Wednesday 16 February 2011

ConservationDogs.com article in The Independent -16th January 2011

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/conservation-dogs-eco-researchers-2215929.html

Check out this link:

Detecting Pine Marten Scat- advancing Luna's training

Lunas continuing her training in Pine Marten scat detection. Once fully trained Luna can be employed to help wildlife organisations and conservationists by offering a non biased and non invasive method of detection of scats. Scat Detection Dogs are also able to cover an increasingly larger area than a human search team currently can.

Wildlife detection dogs are another survey method, option, tool or supportive service that can help gain a fair and accurate reading of scat abundance and presence in any given area, regardless of the terrain and environment (such as thick foliage and dense bush).

We are training in wooded areas, with thick vegetation, branches and leaves littering the ground. We prepare Luna by placing her working harness on and focusing her prior to searching.

Luna is sent ahead of the handler and covers the area in a zigzag pattern. Once the area has been covered by Luna we move forward to cover the next section in the same way.


To ensure we train Luna to detect scats on any area and any height we are including tree branches when hiding Pine Marten Scats for Luna to find.

Luna already covers the ground effectively so we do this to increase the difficulty of her search as this improves her as a scenting dog, especially in difficult terrain.


Once Luna has located the scent source/target odour she "alerts" to the handler.
The handler then joins Luna at her location and once the Scat has been identified by a clear "alert" or "indication" Luna is then rewarded.
***
We will keep you updated on Luna progression in her training for this exciting project.

Wednesday 9 February 2011

Pine Marten Scats in the Forest

Luna's training is going well, we have took her to the next stage of training and
we are carrying out longer searches in thick dense wooded area's now.

 The Scats are placed out, then Luna is allowed to conduct her search to see how many
she can detect and indicate on.

Luna is allowed to conduct the search off lead in such thick wooded areas,
as long as it is safe for her to do so.

Once Luna has correctly identified and indicated on the Pine Marten Scat
we reward her, remove the scat and flag the area.

 Flagging the area helps identify the previously removed Scats, and if Luna returns to the area and shows an interest- we will know that this area was used in training and residual scent may remain.


Friday 4 February 2011

Bat Carcass Detection Dog Training Program

Autumn 2010 saw the start of our Bat Carcass Detection Dog Training Program.
We hold a License allowing us to store the carcasses of various species of Bat's for the specialist training of our Springer Spaniel, Twister.

Wednesday 2 February 2011

Luna in training

Luna's training has got off to a great start, we are thrilled at how fast she has learnt to indicate on the Pine Marten Scat. She is still in the early stages of training and sometimes she gets so excited she has to settle down a little prior to finding the Target Odour (Pine Marten Scats).

We start the training indoors, to reduce distractions and help maintain focus in these fragile early stages of scent training.

Luna's First training session outdoors in a local country park.

The training will involve searches on the lead and also searches off the lead to ensure Luna can work to her full capability operationally in both situations.

Free Search off lead in open fields.

Luna is our Black Labrador Bitch, she is 16 Months old and has been in training for 2 weeks.

Conservation Dogs Recent Projects

The last few months have been very exciting for Conservation Dogs, we have been involved in some really interesting projects and received some excellent press coverage.  Projects have included a trip to Africa, training dogs to detected Cheetah Scats, setting up a new bat carcass detection dog program, the training of dogs for the detection of Pine Martens to name just a few!

Below are just some of the press coverage our work has received: 

Bat carcass detection dog articles:





Cheetah scat detection articles:






General articles:


Tuesday 1 February 2011

News articles

Welcome to the Conservation Dogs blog! 

There will be plenty of articles, news and photos posted here on all the research, training and projects we are undertaking so ensure to subscribe to keep up to date with all that's happening at Conservation Dogs.   

Enjoy!