Where Que took broad steps, Epic is surveying the scents under the shelter inch by inch, searching for a whiff of egg mass. Epic's nose doesn't seem to leave the ground as he checks every nook and cranny near a handrail. He gets worried if he doesn’t succeed right away.Įpic leaps from his crate ready for his turn, and takes his time, combing the shelter more thoroughly. While Que is confident, Bontrager said Epic is younger and a little more uncertain. “Yes! Good job!" Bontrager said before returning him to his crate. He yips excitedly at the smell until zeroing in on the spot and paws the scent tube. In less than a minute, Que catches the odor. “When the harness goes on," Bontrager said before leading Que into the shelter, "the dogs know it’s time to work.” The longer time periods result in the more pungent tube, which are more easily discovered.īontrager will set the tubes out and train the dogs one at a time for short, 10– to 15-minute sessions.Īt Happy Hollow Park on a recent morning, Que is the first to try to find three tubes spread out under a shelter housing picnic tables.īontrager puts on Que’s working harness, offers a separate tube so Que knows what to smell for and gives him his treats. The exposure times range from 12 to 48 hours. ![]() Que and Epic now train on tubes that have been stored with live egg masses. It was a breakthrough, and Bontrager found a biology professor, Collin Hobbs at Huntington University, who was willing to help. This is when she discovered Getxent, a type of plastic tube that absorbs and hold odors for about six months. ![]() It turns out, there is even a difference in the scents of a frozen egg mass and a live mass in nature. “I was just not figuring out why they couldn’t figure it out in the field,” Bontrager said. That person put her in touch with someone in New York working on the same invasive insect problem. The problem stumped Bontrager until she reached out to a conservation dog trainer in North Carolina. Que and Epic showed real progress training with these but started to struggle in the field as they transitioned from trying to find the frozen samples to the actual masses in the wild. The lab could put the eggs into a freezer that reached -80 Celsius and would keep them there for 96 hours. She obtained eggs that had not hatched, but because those cannot be taken outside, she had to kill off the eggs with the help from a lab in Purdue University. Initially, they used egg masses that had already hatched, but Bontrager soon learned those have a different odor than live egg masses. The odor from insects is not perceptible to humans, so she started by making sure Que and Epic knew how to search for odors, then moved on to the scent of the plant hopper's egg mass. ![]() The scent is paired with food so it becomes a habit: when they find it in the field, they’re rewarded with a treat and praise.įor Bontrager, the process started with a lot of learning on the fly. How are the dogs trained?īontrager began training Que and Epic last year. Bontrager set up crates and fans in her vehicle and will stop at parks to train when she’s done with her nursery inspections for the day. “Now my dogs get to go to work with me all the time,” Bontrager said. For Bontrager and her dogs, the new endeavor is a win-win project. Other states have purchased conservation canines trained for this work, but there are constraints on state-owned dogs, such as how they’re kenneled. “I asked if they mind if I try and train my dogs to do this." “That really caught my attention because this is the newest upcoming threat and I thought we’re probably going to see it here,” Bontrager said. Her unique action was inspired by a video of a similar approach in Pennsylvania, where the species is more prolific. So it was only logical that she decided to combine her skills to help fight against the pest. Invasive species: 10 to watch out for across Indiana When she's not working for the state, the La Porte woman's trains and shows dogs. She spends her days traveling to big-box garden centers and small nurseries to make sure there are no invasive insects or diseases on plants being sold to customers. Que and his brother, Epic, 5, are participants in an innovative new approach to eradicating the pest first found in Indiana in 2021.īontrager is a nursery inspector with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources.
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