Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
While he was developing his independence, I was starting to appreciate that a dog who
uses his teeth to pull Mason jars out of buckets in search of scent wasn't a bad dog. He was
just a jackass.
Marcia Koenig, whose German shepherd cadaver dog, Coyote, found dozens of people,
still remembers the embarrassment of her trickster dog, born on April Fools' Day, taking the
test that FEMA requires for agility and obedience. The little sable shepherd, bored, grabbed
the traffic cones set up for her exam and ran away with them. She flunked. Marcia sighed and
started back to the laborious task of training her to obey.
Nine days after that, Coyote found the disarticulated bones of a homicide victim. That
was her first find but far from her last.
One day, less than two months after Nancy had started Solo and me with our clumsy
bucket dance, it happened. Solo channeled his energy. A bit of form emerged from chaos.
I e-mailed Joan, elated: “He was literally running right past the hidden Mason jar with the
cheesecloth lid. Scent was seeping slowly through the top. He screeched to a halt from a dead
run, his tail went up, he froze, and he turned. It was lovely—it was so clear that his nose said
to him, 'that's the smell!' and that his nose stopped him even when his feet wanted to keep
going.”
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