Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa Anti-poaching dog! A little long...

I guess the Africa forum is the place for this....

One of our program dogs last year showed such promise in scent work that I called colleagues at Working Dogs for Conservation : www.workingdogsforconservation.org
as I knew they were working on an anti-poaching project in Africa, and they needed dogs to sniff out contraband ivory, rhino horn, bush meat and the like.
They took the dog, who already knew how to search, courtesy of a star student of mine,and taught him the ropes with ivory, horn, and all the accoutrements-weapons, ammo, powder etc used in poaching. They flew him to Zambia with two trainers to train the handlers, and set him up in a super facility, complete with armed guards 24/7 for him and the other dog involved. This is 'our' dog,and his name is "Ruger"....





Training is bering conducted and is ongoing but has progressed far enough to take the dog out on his first roadblock, where he searched a van full of people and luggage...




He found a piece of luggage that he indicated on, and when searched, he indicated on a match box inside the luggage...




Inside the matchbox was a single percussion cap, illegal to possess as muzzle loaders and all they entail are common poachers tools. The owner already had a record for poaching, so his day could have gone better...


This is the first ever effort of its kind, but obviously it shows hope as a tool for future anti-poaching efforts. To say that I, my star student, and my friends at Working Dogs are proud and excited about this is an understatement.
This will give non-dog people a bit of insight into what exactly the olfactory capabilities of a dog are.
Proud to sign off on this one...Ingwe.

That's impressive! Must make you very proud, good job!

ingwe
Once they understand what we want they can be very effective. I had a Red Doberman Bitch that know what I was think before I did,
she was the best dog I every had; still miss that gal after all these years. Cheers NC

Good stuff

I'd like to see a cat do that!!

Ingwe you have done some amazing things with dogs

To find ONE percussion cap in all that is simply amazing!

Hell, I doubt if I could find one percussion cap in all that junk!
Amazing!

you should stop by his house and watch his dogs just messing around at the house without being told what to do....

If you want the warm-n-fuzzy factor thrown in, this was a "rescue" dog we got from a shelter turned in because he was snarkey and hyper...which to a trainer means 'high drive'
If you know what you are doing, high drive dogs are easier to work with, and my star student knew what she was doing.The best 'natural' dog trainer Ive ever seen.
Anyway,come to find out the dog has an eye problem and is virtually blind.In his case that equates to less things to distract him, cause he can't see them. he just did a 48 hour rotation on another roadblock.( no finds on that one...)

Imagine the dismay of all those thousands of dollars hunters have spent on scent lock and various oder killing sprays.

In that fully overloaded van full of millions of scents, that dog found that little box.

Yeah......... like all this crap marketed to cover scent is even remotely realistic to consider! It makes me actually feel sorry for the thousands of people sucked into this insane marketing scheme of scent removal and control!

Oh, Believe me you cannot even begin to imagine what that vehicle smelled like. I've lived there and seen this kind of thing countless times. These folks are living in these things cooking, bathroom, eating, sleeping it's an olfactory entity on it's own!

And Jim...I know Im not telling you anything, but the ONLY critters we found in our research ( WE being my certifying organization) that have better olfactory capabilities than dogs are.....wait for it....bears.
Wish we could train them to do this stuff....


Always wished I could train a coyote to detect dope too....but they are a different kettle of fish in the canine world...



And on the other topic, yes the scent covers and scent loks etc are a friggin joke, we tested them with dope dogs. Dogs went through them literally like they weren't there.

There was a discussion about the Ozonics here in the 'fire a few months back. I poo pooled it and another member pointed out that studies had been done on it, its not entirely a joke. I looked up what stuff is available and if you dot your "i"s and cross your "t"s just right, you CAN get past a dog with it. Enough of a threat that the FBI, DHS, and TSA have all conducted research with it and explosives...the results of which are not made public for obvious reasons. I could tell you what little I found out too but it is significant enough that Im not airing it on the net.


Interesting times we live in.

