Dog used to sniff out endangered fungi for conservation purposes

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Daisy the Italian Water Dog has spent years honing her sense of smell to sniff out a rare fungus. As the fungi teeters on the edge of extinction, scientists hope Daisy and her nose will help save the species before it's lost.

Transcript

00:00 Here at Healesville Sanctuary, Daisy the Italian water dog is the only canine in the world

00:06 who can sniff out fungi for conservation purposes.

00:09 Daisy has spent years developing her sense of smell to detect the tiny and critically

00:13 endangered tea tree finger fungus.

00:16 In the forest next to the sanctuary, Daisy has honed her skills wearing a working jacket

00:20 and GPS collar.

00:22 Her handler Nick Rudder says their close bond makes Daisy more productive.

00:26 It's really helpful that we have that unspoken, non-verbal connection that I can kind of see

00:31 what she's thinking at any given time and she can read me really well.

00:34 We can move through the environment in a really delicate way and we can continue to look for

00:40 this species for a long time even if we're not finding many.

00:44 Although Daisy is the only canine capable of finding the elusive fungus, other dogs

00:48 in her training program can find platypus, frogs and native rats.

00:52 The tea tree finger fungus is only found in six locations in Victoria and is a good barometer

00:57 for how healthy an ecosystem is.

00:59 Before Daisy started finding the fungus, it required painstaking surveying by people who'd

01:04 examine the tree branches.

01:06 An experiment found that Daisy, competing against a human surveyor, could find more

01:10 fungus, could find it faster and was less likely to miss it.

01:13 Now researchers are saying that collaboration between canines and humans yields the best

01:18 results.

01:18 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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