In Kenya, anti-poaching dogs are wildlife's best friends

[TomSea]

In Kenya, anti-poaching dogs are wildlife's best friends

Five-month-old bloodhound Shakaria gambols through the long savannah grasses of Kenya's Maasai Mara reserve, her playful mood swiftly turning to keen determination as she is ordered to track a human scent.

Straining at the leash, she pulls her handler along an invisible scent path laid down for her until she finds a ranger hiding in the grass, pretending to be one of the poachers she is training to sniff out.

Shakaria is top of her class of five puppies being trained by American experts to join a tracker dog unit, which has become pivotal in the fight against poaching in the Mara Triangle, part of the vast Maasai Mara ecosystem in southern Kenya that merges into Tanzania's Serengeti.

Read more at: http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/world/in-kenya-anti-poaching-dogs-are-wildlife-s-best-friends/article/515260