Meet Kip - Wildlife Detection Dog
A second dog has completed training to join Zoos Victoria’s Detection Dog Squad and his first fieldwork assignment is to track the elusive Platypus.
Kip the Kelpie-cross has fantastic problem-solving skills, mental and physical stamina, and is excellent at detecting complex odours, which makes him the perfect candidate to help Zoos Victoria conservationists sniff out threatened species in the wild.
Kip joins a Labrador called Moss, who graduated to fieldwork last year, and two other dogs in training at Healesville Sanctuary.
The Detection Dog Squad is an important resource for Zoos Victoria’s fighting extinction work as the dogs can traverse rugged mountain terrain and along creek beds, which makes them an integral survey method for saving all sorts of species.
Wildlife Detection Dog Squad Officer Naomi Hodgens has a special bond with Kip after adopting him seven years ago. She is pleased with how quickly Kip has responded to complex scent training, honing his Platypus detecting skills for over a year, and now he is also working on the critically endangered Baw Baw Frog.
“Kip loves to work and is incredibly stimulated when faced with a scent challenge,” Ms Hodgens said.
"He is a highly intelligent dog who needs to be challenged. So, he doesn't just sniff out a trainer, we have been trialling the use of purpose-made scent tubes that absorb animal odour and can then be hidden as part of training."
Kip has detected the scent of Healesville Sanctuary Platypus, and radio-tagged Platypus, as well as finding the scented tubes buried around creek beds, mimicking Platypus burrows built deep in the side of a riverbank.
“These scent tubes will be a useful tool for future Detection Dog Squad work, because we can collect animal odour, plant them in the field, leave them for a while so our human odour will disappear, and then use them.”
Kip is on track to sniff out wild Platypus in the field from April. Zoos Victoria’s Detection Dog Squad will work with wildlife experts, including Healesville Sanctuary’s Platypus Specialist Dr Jessica Thomas, to collate data on the wild Platypus burrows as part of efforts to better understand the iconic Australian monotreme.
Dr Thomas said the fact that a dog can do scent detection in a non-invasive way, while a Platypus is asleep during the day and isn’t disturbed by the dog or scientist, is the perfect conservation formula.
