Bear, a rescue dog, who saved around 100 koalas during the Black Summer Bushfires in Australia, has been awarded for their brave acts.
Bear, who is 6 and is an Australian Koolie, was awarded a special medal by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) at the House of Lords earlier in the week for saving 100 koalas.
Bear and his team appeared via a video link to accept the award on Tuesday this week.
Romane Cristescu, the handler of Bear, said she could not be prouder of the former rescue dog.
Talking about Bear, Romane said:
He’s been such a good boy in helping us find and rescue a lot of koalas, especially during the bushfires, but he works throughout the year to help us in our job to make a better and safer place for koalas.
The thing is, Bear had a pretty rough time before this.
Bear was once abandoned by his former owners due to his obsessive-compulsive disorder, which made him unable to play well with other dogs that were in their area.
The good thing is that this condition made him a great candidate for the University of the Sunshine Coast’s Detection dogs for Conservation Program.
Bear was trained to recognize the scent of koalas’ fur.
Their training paid off when they saved more than 100 koalas during the 2019-2020 Black Summer Bushfires in Australia.
Bear was taught to drop silently on the ground at the base of a tree when he detected the smell of the koalas.
Bear was trained to do such so it could not disturb the koalas.
Bear is the only dog in the world trained to sniff out both koala fur and faeces.
The 2019-2020 Black Summer Bushfires in Australia was his first deployment.
It is believed that more than 3 billion animals died during this bushfire season and more than 24 million hectares of land was burnt during the Black Summer Bushfires in Australia.