What The Dog Knows

Description

"Taking the reader from crime scenes to training sites and science labs, talking and working with other handlers and trainers, and interviewing animal psychologists, forensic anthropologists, breeders, and scent researchers, Warren explains how working dogs can capture the hidden worlds their noses know and translate that arcane knowledge for humans. The fascinating concepts behind the complex capabilities of working dogs emerge as Warren weaves the world of science and dog cognition with her own experiences in the field : all with an unsentimental yet sensitive touch. What the Dog Knows tells the stories of cadaver dogs, drug and bomb detecting K9s, tracking and apprehension dogs : even dogs who can locate unmarked graves of Civil War soldiers and help find drowning victims more than two hundred feet below the surface of a lake. Working dogs sometimes seem magical, as they distinguish scent, cover territory, and accomplish tasks that no machine is yet capable of. With an additional chapter included in the paperback, What the Dog Knows reveals the science, the intense training, and the skilled handling that lie behind those abilities : and shows why we keep finding new uses for the wonderful noses of working dogs."

Author description

"Cat Warren is a professor and former journalist with a somewhat unorthodox hobby: she works with cadaver dogs : dogs who search for missing and presumed-dead people. What started as a way to harness the energies of her unruly, smart, German shepherd puppy, Solo, soon became a passion for them both (though Solo thinks it's simply a great game, with the reward of a toy at the end). They searched for the missing throughout North Carolina for eight years."