What the Dog Knows: scent, science, and the amazing ways dogs perceive the world
As seen:
By Cat Warren (Professor)
avg rating
1 review
A World Book Night book.
A New York Times–bestselling book about the extraordinary abilities of man’s best friend.
When Cat Warren adopted Solo, an unruly German shepherd puppy, she soon
began to wonder what she’d let herself in for. Solo’s boundless energy
was what made him loveable — but it also made him exhausting, and
difficult to train. Then she struck upon an idea: what Solo needed was
something to do.
Like many dogs, Solo was destined to work: using his nose to help the
police locate missing people. In this lively, accessible book, Warren
details Solo’s journey from troublesome pup to expert cadaver dog, and
explores the fascinating hidden world of animals that do essential work
and the handlers who train them.
Resources for this book
Reviews
'What the Dog Knows' comes from the Popular Science/Animal Behaviour category and follows the early years of Solo, a lively and boisterous German Shepherd puppy, who was trained to find dead bodies (cadavers).
Set in and around Durham, North Carolina, USA (slightly spooky as our Book Group is located in Durham, England) the story begins with Cat, Solo's owner, delving into the recent history of 'body dogs' and the difficulties of training animals to sniff out dead bodies.
Cat gradually comes to trust Solo's natural instincts and relates examples of his successes and the pair's work with Police Departments and individuals.
The book group reviewed this novel after receiving copies from Scribe Publications (via RGFE). Firstly...this story is about a German Shepherd, so why a picture of a Labrador on the cover? Does a Labrador appeal more to British readers - we noted that original (USA) copies of the book use a picture of Solo.
Some members found the book a difficult read and struggled to engage with both the writing and content (being averse to reading about dead bodies in various forms). The book refers to a lot of academic research and whilst relevant and interesting it does make the book more hard going than just concentrating on Solo's story.
However, some book group members found the scientific aspects of difficulties with dead bodies fascinating. We discovered the problems with trying to isolate the smell emanating from dead bodies, and that 'body dogs' are few and far between and only in use within the past twenty or thirty years (much is to do with expense of training and lack of need).
The discussion we had also covered the parallels between animal and human behaviour and whether we could see how some animal training linked to parental expectations and children's behaviour.
Our rating: Wow, this book really split the book group. Some members disliked it so much they gave up on it fairly quickly and so scored it 0 out of 5 (and one 1/5). Those who stuck with it scored it more highly with 3 out of 5.
