There are some venues that you arrive at and immediately know are going to give you plenty to work with, and Riding for the Disabled (RDA) Henderson was certainly one of those.
On Saturday 12 September, we hosted two Novice events back-to-back at RDA Henderson. This venue had actually been almost a year in the making for us. Scent Squad member Supreet Chadha first came across it and suggested it as a potential trial venue, so finally being able to secure it, plan around it and see the day come together was particularly special.
And it really is a beautiful facility. The property gave us enough variety to create two complete events while still keeping the searches separated enough that residual odour from the morning did not interfere with what we wanted to do in the afternoon. It also gave our Novice teams something we always expect when we step outside our familiar training environments: novelty.
Event 1: A challenging start
Our morning event was judged by Adele Williams, Kelly Daniel and Susie Londer, alongside provisional judge Noel Reid.
Teams began with an interior search before moving into containers in the main arena, followed by an exterior and finally the vehicle.
The arena proved to be one of the biggest talking points of the morning. Rather than a traditional sand arena, the footing is a sand and synthetic-fibre blend, giving it an almost carpet-like quality. Add in the layers of environmental information that come with a working horse facility, and it was a very different picture for many of our Novice dogs.
And that caught a few teams out.
The container search in particular asked quite a lot of dogs who are still relatively early in their trialling careers. Some dogs found it difficult to settle into the search on that surface, particularly with all of the competing horse smells and the unusual footing underneath them.
What I really enjoyed seeing, though, was how many dogs were able to regroup afterwards. A difficult search did not necessarily dictate the rest of their day. Teams moved on to the exterior and vehicle searches, and we saw dogs regain confidence, get back into their work and finish their event on a much stronger note.
That, for me, is an important part of trialling. We spend an enormous amount of time teaching our dogs about odour, but eventually we have to take that understanding somewhere they have never been before and ask, “Can you still solve this here?”
Sometimes the answer comes easily. Sometimes the environment becomes part of the problem the dog has to work through.
Event 1 finished with 14 of 23 teams qualifying, for a 61% overall qualification rate.
Our Highest Qualifier was Bernadette Boyd and Cloe, with Nikki Leigh and Jovi taking Runner-Up.
Judges’ Choice awards went to Bernadette Boyd and Cloe for Interior, Louise Morley and Skittles for Containers, Nikki Leigh and Jovi for Exterior, and Emma King and Suri for Vehicles.
Taking what we learned into Event 2
One of the benefits of hosting two events in the same venue on the same day is that you have an opportunity to look at what the first group of dogs tells you.
After the morning event, we talked through what we had seen and made a few changes to the afternoon flow. The biggest of those was moving the container search out of the arena.
Novelty is part of scent sport, and environmental challenge absolutely belongs in a trial. At the same time, these were Novice teams. For many of them, this is where they are beginning to test whether their dogs can take their understanding of target odour into a trial environment at all. We still want to challenge them, but we want the search to remain a fair test of the skill being assessed rather than allowing one particularly difficult environmental feature to overwhelm the entire picture.
Kelly and I discussed moving her container search into another suitable area of the facility, and I think it was a good adjustment for the afternoon group.
We did, however, retain the vehicle search inside the arena. Interestingly, the dogs generally coped with that picture much better. The vehicle itself provided such a large and obvious search object that many dogs were better able to remain connected to the task despite the footing and surrounding environmental information.
The afternoon teams then continued through their other elements, including Susie Londer’s interior and an exterior search set by Adele Williams through the horse stable area.
This time we saw 15 of 20 teams qualify, giving Event 2 a 75% qualification rate.
Our Highest Qualifier was Sarah Rida and Rou, with Dianne Stephens and Sass taking Runner-Up.
Judges’ Choice awards went to Dianne Stephens and Sass for Containers, Sylvia Franke and Stella for Vehicles, Margaret Walker and Roshi for Interior, and Carol Sheng and MJ for Exterior.
Across the two events, that gave us 29 qualifying teams from 43 runs, or an overall qualification rate of approximately 67% for the day.
Good trials are about more than the hides
One of the things I came away particularly proud of from this event was the flow of the day.
There is a lot that happens behind the scenes of a scent trial that competitors should ideally never have to think about. Where teams are waiting, which direction they are travelling, how long it takes to move between elements, whether one search area interferes with another, when judges can reset, and how all of those individual pieces affect the overall timeline.
Gina Reid from K9 Scent Seekers, who is also the SSANZ Secretary, and I spent time beforehand working through the venue and planning that flow. We wanted teams to move efficiently without feeling rushed, but equally we did not want people spending huge amounts of their day standing around waiting for their next search or for prize giving to begin.
We started Event 1 at 9.30am and were finished at approximately 11.30am. After resetting for the afternoon, Event 2 began at around 12.50pm, and we finished prize giving at 3pm on the dot.
For two complete Novice events, I was incredibly happy with that.
Efficient trial flow does not happen accidentally. Hide placement plays a part, but so does understanding the physical venue, how competitors will move through it, where dogs need space, where judges and volunteers need to be, and how long all of those little transitions actually take. When those pieces are well planned, the whole day simply feels easier.
The people who make it happen
As always, there are a lot of people behind an event like this.
Supreet Chadha is one of our Scent Squad members and has become very much the right hand to my left when it comes to running these trials.
She is also the photographer behind Mustard Bloom Media, and the photos throughout this post are hers. Alongside everything she does to help our events run, she is often behind the camera capturing the dogs, handlers and little moments that make up the day.
From initially finding RDA Henderson almost a year ago to all of the work she puts in before, during and after our events, I am incredibly grateful to have her as part of the team.
The same goes for our wider Scent Squad group. I may do a large portion of the initial planning, but these events simply would not run the way they do without the people around me who let me bounce ideas off them, turn up early, move equipment, steward, reset search areas and solve the little problems that inevitably appear throughout a trial day.
Something I appreciate enormously is that many of them come along to help at events even when they are not competing at that particular level. Their own dogs may be working at Intermediate or Advanced, or they may simply not have a dog entered that day, but they still give up their Saturday to help Novice teams have their opportunity to trial. That willingness to support events beyond just the classes they personally compete in is a huge part of why we are able to run these days as smoothly as we do.
And, of course, a huge thank you goes to Adele, Kelly, Susie and Noel for giving their time to our competitors and setting thoughtful challenges for our Novice teams.
I often say at prize giving that scent sport really is a circle. We need organisations willing to host events. We need judges willing to give their time and create fair challenges. We need volunteers who keep everything moving. And we need competitors willing to show up, put their training out there and trust their dogs.
Take one part away and the rest does not really work.
When all of those pieces come together, though, we get exactly what we had at RDA Henderson: a full day of dogs searching, handlers learning, a few challenges to take home and train, plenty to celebrate, and a group of people enjoying the sport together.
RDA marked our seventh and eighth events of 2026. We have one final Double Buried Hides trial coming up in October, which will take us to Events 9 and 10 and close out what has been a very full trialling year for us.
Ten events in one year was certainly not something I pictured when we first started putting these days together.
But I am pretty excited to see where we take them in 2027.