn on the screen.
Tracking is not area search
In person tracking the dog is meant to follow the trail, which is what makes the layer’s GPS track the reference and the deviation worth measuring. In an area search the dog quarters ground and is not meant to follow the track at all, so a deviation says nothing. The app does person tracking today.
Get the app
The trail layer records the trail on their own phone and shares the code — the handler sees only the start until the run is saved.
Free to download.