# The Bloodhound Nose....



## RandomElk16 (Sep 17, 2013)

I don't have hounds or know tons about them, so please correct me if this is wrong. I saw a little snippit today that I thought was pretty cool:

_"Bloodhounds smell odor through separation. To us a pot of stew smells like a pot of stew, but to them they smell Beef, Potatoes, Carrots and everything else separately. Its called Odor Layering and it gives them the ability to focus on one scent and follow only it. Much like a Wolf does in hunting for his food."_

Seeing this caused me to look into it more. Another snippit I found on the issue:

_"Odor sort of hoovers like fine baby powder then settles to the ground. Many things can interfere with a dogs ability to find odor. Ultraviolet rays and wind can break down an odor.

So doesn't it seem almost impossible for a dog to pick up on an odor that is days, or weeks old? Does to me, but they do. And some blood Hounds have actually been known to track the odor of a human down the road and down the interstate for miles and miles."_

Also here is a link to a small part of Mythbusters episode on bloodhounds:

http://videos.howstuffworks.com/discovery/30328-mythbusters-bloodhound-and-scent-video.htm

There are a few cool ones on there about both hounds and guard dogs. They say dogs can smell about 1000x better than humans.

Anyways, I never bounced around Google so much on the subject but today was pretty interested in it. Very cool to learn about our best friend. Please correct any of this or add anything else that we may find interesting!


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## Fowlmouth (Oct 4, 2008)

Cool!8) I have never thought about odor separation like that before, it makes sense though. The areas I duck hunt are so thick with phragmites a person can barely walk through them, I know I wouldn't be able to find hardly any of the birds I shoot without my dog. It amazes me every time he comes out of that thick crap holding the duck in his mouth. I use my dog for waterfowl hunting almost exclusively, with an occasional pheasant or chukar hunt. He does okay at finding pheasants, but Chukars not so much. My buddies setter will be on point and my dog doesn't seem to have a clue there are chukars anywhere near him, until they fly of course. You would think he could smell them too. I am thinking maybe this is where the odor separation comes into play and he ignores certain scents and is probably focusing on what he knows, ducks.


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## houndsnhorses (Jul 14, 2014)

I am not sure about the scent layering...I don't know how anyone would ever prove the way a dog processes smells lol. As far as the UV rays and wind etc I can add some input there. I run hounds on bear, lion, bobcat, ****, and even run a couple curs as coyote "tolling" dogs. The hotter it is and the more direct sunlight a track gets the quicker the scent goes away. A lot of times you will see a dog following a trail with little effort through shady areas, and then when that same trail goes out into the sun they have great difficulty trailing it at all. In the summer most bear hunters pull their dogs in as soon as it gets really hot unless they are already running a fresh track. Part of this is to save dogs from heat stroke but a lot of it is because they have a much harder time lining out a trail in the heat. I think the UV rays themselves may have some to do with it, but more than that I believe the heat caused by direct sunlight more or less evaporates the scent. Wind plays a role because a dog that is running a strong scent trail will often pick up their heads and follow the scent in the air...you can see how the wind could screw that up in a hurry. The wind gets to swirling and so does the scent. Plus it is blowing other scents in on top of the scent they are supposed to be tracking. It takes a patient dog to work out tracks in the wind. Ground type also play a large role in scent. The best scent trails are in the snow because the snow holds the scent. Mud generally is nothing but trouble when trying to track and if it rains on top of the tracks you can pretty much forget it unless the trail is pretty dang fresh. As far as the bloodhounds though it may be some different. A bloodhound has a much colder nose than most hunting hounds (meaning they can smell better). They aren't used as much for hunting dogs because they are not generally as fast and have a harder time keeping up to fast moving game like bears and cats.


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## USMARINEhuntinfool (Sep 15, 2007)

We learn/teach about this in K9 training. Its the olfactory system (system that smells). A human has about 2 square inches of olfactory, where as a long snouted dog (blood hound, shepherd, malinois, all of your bird dog breeds) have in the area of 10 x's that. Your olfactory consists of the nostrils and the roof of the mouth. The ability of the dogs to separate odors is the reason that we are able to train detector dogs for specific use i.e. Narcotics, Explosives, Cadaver, Arson, etc. To certify we have to demonstrate that the dog is able to decipher the specific odor and nothing else. We teach them to decipher the odor and then display a positive final indication, essentially the same thing a pointing breed is taught to do. Dogs noses are insanely accurate. In blind tests conducted between a dog and the best man made reproduction (airport mechanical sniffers) the dog wins out every time. My dog is an explosives dog and can decipher approximately 32 different odors.


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## massmanute (Apr 23, 2012)

I think there might be some truth to the odor layering theory. As I recall, I once read about at least one case where the scent article for a bloodhound search consisted of ground beef that had been touched by the person being sought, and the dog succeeded in the search. Other cases are well documented where bloodhounds have been able to follow the trail of a specific individual in an area that was heavily crisscrossed by the paths of a large number of other people.

