What Qualities make a great Detection Dog?

David October 18, 2018 80 Comments

Question: What Qualities make a great Detection Dog?

Answer: Search trainers and training directors acknowledge that there are a number factors they consider
when screening canine candidates. They look at such things as a canine’s fitness, sociability, size, and
trainability. These are very important factors with regard to determining a canine’s suitability for entering
search work. As important as these factors are, however, there are two that must be stringently evaluated:
a) a canine candidate’s drives, and b) a canine’s nerve strength. It is these authors’s assertion that without
the proper combination of drives and nerve strength a canine candidate will not be successful in search
work, regardless of their performance in other screening instruments.

An in-depth screening instrument can be found here:

https://k9-trader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Brownell-Marsolais-dog_sreening.pdf