In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla answers some questions from Patron Meg! We discuss when and how to introduce alerts, target odors, and a variety of life skills. We also talk about whether or not sports and other "hobbies" may harm your detection K9's performance and much more. Science Highlight: Search strategies for conservation detection dogs Links Mentioned in the Episode: Playlist of all of Niffler's training sessions @detectionforgood on Instagram You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists Website | Merch | Support Our Work | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok
In this bonus episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with the Skylos Ecology Team, Tracey Lyten and Fiona Jackson, to discuss how to work safely around wildlife and livestock. What are your exepectations/goals around detection dogs and wildlife? Safety is top priority! Teaching the dog that the animal is there, they can acknowledge them, but not disturb them We don’t just want the dogs to bother wildlife, but we want them to be able to work around them as well It’s important for the handlers to be prepared for any and all hazards that you may come across Why is appropriate behavior around wildlife important? Safety for the dogs and wildlife Ensuring the job can get done and proper data can be collected To give clients confidence in the method and remain professional and ethical in the business How do you select a dog that would be able to learn these skills? Testing dogs natural instinct around other animals It takes a lot of work to teach a dog to not chase if they have the...
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Edwin, a conservation dog handler at Actions for Cheetahs in Kenya. Kayla spent 6 weeks with Edwin and Naomi helping move the program forward before Heather and Rachel (also from K9 Conservationists) arrived to spend about a month each with the program. Stay tuned for more updates! Links Mentioned in the Episode: Where to find ACK: Website | Facebook | Vaccination Facebook Page | Go Fund Me You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists Website | Merch | Support Our Work | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok
In this bonus episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Naomi, one of the conservation dog handlers at Actions for Cheetahs in Kenya that she spent 6 weeks with before Heather and Rachel arrived in Kenya.. Links Mentioned in the Episode: Where to find ACK: Website | Facebook | Vaccination Facebook Page | Go Fund Me You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists Website | Merch | Support Our Work | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Miriam Ritchie from the New Zealand Department of Conservation about leveraging your dog’s instincts to conduct a job. Science Highlight: Impact of weather conditions on cheetah monitoring with scat detection dogs Patreon Questions: Taylor: Are they hunting the rodents? Does that affect her selection? Taylor: How has the welcome been with this project? Megan: How do you introduce the rodents in training? Do you use wild caught, captive bred, or domestic animals in training? Links Mentioned in the Episode: The success of using trained dogs to locate sparse rodents in pest-free sanctuaries Where to find Miriam Ritchie: Instagram You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists Website | Merch | Support Our Work | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Ann McGloon from Seeking Scent about precision tracking and using hide placement to get the most learning application for your dogs. Science Highlight: Wildlife detection dog training: A case study on achieving generalization between target odor variations while retaining specificity All dogs know how to sniff. Do they all know how to problem-solve? A lot of dogs, especially pet dogs, have forgotten how to use their nose and their olfactory abilities Depends on the dog, but sometimes they need to be encouraged to problem solve. What concepts can we teach our detection dogs by using hide placement? Why would we want to use placement to teach these skills? Olfaction isn’t the only cue dogs are using to solve the problem. Location, location, location. Train the environment they are going to be searching. This will help create more efficient searches because you are giving them exposure to what they are going to be experiencing ...
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Arden from the New York New Jersey Trail Conference about her work helping build coalitions and use detection dogs to mitigate invasive insect and plant infestations. Science Highlight: Detection dogs in nature conservation: A database on their world-wide deployment with a review on breeds used and their performance compared to other methods Patreon Questions: Megan - How did you get land managers on board? Bronwen - What’s the best way to collect and store insect samples? Are there special considerations about decay? Megan - What unique challenges are there to working with insect targets for detection dogs? Ashley - Aside from identifying and removing invasives, what is NYNJTC doing to prevent their spread? Links Mentioned in the Episode: Insert the Doug video Where to find Arden: Website | Instagram You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists...
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Sarah Owings from Cyber Dog Online Training about clean mechanics for training and working with high drive dogs. Science Highlight: Detecting small and cryptic animals by combining thermography and a wildlife detection dog Why do mechanics matter? Clarity shapes all learning. The clearer you are with your dog, the more successful they will be. Before you blame the dog, be sure your mechanics are clean and communication is consistent and clear. What problems can poor mechanics cause? Dogs may steal food or toys from you, bark, whine, zoomie, etc. This is all from a lack of communication What are some human-end behaviors that can cause miscommunication? Lumping criteria (ie. jumping too many steps at once) Having no criteria/winging it Sessions that are too long Lack of reinforcement strategies What are some mechanics or exercises to improve handler to dog communication? Make sure the criteria is doable and raise the criteria s...
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Tony Harvey about intelligent disobedience. Review Highlight: JPinCB says “Kayla’s authentic, enthusiastic interest in all of her guests and topics, paired with her knowledge in a variety of scientific fields makes this podcast fun, interesting, and informative. If you have any interest in dogs, nature, travel, science, even pursuing your dreams, you will love this podcast.” What is intelligent disobedience? When the dog goes directly against the handler's cue in an effort to make the better or safer decision (ie. A guide dog not crossing the road when asked when there is a vehicle coming). How do you teach this? This is taught by training dogs different behaviors for different contingencies A high level of reinforcement is given for these behaviors How do you teach handlers to respond to this? Many sessions with and without the dog The handlers need to learn what each behavior feels like Patreon Questions: Are there speci...
In this episode of K9 Conservationists, Kayla speaks with Misa Winters and Tara Wilson about laboratory analysis of scat after field collection. Science Highlight: Duration of urination does not change with body size What can we learn from our scat samples? Genetic analysis (what species, what individual, what did it eat, sex typing) Morphological diet analysis (fur, bones, teeth, plants, insects) Microbiome (bacteria and immune system interaction) Parasites, pathogen analysis (bacteria and viral disease) Hormonal analysis (stress, pregnancy, nutrition, relative age) Age (isotope data) Hormones in particular are great from scat because it is more representative of an animal over time, versus a blood sample which is a smaller snapshot in time and could be skewed by the stress of capturing or darting an animal. What questions from samples are harder/easier to answer? Easier: Species ID from mitochondrial DNA (if you have good reference data) Prey analysis (if you have a targeted strategy - e.g. it’s hard to use a single genetic marker to analyze ALL prey but it depends on if you’re looking for mammals, birds, fish, etc.) Pregnancy (but actually need three assays estrogen, testosterone, and progesterone which can also point to a juvenile or adult). Stress - is it nutritional or environmental (T3 or cortisol) Harder: Individual capture-mark-recapture since it uses nuclear DNA and relies on a good resampling scheme. How many animals are on the landscape? Especially when using prey data, you have to make a lot of assumptions about how many predators can eat from the same prey species. We also know that DNA from prey is not equally represented after digestion, it will depend on the tissue ingested too. Where to find Misa Winters: Website | Instagram | Lab Instagram Where to find Tara Wilson: Instagram You can support the K9 Conservationists Podcast by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/k9conservationists. K9 Conservationists Website | Merch | Support Our Work | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok