Schweiss tracking in Rold forest

Schweiss or blood spoor tracking is a core ability of the Ridgeback, their inbred intelligence and courage makes them excellent at tracking wounded (and perhaps dangerous) stag and this is indeed one of the cental abilities the breed was made for. But to become a dependable tracking dog - or just to pass the first tracking trials - you have to practice and learn.
Today 12 Ridgebacks ranging from 7 months to 7 years and their handlers met in the middle of the largest Danish forest - Rold Skov. The frozen forest was beautiful to drive through on the way in to the hunting cabin where the we were to start.
A good few hunting tales later and a lot of good advice by expert handler Elisabeth Svendsen and we were ready to go out and lay the spoors for the dogs. It was snowing lightly when we started but the snow made it easy to see where the blood was dripped (ox blood) - not to mention that our foot prints were easy to see even for the sensory challenged humans.
Another trip back to the cabin and now it was the dogs turn. It was now snowing rather heavily and a few of the cars got stuck in the snow and left behind. The snow had also covered our tracks - what had seemed simple a few hours earlier was now covered by fresh inches of white and the unproven dogs were left to their own noses.
Actually - the only problems occured when the dog handler still thought he or she knew better than the dog and tried to direct them off the track ..... and even totally unproven puppies like Funny found every spot of bright red blood deep in the white snow and flawlessly found her stag foot now hidden under inches of fresh snow. Sammy's only confusion was that there was real live deers in the thicket behind us, and it took a little persuasion to tell her to follow the hour old blood track instead.
The snow was now coming down with a vengeance and getting out of the forest and back home was not quite as easy as getting there.