I've always wondered whether there was a scenting ability "league table" so to speak?

I recall the Russians did some tests with Jackal's and they had better scenting ability than dogs..

The other surprise were Rats.. apparently they can detect lower concentrations of odour than dogs and there was an organisation that was training Pac Rats for mine clearing in Africa somewhere...

My other guess would be pigs?

That is impressive!

Pete: The Russians I am afraid were wrong about the jackals ability...it is less than that of a full sized ( 50 lb dog) HOWEVER, the jackal is a good size to deploy, and has a manic focus...so the Russians interbred them with some kind of smallish dog for a hybrid thats easy to deploy in tight places and focused. Olfactory ability being less than a dog still puts it quantum leaps off the charts compared to a human.

Rats are noted for their olfactory ability, they, like dogs, are what we call Macrosmatic....lots of ethmoturbinates and Olfactory Sensory Neurons...still not better than a dog, again size is the factor, you can only cram so many Olfactory cells in a small package. Their ability however is phenomenal and they've been used extensively to clear mine fields in Mozambique, because they can smell more than good enough, and unlike a dog, don't weigh enough to set the mines off.
Like you I have often wondered about pigs, but have never seen the results of any studies on their ability.
FWIW the " Lowest Threshold of Detection" found in dogs came out of a 2005 study at FSU. Amyl Acetate was used as the scent involved and dogs not ordinarily recognized for their noses were used.
A Giant Schnauzer was able to detect down to 1.09 ppt ( Yes...parts per trillion
)
A Rottweiler was able to detect down to 1.14 ppt

That is barely more than 1 ppt, and impossible to wrap your brain around.

ingwe
I thought the blood hound had more of the little scent neutrons that any other breed?? But from what I have observed they are near as smart to absorb the needed train, would this be a fair statement. Thanks for your input. This has been an area that has held my interest. Cheers NC

Once a dog reaches about 50 pounds and has a 'traditional pointed snout' which is to say not brachycephalic( push faced, like a pug..) They seem to top out at about 220 million Olfactory Sensory Neurons. Much to the dismay of bloodhound fans, a great deal of what you hear about them is myth.
That said however bloodhounds can sometimes do what seems like the remarkable. They are hard wired to track, and nothing else. With what we shall call an uncluttered mind,they are not as prone to distraction as some others. A GSD on a track for instance is thinking a mile a minute. Will he find the bad guy, will he get a bite , will there be a fight? The bloodhound simply wants to know where the track ends....
I have heard bloodhounds, and beagles for that matter have about 300 million OSNs but have never seen a citation or research to back it up.

That's awesome, Tom.

Impressive to say the least, congrats!

Chris

I didn't realise that the scenting aspect of the breeding programme had been discredited. I believe they were bred for Aeroflot but never in any great numbers. Over here, Customs at a couple of ports were using Border Terriers (from working lines)for the same type of work..

Re the rats, I read somewhere that they actually smell in stereo with each nostril capable of processing different smells simultaneously..If that's true, its make human scenting ability look even more crude!

The rats, the dogs, the bears, all macrosmatic critters can smell 'in stereo'. The whole olfactory system is basically two bilaterally symmetrical mirror image systems. It is what allows the critter to discern the direction the scents coming from.
It is not that the jackals ability have been discredited, but science has simple shown a bigger dog equals more OSNs...More OSNs equal better ability.

The Border terriers you mentioned are kinda like the half jackals, first their abilities are so far above ours , and just barely below a full sized dog...what they lack in OSNs they make up for in drive. Its why Jack Russels are such good hunters, and Ive even seen dachshunds used for drug detection in facilities. Even the so called push-faced dogs whose olfactory systems are really screwed up, smell so much better than a human that it is hard to grasp.


