What are conservation search dogs?

Conservation search dogs are specifically trained to detect the scent of a target species (such as  e.g. a box turtle, a wood turtle etc.) and to alert their handler once the species of interest is found. Working with trained dogs in the field can be very valuable as certain conditions make it difficult for the human surveyer to find all individuals of the target species (thick brush, tall grass etc), but a dog's nose does not have these limitations.

We have worked with contracted, trained and proven dog/ handler search teams, have one "casual" turtle-finding dog and are now training a new generation of our very own team of "serious" search dogs.

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