{"source_url": "http://www.1310kfka.com", "url": "http://www.1310kfka.com/abc-news/world/01/dogs-are-saving-koalas-in-the-australia-wildfires/", "title": "Dogs are saving koalas in the Australia wildfires", "top_image": "http://abcnewsradioonline.com/storage/news-images-january-2020/iStock_1920_AustraliaMap.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1578589486237", "meta_img": "http://abcnewsradioonline.com/storage/news-images-january-2020/iStock_1920_AustraliaMap.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1578589486237", "images": ["http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Dan-Patrick-stock-120x120.jpg", "https://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/tunein-radio-1.png", "https://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/spotify-podcast-badge-blk-grn-165x40.png", "http://abcnewsradioonline.com/storage/news-images-january-2020/iStock_1920_AustraliaMap.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1578589486237", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Friends-of-baseball.jpg", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/AirCareMed.jpg", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/drive-nice-web.png", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/buildings-by-design.jpg", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/1310-kfka-webpage-logo.jpg", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/KFKA-white-on-black.jpg", "http://d199t8psk3yhk6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/drivewise_logo_main_color-high-e1570036246163.jpg"], "movies": [], "text": "Photo Courtesy: omersukrugoksu/iStock\n\n(SYDNEY) \u2014 Among the thousands of firefighters battling the catastrophic Australia bushfires, there have been four-legged furry heroes employed with a job of their own.\n\nDogs are being employed to rescue koalas during the fires, and with the flames expected to continue on for months, they\u2019re only just getting started.\n\nTATE Animal Training Enterprises specializes in detector dog services in Sydney, and its team of pups has saved dozens of koalas, owner Ryan Tate told ABC News.\n\nOne dog, 4-year-old Taylor, has rescued eight koalas since September, according to Tate.\n\nLike most detector dogs, Taylor uses her snout to sniff out koala fur. In perfect conditions, she is able to locate the koalas wherever they may be because their smell drops down from trees.\n\nOn days with difficult conditions, such as high winds, Taylor searches for koala poop to identify where they have been, and human experts can then come in and scan the appropriate trees.\n\nTrainers use the command \u201cKoala, find!\u201d to alert the dogs of their mission.\n\nSteve Austin, a trainer who works with Tate, told ABC News that the importance of these dogs can\u2019t be overstated.\n\n\n\nKoalas are vital to Australian wildlife, but are right now on their way to becoming extinct, according to Austin. If more dogs were trained to detect the animals, he said, thousands more could be saved.\n\nThe National Disaster Search Dog Foundation, a California-based organization, said in a statement that search dogs can sniff out scents most humans can\u2019t detect, making their noses \u201ca critical, life-saving tool to help the koala population survive.\u201d\n\nNumerous dogs from other organizations have been employed to search for koalas during the fires, with one even gaining internet fame.\n\nBear, a detection dog from the University of the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, garnered attention for his koala-saving efforts. Actor Tom Hanks called for Bear\u2019s story to be made into a movie after seeing him go viral, saying \u201cthe story of Bear, the koala detection dog. That\u2019s adorable. I like Bear\u201d during a Twitter interview.\n\nWildlife has been ravaged by the fires, with one expert at the University of Sydney estimating that more than one billion animals have died.\n\n\u201cWe haven\u2019t had fires of this scale and intensity before, so we are in uncharted territory,\u201d Mathew Crowther, an associate professor at the college who specializes in wildlife ecology and management, told ABC News in an email. \u201cIt may take a long time for the ecosystems to recover, and some may not be the same, particularly if they have lost species.\u201d\n\nAt least 25 people have lost their lives and more than 2,000 homes have been destroyed across the country, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said earlier this week. Over 15 million acres have burned in Australia since the start of the fire season.\n\nThe country\u2019s fire season typically runs from December to March, but these fires began in September.\n\nNew South Wales, a state that has been particularly hard, is bracing for extreme conditions over the weekend that will create \u201cerratic and dangerous\u201d fire behavior along the southern coast, according to the state\u2019s Rural Fire Service.\n\nAs of Thursday, 132 fires were burning in New South Wales and 55 of those were still contained, according to the fire service.\n\nThe State Department on Wednesday raised its travel advisory for Australia to Level 2 on its four-level scale, urging travelers already there to exercise increased caution and tourists considering a trip to postpone.\n\nCopyright \u00a9 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.", "keywords": [], "meta_keywords": [""], "tags": [], "authors": [], "publish_date": "Thu Jan  9 17:00:19 2020", "summary": "", "article_html": "", "meta_description": "", "meta_lang": "en", "meta_favicon": "", "meta_data": {"viewport": "width=device-width, initial-scale=1", "robots": "max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1", "og": {"locale": "en_US", "type": "article", "title": "Dogs are saving koalas in the Australia wildfires", "description": "(SYDNEY) -- Among the thousands of firefighters battling the catastrophic Australia bushfires, there have been four-legged furry heroes employed with a job of their own. Dogs are being employed to rescue koalas during the fires,...", "url": "http://www.1310kfka.com/abc-news/world/01/dogs-are-saving-koalas-in-the-australia-wildfires/", "site_name": "1310 KFKA", "image": "http://abcnewsradioonline.com/storage/news-images-january-2020/iStock_1920_AustraliaMap.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1578589486237"}, "article": {"publisher": "https://www.facebook.com/1310KFKARadio/", "section": "World", "published_time": "2020-01-09T17:00:19+00:00"}, "twitter": {"card": "summary_large_image", "title": "Dogs are saving koalas in the Australia wildfires \u00bb 1310 KFKA", "image": "http://abcnewsradioonline.com/storage/news-images-january-2020/iStock_1920_AustraliaMap.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1578589486237&time=1578594033", "description": "(SYDNEY) -- Among the thousands of firefighters battling the catastrophic Australia bushfires, there have been four-legged furry heroes employed with a job of their own. 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