SMELL — FIELDWORK AND EXPERIMENTS IO5 



Since we are dealing with dogs, it is as well to continue 

 with them here before going on to the uses of scent and 

 smell in other mammals. 



Sporting dogs — retrievers, spaniels, terriers, pointers and 

 setters — all have, or should have, keen noses which are used 

 in various ways in field sports. Retrievers, as their name 

 implies, are used for finding and bringing to hand shot game 

 and, more important still, to trace and bring back a bird 

 which may have been wounded and incapable of flight. 

 Spaniels are double-purpose dogs and have to flush (put up) 

 game and then, having done so, remain steady until the 

 bird or hare has been killed, when it must locate and retrieve 

 it successfully. Pointers and setters are both used for the 

 same purpose, which is to work up wind and "point" when 

 a bird has been scented. To do this, they must not only 

 have fine noses but they, too, when in training, must be 

 broken from hares and rabbits and so ignore them and their 

 scent. Terriers are used for a variety of purposes, but hunt 

 terriers, which are put into the earths of foxes with the 

 object of bolting a fox which has gone to ground, must be 

 good at scenting, since foxes will, if they can get down the 

 holes and tunnels, go to ground in rabbit warrens or even 

 in drains, and some of the latter may have branching pipes. 

 In such cases, the nose of the dog must be good, and it must 

 be able to tell the terrier as quickly as possible just where 

 the fox is lying up. 



We cannot leave sporting dogs without referring to the 

 subject of game birds which are sitting on eggs and which 

 are often said to be able to "shut off" their scent, so to speak, 

 in order to protect their eggs. Most country people who own 

 a gun-dog will have had the experience of being out with 

 their dog during the nesting season and of seeing their dog 

 walk right by a sitting pheasant or partridge of which the 

 dog takes no notice. 



This is unlikely to be because the bird has some method 

 of retaining scent, it is much more likely that her body scent 

 is there all right, but sitting close and still as she does when 

 incubating, her scent is not diffused by any movements of 

 body or plumage. 



Much more could be written about sporting dogs and 



