When it comes to locating and saving vulnerable animals, dogs have what it takes.
Sometimes called sniffer dogs, scent (or detector) dogs find animals by using their powerful scent-detecting abilities. Depending on their breed, a dog’s sense of smell is 100,000 to 100 million times more sensitive than ours. What’s more, seven to 40 times more of their brain is devoted to figuring out scents.
Those traits — and their willingness to please — make them great allies in searching for animals and their telltale signs, like droppings, fur or feathers.
It was a sniffer dog that famously located injured and lost koalas during the 2018 Australian wildfires. Worldwide, many other dogs play key roles finding rare and endangered wildlife.