As I'm sure you're aware, I love my dog (pretty apparent, right?). Not only do I love him, I love dogs in general. I find them fascinating - their history, the science behind why they do things, all of it. Today I stumbled upon this great article about dogs' sense of smell. The article focuses on how biologists and other scientists are turning to dogs to help do some work that is challenging for people (i.e. searching for endangered and exotic species for education or conservation purposes). How cool is that?!
Working Dogs for Conservation is one of the groups highlighted in the article. It's a group of biologists and dogs that travel around the world studying rare, endangered and invasive species. Pretty amazing! But that's not even the coolest part - "Many of the dogs employed at Working Dogs for Conservation aren't bred for detection work; they come from the pound. 'The
reason these dogs are in shelters is because they would make really
poor pets,' Parker says. 'They're obsessed by a toy to sometimes an
incredible extent — like, they will jump through a plate-glass window to
get to a ball outside.' That incredible 'toy drive' means they have the focus and motivation to work a full day." I can't stand how awesome this is. And there is even a newly formed organization called the "International Conservation Detection Dog Association" whose mission is to be a forum for detection dogs in the conservation field.
If you have time (and you're interested) you should totally check out the full article, it's quite interesting. I'm not surprised that the animal kingdom continues to inspire our scientific investigations and efforts.
Read the full article here: http://www.npr.org/2013/09/03/192798179/the-latest-in-scientific-field-equipment-fidos-nose
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