The Search & Rescue Dogs of England's Lake District

In the boulder covered slopes of England's Lake District, a body lies under a giant rock. The rock is as big as a lorry, and leans outward, giving the body some shelter against the cold, wet wind blowing up the narrow cleft. The rock shelter also hides the body from view and blocks its scent from blowing down the valley, towards the search & rescue dogs looking for it. Suddenly, a slender border collie named Mist dashes past the rock, then pauses; she has caught the scent of a human. Within seconds, the dog is sniffing the body, pawing it gently, probing under its tightly curled arms, and finding — a squeaky toy. The body sits up, and they both play the game of Fetch the Squeaky Toy.

Mist's handler, Mick Guy, says "She thinks all strangers carry squeaky toys."

It's a serious game. Mist, an experienced mountain search dog with three "finds" to her credit, is keeping her skills honed, while others in the group are still training to qualify for one of the most difficult and demanding jobs a dog can have. A mountain search dog, and its handler, must go through at least two years of intensive training, one night a week plus one weekend a month, then must pass a grueling eight day assessment, in order to become "graded" — qualified to be sent on actual rescues. Bad weather is no excuse. To the contrary, trainers must seek out the worst weather and most difficult terrain, as this is what they will experience in real rescues. Midges and ticks, thick fog, high wind, deep snow, and polished ice — these are the conditions of a real rescue. People don't get in trouble on lovely spring afternoons.

England's Lake District (or "Lakeland") encompasses a quarter million hectares of rugged mountains in England's extreme northwest. Heavily glaciated in times past, its bare, rocky ridges separate wide, flat-bottomed valleys with large natural lakes. The highest mountains, reaching 900 meters, are treeless and covered with loose rocks and boulders; most mountains have huge cliffs on two sides, but also have a ridgeline that can be walked with no special equipment. Because of its beauty, and the easy access along its mountain ridges, Lakeland has been one of Britain's most popular tourist spots for nearly two centuries, and receives around 14 million visitors a year.

This causes problems. A tourist parks his car in a valley on a pleasant summer day, looks up at the cliffs above him, and says to himself, "I could walk up to the top of those cliffs on a footpath." He doesn't realize that those mountains are five times as likely to have rain, and twenty times as likely to have gale force winds, than the valley in which he stands. He doesn't realize that a thick, wet fog can envelop the mountain top at any time. So he starts walking, wearing only his tennis shoes, shorts, and tee shirt, carrying no map or compass or water. This happens several times a month, every month of the year. People get lost and call for help on their mobile phones, or end up benighted on a rainy mountain top in a high wind; or wander off a cliff in a thick fog. The Lake District has thirteen mountain rescue teams, and seven of these sponsor rescue dogs.

When called out on a rescue, the dog team (consisting of the rescue dog and its human handler) will typically work a specified area very quickly and thoroughly. The rescue dog searches for airborne scents rather than ground scents, so the handler must guide the dog to take advantage of the wind. The dog will follow the scent as it floats through the air — a difficult feat, as the faint scent will eddy and swirl, forming weak spots and strong pockets. When the dog finds a person, it will "indicate" by barking loudly. In all of this, the dog acts with minimal human guidance; the dog is in charge, and the human is along to help. That's what makes the Rescue Game so fun.

A new pup starts to learn the Rescue Game in the family garden, finding family members who have hidden. The pup is encouraged to bark when it finds a human, and trained to associate finding with barking. This "find sequence" is slowly extended as the training moves into the field, so that the finding becomes more challenging and the indicating more sophisticated and purposeful. The handler must be trained as well: how to read the wind, how to gently guide the dog in the right direction, and — most important — how to trust the dog when it indicates, or when it makes it clear that no one is in the area.

During this training, the dog searches for volunteers who imitate unconscious or dead people, and so are called "bodies", and sometimes "dogsbodies" — a pun on the British Naval slang term, "dogsbody", meaning someone assigned to do boring and disagreeable work. "Boring" and "disagreeable" certainly apply; the body must lie still, in the most difficult terrain and weather imaginable, for periods of up to six hours while the dogs do their search. A dogsbody is, however, no mere inert target. How a body reacts to being found is a crucial part of the training, and carefully monitored. For the dog is not really searching for the dogsbody at all - it is searching for the squeaky toy (or, sometimes, a bit of food) that the body has concealed! When found, the body must hide the toy to bring out the proper "indicating" bark, then reward the dog with the correct amount of play.

All of this — the weekly training, the midnight callouts, the foul weather and dangerous locations — take their toll on the handlers and their dogs. A good find makes it all worthwhile. Mick Guy told me of Mist's most recent find. "This man had gone deep into the woods to commit suicide. He had cut his wrists with his knife, then thought better of it and tried to crawl back to his car. He collapsed after a short distance." Mist and Mick's fast find gave this man a second chance.