In this 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 expectations/goals around detection dogs and wildlife? Safety is top priority! Teaching the dog that the animal is there, they …
Canine Ergonomics 1 & 2 (Patreon Book Club Notes)
As part of our monthly Patreon Benefits, we have a book club. For the next few months (summer to fall 2022), we’re reading Canine Ergonomics by William Helton. These rough notes are for chapters 1 and 2 of the book and include heavy quotes of notable passages from the book. …
Laughing and Learning with Naomi Kung’u from Action for Cheetahs in Kenya
Kayla sits down 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. Naomi talks about her hopes as a female K9 handler, how the dogs are helping her learn to be more …
Leveraging Terrier Instincts with Miriam Ritchie
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 …
Hide Placements for Training Success with SAR Handler Ann McGloon
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 …
Collaboration, Invasive Plants, and Insects with Arden from New York New Jersey Trail Conference
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 …
Clean Training for High Drive Dogs with Sarah Owings
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. …
Poop is Brown Gold: Genetic Analysis with Tara Wilson and Misa Winters
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 …
Intelligent Disobedience and Cue Hierarchies with Tony Harvey
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 …
Things to Consider When Starting a Conservation Detection Dog Program
If you’ve used conservation detection dogs in the past or are considering them for future projects, you may wonder whether it’s better to just get a dog yourself versus hiring an expensive outsourced team. There are a lot of factors to consider when starting a conservation detection dog program from …