Detection dog

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A detection dog getting ready to search a car for explosives.

A detection dog is a dog that is trained to and works at using its senses (almost always the sense of smell) to detect substances such as explosives or illegal drugs. They are often known as sniffer dogs. Hunting dogs that search for game and search dogs that search for missing humans are generally not considered detection dogs. There is some overlap in cases like cadaver dogs that detect human remains.

Detection dog at the Canadian/American border

Detection dogs have been trained to search for many substances including the following:

Agricultural produce
Crime Evidence
Cancer^[1]

Drugs
Explosives
Human remains
Mold
Termites

One notable quality of detection dogs is that they are able to discern individual scents even when the scents are combined or masked by other odors. In one case at an Australian prison, a detection dog foiled an attempt to smuggle drugs that had been hidden in a woman's bra and smeared with coffee, pepper and Vicks vapo-rub.^[2]

Some of these functions can be carried out by trained pigs, which also have an excellent sense of smell, and have been used to hunt truffles, underground fungi, for centuries.