You might once have come to Mallorca on a ferry boat. If so you might have noticed a search done by sniffer dogs, or even been subjected to one.

There are about ten or twelve sniffer dogs on the island of Mallorca, seven of which are under the auspices of the Guardia Civil and their Servicio Cinológico.

Sniffer dogs are trained by the civil guards for three main areas of detection duties: drugs, arms/explosives, and people search. I was surprised to learn from one of the officers that dogs can be trained in sniffing out absolutely anything, including banknotes, coins, CDs, you name it. This is possible due to the dogs’ highly developed natural sense of smell.

Even poison can be traced by a dog’s nose. Sniffer dogs trained to trace hidden poison in Mallorca are under the responsibility of the environmental department of Govern de Illes Balears. Sometimes farmers use poison to kill perpetrators of their chicken and other livestock. However, the practice of using poison in farming other than rat poison is now illegal for environmental reasons and severe punishment of perpetrators can result. During the last six months, three Mallorcan farmers were caught by the officials with the help of their sniffer dogs; the culprits were fined up to 30,000 € each. Raids can be made on farms and in farmhouses by surprise and without warrant.

The photo (top) was taken in Manacor, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: May 24th, 2009. The time was 12:50:10. The photo (bottom) was taken was taken from the Internet and the Guardia Civil website. Muchas gracias.