Since you are in the UK a common dog for EOD over there ( bombs) is a Springer Spaniel. Again a little smaller dog, but with a little bigger 'drive' They are excellent at their jobs.Our Dept. Of Agriculture uses beagles for a similar reason, they are good at what they do and are deployed in public places, where no one finds them intimidating. I had one indicate on a bottle of Ms Balls Chutney-new,sealed and unopened- in my luggage like Id just poured it out in a bowl....( It is processed fruit and therefore OK to bring in...)

Springers, and to a lesser degree Labs, a very popular for all types of detection work.

My other half brought a Cocker X with her when she moved in, and that thing is beyond "driven" and nearer "absolutely mental"; I still can't believe a dog can get *that* excited when you return after being out of the room for 5 minutes lol!

Awesome thread, Ingwe.

I've never heard the 'stereo sniffing' info before. Makes them all the more unbelievable...

That parts per trillion literally boggles the mind...


Thanks!

Great post Ingwe. We added dogs to the clan 24 years ago and their scenting abilities always amaze me. Friendliest alarm system there is!

I agree, Tom, way cool thread.


maddog

Glad to hear that the dog is being protected with some serious security -- he sounds like he is a real threat to the poachers!

An acquaintance from Kenya told me that a few years ago a detection dog at Kenyatta International Airport at Nairobi was poisoned -- and it was an inside job too.

Evidently somebody wanted to smuggle something by air, and bribed some airport worker so the dog would be dead when the shipment went through.

John

Good read. Kudos oh Great One!

John, during a consult ( or two) with the Conservation Dog people I told them to not let the handlers know where and when roadblocks would be established.I hope they listened...

Also told them repeatedly when its time to exercise the dog daily, do it at different times and different places every day....

This is great stuff Thomas. I do believe that it warrants a trip across the pond so that you may personally determine that your recommendations have been implemented (being the Grand Poobah does have it's benefits, no?).
What, you sold your .375? No worries, just bring along the 7x57 to supply meat for the pot and I would be happy to accompany you with my .375 to provide the necessary security. Never know when an old Dugga boy with heavy bosses might try to do the Poobah harm. Oh, and all liquid refreshments would be on me

Brings back memories. The common firearms where I was in West Africa were crude-looking muzzleloaders, percussion. Two things I regret; not taking a closer look/interest in these things at the time and also not hanging out more at the blacksmith's place in the next village, who IIRC used to repair them among other items. I'm recalling an adobe forge with hand-driven bellows.

Once when staying at a poachers' village out in the sticks they were using Greener 12 bores on Martini Henry Actions, along with relaoded brass shell and round ball ammo. A miner's carbide lantern was worn on the head and most hunting was done at night.

Only saw a break open shogun once, a single-shot, didn't see the brand.

On the topic of dogs, there are a number of accounts of Indians bringing their dogs to war along Lake Champlain in the F&I War and as well as portraits of 18th Century Eastern Woodland Indians accompanied by what appear to be 25-50 pound dogs.

I'd guess it would be very difficult to spring an ambush on someone in the woods who has a trained dog.

Birdwatcher

Ingwe,

Great to hear that you are in front of this, and have already given them some very good advice!

I can easily understand that a good detection dog could be such a serious threat that the bad guys would "put a contract out" on the dog.

You can possibly bribe a cop or a dog handler, but your only option is to kill the dog that works hard for them every day.

John

If you know how things work in Africa, they'll kill the dog AND the handler for the price of a ham sandwich.

There was a dog being used years ago, a border collie detecting poached abalone on the coast of RSA. He got a price on his head pretty quickly and they literally trained a German Shepherd to go with him and the handler and guard the border collie.

Ingwe,

I have not been to Africa, but all of the folks I know who have, say that life is very cheap there.

Regarding the abalone-detecting border collie and his body guard: that is mighty cool! Given the pack nature of dogs, I'll bet it was not difficult training either.

In my (admittedly warped) mind, I am picturing a border collie serching a fishing boat as his "posse" stands guard -- waiting for a chance to bite anybody that messes with the little dog!

Oh, and thanks for an excellent thread too, Ingwe.

John