We used to own a bloodhound, and watching them put their nose to the ground and smell what is there is really quite amazing. They don't just put their nose down and sniff, but they have a whole repertoire of kinds of sniffs they use. It's kind of hard to describe in words, but it is a beautiful thing to watch, and once they get on a trail there is almost nothing that can stop them in their determination to follow it.


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## massmanute (Apr 23, 2012)

Regarding cold-nosed dogs, I am not a hunter with hounds, but it is my understanding that most houndsmen don't want a dog that is too cold-nosed lest the dog follow trails that are too old to be useful for hunting purposes.

Experienced houndsmen, please correct me if I am wrong.


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## massmanute (Apr 23, 2012)

One other interesting thing about trailing with bloodhounds. The hound does not necessarily follow exactly the footsteps of the person being sought. Experienced handlers relate that sometimes the scent will drift to the side, e.g. if a breeze is present, and settle some distance away from the actual footsteps of the person being sought.


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## Kevin D (Sep 15, 2007)

massmanute said:


> Regarding cold-nosed dogs, I am not a hunter with hounds, but it is my understanding that most houndsmen don't want a dog that is too cold-nosed lest the dog follow trails that are too old to be useful for hunting purposes.
> 
> Experienced houndsmen, please correct me if I am wrong.


You are correct, there is such a thing as an "over-nosed" dog. I have always maintained that overall, a hotter nosed dog will catch you more game than a cold nosed dog. There are several reasons for this but one is that a cold track is going to have more exposure to scent killing elements as houndsnhorses explained and is thus more likely to dead end.

The speed in which a dog can move a track is paramount among hunting hounds. My experience with bloodhounds is that they are track stradlers, meaning that they have to stick their nose in every foot print to move a track which is a slow process. With bear and bobcat dogs in particular, a hound needs to be able to run a track with it's head up to stay with a jumped bear or bobcat trying to outrun the dogs.

I hunted with another houndsman who used to run a bloodhound in his pack. It did fine working out a cold track but as soon as the bear or cat was jumped it quickly fell behind, often not even making it to the tree. Hot nosed dogs seem to be more able to drift a track and keep up with long running game.....a trait bloodhounds were never really bred to do.


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## Mr Muleskinner (Feb 14, 2012)

odor molecules are physical in nature and have their own mass. Each different odor has a different molecular composition. Odor layering is real because odors are different on a molecular level. Comparing odor molecules is literally like comparing apples to oranges.


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## RandomElk16 (Sep 17, 2013)

USMARINEhuntinfool said:


> We learn/teach about this in K9 training. Its the olfactory system (system that smells). A human has about 2 square inches of olfactory, where as a long snouted dog (blood hound, shepherd, malinois, all of your bird dog breeds) have in the area of 10 x's that. Your olfactory consists of the nostrils and the roof of the mouth. The ability of the dogs to separate odors is the reason that we are able to train detector dogs for specific use i.e. Narcotics, Explosives, Cadaver, Arson, etc. To certify we have to demonstrate that the dog is able to decipher the specific odor and nothing else. We teach them to decipher the odor and then display a positive final indication, essentially the same thing a pointing breed is taught to do. Dogs noses are insanely accurate. In blind tests conducted between a dog and the best man made reproduction (airport mechanical sniffers) the dog wins out every time. My dog is an explosives dog and can decipher approximately 32 different odors.


That is awesome! I watch a lot of cop/border patrol shows mainly for the dogs. When a scene has a dog I get excited because they are remarkable at what they do. I watched border patrol the other day and they had wrapped kilo's up in all types of oil to hide the scent. Didn't work for even a second.

And I like how fast a criminal goes from uncooperative to I am so sorry please remove your dog from my ***.


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## ram2h2o (Sep 11, 2007)

I was fortunate enough to have two bloodhounds that were trained for tracking. It is amazing what they can do. Had a demo in HS football stadium once. Had person walk down onto field before game and then go up into stands on opposite side before game started. At half time, I gave Max a shirt that the person had worn to scent and gave him command find it. He went down around field and up into stands and stopped at the correct person and began to bay tree'd. True that they don't follow track but follow the scent from the person being tracked. It is said that the long ears on Bloodhounds wave the air around and makes it easier for them to pick up scent.


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## USMARINEhuntinfool (Sep 15, 2007)

It's pretty spectacular what you can train them to do. We train our patrol dogs (apprehension) to track as part of their training and certification. These dogs are trained to track based on ground disturbance and the presence of human odor, not discriminate to one individual. Hounds that are trained for police/SAR work are trained to trail discriminate odor, which is where they are provided an odor item such as the shirt discussed above. When they trail they generally will not go step to step, they are tracking the odor which will move off the actual track based on the wind at the time. Where as the others combine ground disturbance and human odor, a really good one, like my former dog, will track step to step quite phenomenally. The majority of people give up when the dog shows up. I can not tell you how many times I have shown up to the scene of a non-compliant/fleeing suspect with the dog and gained immediate compliance, my current dog looks really mean. K9 work is a lot of fun.


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