Tiffany Revelle
Staff Writer
LAKE COUNTY ? Dogs aren”t just man”s best friend. They”re about to be a huge help to California”s wildlife and habitat, as well.
Heading up the push for a K-9 program for the California Department of Fish and Game is local warden Lynette Shimek, who is leading the effort as K-9 Program Coordinator for all of California. She covers the Northshore in Lake County as a game warden, and for the next year or so she will coordinate the program”s revival in Sacramento.
Shimek expects the DFG”s K-9 component will be top-notch, with its cutting-edge approach to preventing the spread of quagga mussels to California”s waterways, among other things. She is spearheading the department”s development of the program as its K-9 Program Coordinator for all of California.
DFG aims to have 24 dogs statewide within the next 12 to 18 months, said Shimek, all of them trained to aid the peace officers charged with protecting one of California”s most valuable assets.
“California”s wildlife and habitat is under attack,” said Shimek in a recent interview with the Record-Bee. “The introduction of invasive species, environmental degradation and poaching all contribute to its demise. To compound the problem, the international black-market preys on California”s wildlife with illegal sales of wildlife and wildlife parts estimated at $100 million a year, second only to the illegal drug trade.”
So where do dogs come in? Very handy, apparently.
Dogs have scenting capabilities possibly up to a million times stronger than a human”s, according to the DFG, enabling them to find things a warden might overlook. “For instance, a dog can locate a bear gall bladder hidden in a hub cap, an expended rifle cartridge casing on a wooded hillside, or a quagga mussel on the intake of a boat motor,” said Shimek.
All 24 dogs planned for the state will be trained to detect the invasive mussel, which invaded the Great Lakes via ocean going boats” ballast water, and has since spread as far west as Lake Havasu on the California-Nevada border.
Spokesman Bob Muir said the aqueduct was shut down July 20 for 10 days to dry out and eradicate quagga larvae found in the first 21 miles of its system.
“The quagga absolutely scares the heck out of me,” said Shimek. And rightly so. Just to maintain the tiny, prolific mussel”s population in the Great Lakes is costing in the billions of dollars.
California DFG”s use of K-9 units to sniff out the mussels is cutting-edge, said Shimek. She believes California will be the first state to use dogs to detect them.
And she should know. She”s contacted every state in the U.S. to find out which had K-9 programs and how they worked in order to develop one for her home state.
But the goods don”t come without a price. Shimek said she”s put in applications for three separate grants to fund the K-9 program for DFG. Two of them are from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, totalling $227,000.
A detection dog costs approximately $6,500 and must undergo four weeks of training with its new handler. Dual-purpose dogs, which also protect the handler and aid in apprehension, cost $9,500 and go through six weeks of extensive academy training. The dogs must also continue to receive an additional 16 ? 24 hours of training per month.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com.
