Sniffer Dogs: How Dogs (and Their Noses) Save the World

People casually speak about dogs being man’s best friend, but in fact there is a great deal of truth to that little phrase. Author Nancy Castaldo has written a wonderful middle-grade book that takes a close look at dogs and all they do for people. Young people will find this a fascinating overview of the many ways dogs help us. What makes dogs so special?

As Castaldo explains in her book, one of the ways dogs are special is they smell the way people hear – everything that is there. Dogs’ noses have 300 million sensory neurons while humans have only 6 million. And dogs are smart. They can be trained to use their sniffers for many important duties. Some find living people buried in disaster areas such as building collapses or after storms. Some find corpses. Some are trained to find explosives or drugs or accelerants in arson fire sites. Others work with scientists tracking wildlife while some are trained in medical applications such as recognizing dangerous blood sugar levels in diabetics. Castaldo’s excellent research and lively writing along with great dog photos make this a book kids will love, and they won’t even suspect they are learning.