Difference between detection and tracking

If you are looking to actively pursue detection or tracking with your dog, it is often unclear what the difference between detection and tracking is now.

Detection or searching is teaching 1 or more scents to a dog.

Dogs are taught to recognize this odor and if they have smelled the odor to look for the source of the odor. In practice, think of drug dogs but also dogs trained to recognize the smell of explosives. Money is another scent used in practice.
Depending on the substance, the dog will usually refer but also lie down or bark.
With explosives, the dog will have to mainly point and be quiet. With drugs, the dog may possibly bark, depending on what the handler wants
In practice, we see that police dogs can often search for drugs but are also active patrol dogs, dual purpose. With explosives, there is often single purpose.
Of course, it's also just plain fun to teach your dog a scent and let him find it.
We often start with a small piece of kong (rubber). If the dog masters this, learning an additional scent is quickly learned.

In tracking, the dog follows a scent trail until it finds the object or person.

Mantrailing is a popular method of tracking. In it, a person leaves a trail. With the dog on a leash (long lead), the handler follows the dog until it finds the person. Mantrailing can be done indoors or outdoors or a combination. The level of difficulty can be determined based on the dog's experience and ability. Think a track over a hard surface, stone, asphalt will be more difficult than a track over a soft surface such as grass or sand. The more you train with your dog on different surfaces the more experienced your dog will become in mantrailing.
In addition to searching for people, your dog can also learn to follow the trail of another animal

In our DSC-K9 Academy, we teach both detection as well as tracking training at different levels