Canine chasers may save airplanes from birds

By LIAT COLLINS

Every dog has its day job. That could be the motto of a conference held at Tel Aviv University yesterday on the use of dogs to help man.

Apart from the conventional rescue dogs, guide dogs, and dogs used in therapy, canines are now being used in a new field: chasing birds away from airports.

According to Yossi Leshem, head of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel's International Ornithology Center at Latrun, the Israel Air Force is interested in immediately using the new method to help prevent air accidents caused by birds that crash into planes or get sucked into jet engines.

The IAF invited Dr. Nicholas Carter, a US zoologist, who helped develop the new line of work for dogs, to help establish it here.

Carter told the conference of his experience with Border Collies at several North American airports, saying there are many advantages to using dogs for this type of work.

"They are under control of a dog handler at all times. He controls them by whistling like the way farmers control sheepdogs. They have to learn where they can go and where not, and the handler is in touch with the control tower to make sure that the dog doesn't scare a flock right into the path of a plane. They are relatively inexpensive and can work in most circumstances and temperatures."

Another commonly employed method to scare off birds is to sound cannons or firecrackers, but according Carter, the birds quickly get used to the noise and stop responding.

"After a day or two, they stop thinking that there is a threat. With the dogs, on the other hand, there is always a threat for the birds. It's not something they can get used to. It's like having a wolf around."

Border collies have been found ideal for the task, Carter said, "because they're workaholics. When other dogs would quit, the Border collies just go on working.

"They've been bred for it for years. Also, since they have been bred to herd animals, they have also been bred not to kill."

The bird-chasing dogs were first used in similar work at golf courses five years ago, said Carter.

They have been used at airports for a year. "We have one dog at [a] Florida airport who has been so effective he has worked himself out of a job. Within two months, basically there were no more birds left to chase."

Leshem, who is working with the IAF to find solutions to the problems of birds who live alongside airports, said: "Crashes between planes and birds are one of the biggest risks to flights around airports."