Introducing Wolf Scat
A Few Weeks ago we were able to get a donation of Wolf Scat from Wolf Hollow Education Center in Ipswitch Massachusetts. Thanks to this, I have been able to start training Scout on the Target Odor of Wolf Scat.
There have been some reports that dogs find the scent of Wolf scat to be aversive and that they avoid it. There was even a published study in 2020 where researchers stated that some of the detection dogs showed so much aversion that 3 of the 4 dogs were removed from the study.
Scout did not appear to show any aversion to the wolf scat. In fact she seemed to find it very interesting! Below is a video of her first introduction to the wolf scat.
There is still lots to learn! Over the coming months we will be working on
- extending the duration of her alert to several seconds of sit
- Introducing distractor odors like fox scat, raccoon scat, and finally the really hard one of coyote scat so Scout knows exactly which kind of scat to look for
- Working on an "All Clear" no Wolf Scat in this line up so she can indicate when scent samples have "Wolf Scat" vs "No Wolf Scat"
- Build up duration for her "All clear" signal
- Working more outside on trails and in field to get ready for field work in places where wolves might be living
- extending the duration of time she can search before finding something-- in the real world she wont be finding scat every 5 minutes!
It's a lot for a little puppy to learn! Good thing this little puppy loves to hunt! (and isn't afraid of Wolf Scat)