Tracker Dog Squad Training Centre opens at Bandipur
To intensify efforts against forest crimes in Karnataka’s five tiger reserves, the Forest Department has set up a Tracker Dog Squad Training Centre at Melukamanahalli in Bandipur.
This pioneering initiative is the State’s first independent facility dedicated to train tracker dogs. Earlier, the State tiger reserves were supplied with sniffer dogs by Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network TRAFFIC WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature)-India and these sniffer dogs were trained for 7 -8 months at Basic Training Centre – Indo Tibet Border Police Force (BTC-ITBP), Panchkula in Haryana.
The training centre is strategically located near the administration division and safari centre of Bandipur Tiger Reserve, Karnataka’s first tiger reserve. The facility, equipped with kennels to accommodate 12 dogs and a storeroom for supplies, is designed to prepare tracker dogs to combat forest crimes.
The centre focuses on detecting forest crimes such as poaching, illegal tree cutting and smuggling of forest produce, preventing human-animal conflicts by identifying and tracking rogue animals, tracking arsonists responsible for forest fires during summer and supporting general law enforcement in forested areas.
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