Increasing concern about the status of rare species and endangered wildlife populations has spurred the development of non-invasive methods for wildlife censusing, monitoring and research. Examples of non-invasive sampling methods include photographic traps, hair snag stations, and fecal (scat) collection. In particular, scat samples can provide a wealth of information such as a species' presence, relative abundance, food habits, parasite loads, habitat use and home range size. Furthermore, analyses of endocrine extracted from scats can determine the sex and reproductive status of individuals, and analyses of the DNA contained in scat can verify species and sex, and potentially determine population size, home range, paternity, and kinship.

Use of non-invasive approaches to obtain critical data requires that wildlife or sign (e.g. scat, urine, hair, dens) be easily located, a difficult task in rugged terrain and among animals with extensive home ranges. To reduce the difficulty, WDCF handlers have trained working dogs to differentiate and locate by scent target species or their sign. The denning, hibernation, or burrowing traits of some species make them excellent candidates for location by canine olfaction. Over the past decades, dogs have been successfully trained to detect a variety of wildlife species (e.g. seals, foxes, turtles, snakes, birds, black-footed ferrets, termites, bears). In the future, WDCF aims to expand the use of detection dogs in wildlife research quantifying detection and discrimination performance in a scientifically rigorous manner.

Working together, WDCF's canine handlers and detection dogs have located target wildlife or their sign for research and conservation projects. WDCF has participated in the design and implementation of various projects, trained canine-handlers, performed data analysis, and prepared presentations, reports, and manuscripts for publication. Furthermore, samples collected by WDCF teams have been used for forensic and disease investigations, monitoring, mark recapture estimates, and physiological analyses.

Photo by Chad Harder