While some of us keep dogs as pets and companions, others put them to work guarding, sniffing out items of interest, protecting, guiding, and generally working hard.
In Australia the University of Sydney is carrying out a survey to find out just what working dogs do, how they are trained, which breeds are best suited to which tasks, and just how many dogs are ‘employed’:
dogs of all shapes and sizes are under the magnifying glass for Australia’s first working dog survey, which aims to find how to get the most out of man’s best friend.
The data on various types of canines — from military mutts to sporting dogs — will then be passed on to the Federal Government’s Animal Welfare Strategy, which wants to make consistent national policies.
The study quizzes the owners of government, service and sport dogs about how they train, handle, house and care for their animals through an online survey.
Co-ordinator Nick Branson says the study will find out how many working dogs there are Australia-wide and why some training programs work better than others.
[Via : Working like a dog: spotlight on man's best friend - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).]
There’s no doubt that dogs play an important part in our society. It’s good to see this attempt to draw data together.
