-- Sydney Morning Herald
WILBER the border collie doesn't know he has a dangerous job; for him it's all a game. Finding the hidden bombs he's trained to sniff out of the ground means only one thing: tennis balls.
An army explosive detection dog, Wilber has been deployed to Afghanistan and his reward for finding something is playing with a tennis ball.
His handler, Lance-Corporal Nathan Cooper, says the selection criteria for a bomb-dog is based around their retrieval drive.
"They think it's a game, they're looking for a ball, and once they smell that explosive they'll respond to that, they'll sit and the ball will come from somewhere. Out of nowhere, they think the whole world is full of tennis balls potentially," Corporal Cooper says.
They also can't be gun shy.
Read more .... Barking mad: bomb-dogs have a ball sniffing out trouble for troops
My Comment: Truly a soldier`s best friend.
WILBER the border collie doesn't know he has a dangerous job; for him it's all a game. Finding the hidden bombs he's trained to sniff out of the ground means only one thing: tennis balls.
An army explosive detection dog, Wilber has been deployed to Afghanistan and his reward for finding something is playing with a tennis ball.
His handler, Lance-Corporal Nathan Cooper, says the selection criteria for a bomb-dog is based around their retrieval drive.
"They think it's a game, they're looking for a ball, and once they smell that explosive they'll respond to that, they'll sit and the ball will come from somewhere. Out of nowhere, they think the whole world is full of tennis balls potentially," Corporal Cooper says.
They also can't be gun shy.
Read more .... Barking mad: bomb-dogs have a ball sniffing out trouble for troops
My Comment: Truly a soldier`s best friend.
