One thing some dogs can do enormously better than people is to find and follow a scent. This makes them ideal in search and rescue, especially if they have a high prey-drive. But it’s not easy to qualify:
To get her mountain rescue tag and search dog coat, [Jody the border collie] completed four successful searches over two days on the steep slopes of the Mourne Mountains in County Down, under the watchful eyes of two independent assessors from the National Search And Rescue Dog Association in England.
John [Binns] trained the dog to search for humans using her highly sensitive nose and under his direction she can quickly cover an area, honing in on an injured person. When she finds one she is rewarded by being allowed to play with her favourite squeaky toy.
“She has the capability of covering large areas of ground in all conditions using her extremely sensitive nose to locate casualties, a task that would require a large number of people,” John said.
[Via : BBC NEWS | UK | Northern Ireland | Abandoned dog becomes rescue asset.]
While there’s a growing trend to specifically breeding dogs for this kind of work, a twist in Jody’s tale is that she was left at an animal shelter. The staff there suggested her to Binns.
