Reddit mentions of Search and Rescue Dogs: Training the K-9 Hero

Adding on to /u/quincyskis here. Check with your local area about how search and rescue works. I'm out in Washington state and we're almost completely volunteer force. We have a k9 handler crew as well that helps look for lost hikers, evidence and the odor of human decomposition. It's amazing when the weather gets warm how many people end up off trail. Anyway check with your local area or pick up some books like this. I'm currently spending the year learning how to train a dog before I get one.

I bet it meant certified. With NSDA you can certify as early as one year of age. People start training puppies the day they take them home.

A couple of books with basics:

Ready! by Susan Bulanda

Search and Rescue Dogs, ARDA

Certainly! I would be happy to answer any questions you have, just send me a PM. I'm not an expert but I would be happy to give you perspective from the real world side of things.

Here is a study you can read that goes over a lot of what I just said. They included smooshy faces too so you can read about how they performed compared to their normal-nosed counterparts if you're interested!

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4859551/

This is by far the best book I have, but it's expensive but it's an actual textbook. It goes over so so much, including the anatomy of dog noses and scent theory and positive training (they even included some writings by Karen Pryor). Fair warning, there are some chapters in there about how humans decompose so if you're squeamish you may want to skip some chapters. It's all very honest but kind of gross if you find those things off-putting.

https://www.amazon.com/Cadaver-Dog-Handbook-Forensic-Training/dp/0849318866

These two books are honestly very much the same. It's not worth it to buy both, just whichever one happens to be cheaper for you. They are very good though! They don't focus so much on scent theory but they are crammed with lots of training instructions and scent games.

https://www.amazon.com/Ready-Training-Search-Rescue-Dog/dp/1621871045/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1484358751&sr=1-1&keywords=Ready%21+Training+the
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https://www.amazon.com/Search-Rescue-Dogs-Training-Hero/dp/0764567039/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=FB2KGHQEPVR4BPM91YPQ

This one is more of just a fun read but I really love it. It is about the author and her cadaver sniffing german shepherd and all the cool things they have done. She is very good about sprinkling cool facts all throughout the book. If you ever want a good book to just read, this one is awesome.

https://www.amazon.com/What-Dog-Knows-Science-Perceive/dp/1451667329/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1484358909&sr=1-1&keywords=what+the+dog+knows