[shezza]

I guess what I'm asking is something different: not whether a cadaver dog could find a body that had been hidden for more than three days (meaning the dog would find a scent of a target body), but if a body had been in a location, then removed so that it was no longer there--would a scent remain in the location where that body had once been (and is not now) for over three days? Sounds like the article indicates a range for all dogs finding the target body (meaning the target IS a body) is around three hours. I'm wondering if there would still be a scent to even track if the body were NO LONGER there and had not been there for 3 or more days. (Am I making sense? or scents?)

[dread78645]

no longer there--would a scent remain in the location where that body had once been (and is not now) for over three days?

Ok, I see what you mean. On some of the websites that deal with traing the dog, it mentions the dog might alert at a spot without the target --the body was put down for a few minutes.

I seem to remember a factoid that a dog could search on a "live" scent (lost children, prison escapees, etc.) up to 48 hours old. I'd think the "dead" scent would be about the same.

[Jaded]

It was my understanding from an LE who works with a dog, that the scent would be "hitable" for up to two weeks in an enclosed area. Also the cadaver dogs are trained for something else. If the cadaver dog hit on the shovel, it is possible the shovel came in to contact with something dead in the sand for the dog to have "reacted", if that is infact what happened.