This dog training book makes canine scent work fun for any dog. Training for tracking, trailing and air scent work, evidence search, disaster search and the AKC tracking dog tests is covered in-depth. Practical Scent Dog Training includes a method of starting tracking training that will get even young puppies turned on to ground scent. Starting with how to work with and read your dog, the author continues into describing how scent reacts in different situations.The training sections are broken down into separate lessons, each building on the previous one. At the end of each lesson, the author has included "Things to Think About" asking the reader questions of how the dog responded during the lessons, and adding informative comments in regards to those questions.The methods here incorporate the combined experience of members of a very successful search and rescue group.

Of all training activities, author Lue Button finds scent work the most satisfying, as it calls for the highest development of canine skill and fosters the closest relationship between dog and handler. Born in Fargo, North Dakota, Button trained animals on her grandparents’ farm and went on to study anthropology, speech, and physics, earning her M.S. degree in Physics from the University of New Mexico in 1974. She has been employed by the Field Test Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory since 1968, retiring in January 1990. Upon her marriage to Donald Button in 1971, she became chief trainer for Von Knopf Weimaraners, studying tracking with Walter Bush and later Wentworth Brown in Albuquerque. After a pivotal search mission with her tracking dog in 1982, Lue Button extended her dogs’ training into all forms of scent work. She has taught numerous courses in obedience and tracking, and is currently training director of the Los Alamos-based Mountain Canine Corps.