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Animal Workforce (Trained Animals Performing Tasks: Non-Military)

EnolaGaia

I knew the job was dangerous when I took it ...
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We have a thread for animals trained and / or employed in warfare:

Animal Army (Trained Animals Employed in Warfare)
http://forum.forteantimes.com/index...rmy-trained-animals-employed-in-warfare.8308/

... but none for animals trained to perform everyday (as opposed to military) tasks on a partially or wholly autonomous basis. The key word is 'autonomous'. My intended context is not that of (e.g.) guide dogs working alongside humans, but cases more accurately reflecting animals working on their own for human purposes.

Here (below) is an example.

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Brainy Crows Trained to Pick Up Trash at Theme Park
A team of trained birds will really clean up at a French theme park, where they will collect and discard cigarette butts and other bits of trash.

Six rooks — a type of bird in the crow family, native to Europe and parts of Scandinavia and Asia — are expected to get to work this week picking up litter at Puy du Fou, a park that features period villages and gardens, as well as historic re-enactments, performances and events ...

The avian trash collectors were raised in captivity and trained by Christophe Gaborit, a falconer and project manager with the park's Academy of Falconry, so you might say that the birds got their job through crow-nyism.

Gaborit was inspired to recruit the rooks (Corvus frugilegus) by something he saw 20 years ago: a group of wild ravens sifting through natural litter in a field ... If corvids — the family that includes crows, ravens and rooks — were already inclined to sort materials in their habitat, perhaps they could be trained to identify and discard litter left behind by humans ...

FULL STORY: https://www.livescience.com/63320-crows-pick-up-trash-theme-park.html
 
This dog is now an official employee of the state's attorney's office in Chicago. In accordance with regulations and protocols, she had to be sworn in as a public employee.

dog-swearing-in.jpeg

Labrador sworn in at state’s attorney’s office in Chicago

It was a real dog of a ceremony this week during a swearing-in at the state’s attorney’s office in Chicago.

The newly sworn-in worker is a Labrador retriever named Hatty. The 2-year-old will be on a 9-to-5 human schedule. But she’s being asked to work like a dog, to just do what comes naturally to most dogs: show affection.

Full Coverage: Oddities
Her job is to ease the strain of criminal proceedings on young children and those with mental-health issues who have been victims of assault. She’ll handle up to 200 cases annually.

Hatty is the office’s first emotional-support dog and was trained partly by inmates.

Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx presided over Tuesday’s swearing-in. Hatty stood on her hind legs over a table and placed her paw across a law book as an oath was administered.

SOURCE: https://apnews.com/f170327ce22340f09b98afc5532a1de2
 
Animals are being pressed into service to aid with social distancing ...
Maryland winery employs delivery dog for curbside pick-ups

A Maryland winery is observing social distancing protocol in its curbside deliveries with an unusual employee -- a delivery dog.

Stone House Urban Winery in Hagerstown has been offering curbside pickup to abide by the government's orders during the COVID-19 pandemic, and to make sure employees and customers keep a safe distance the deliveries are being made by a 75-pound brindle boxer named Soda Pup.

"We've had people call in just specifically to have soda pup bring wine out to them. people who have never even been here before," Lori Yata, Soda Pup's owner and co-owner of the winery, told WJLA-TV. ...
FULL STORY (With Video): https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2020/0...very-dog-for-curbside-pick-ups/6631585672423/
 
The crows are a clever idea.

Seeing beach litter,-a lot of it is very small bits, -a human could never sort it, but what if you had an army of small, sharp eyed litter pickers?
 
Using Pavlovian conditioning, bees have been trained to smell telltale signs of COVID-19 infection in humans.
Bees Have Been Trained to Smell COVID-19 And Identify a Case Within Seconds

Scientists in the Netherlands have trained bees to identify COVID-19 through their sense of smell, according to a press release from Wageningen University. ...

The scientists trained the bees by giving them a treat – a sugar-water solution – every time they were exposed to the scent of a mink infected with COVID-19. Each time the bees were exposed to a non-infected sample, they wouldn't get a reward (a process known as Pavlovian conditioning).

Eventually, the bees could identify an infected sample within a few seconds – and would then stick out their tongues like clockwork to collect the sugar water.

Bees aren't the first animals to detect COVID-19 by scent. Researchers have also trained dogs to distinguish between positive and negative COVID-19 samples from human saliva or sweat with fairly high levels of accuracy. ...

That's because metabolic changes from the coronavirus make an infected person's bodily fluids smell slightly different than those of a non-infected person.

But researchers still aren't sure whether animals are the best bet for sniffing out COVID-19 cases outside the lab. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/new-ts...tal-cities-including-san-francisco-s-bay-area
 

Chinese police trained squirrels to detect drugs at the border

Police have “successfully trained” squirrels, as they do with dogs, to sniff out drugs along the border in southwest China’s Chongqing municipality.

Yin Jin, a police dog trainer in the region, told state media that six Eurasian red squirrels were trained as an alternative to canine narcotics units.

NYPICHPDPICT000006665269.jpg



The squirrel squad has been doing an “excellent job” during routine tests, Jin said. But since the yearslong process has been a tough nut to crack, they won’t be officially deployed for a while.

“It’s probably going to take some time,” Jin added.

A video, published by the state-sanctioned media outlet People’s Daily, shows the elite task force during one of their training exercises.

According to Jin, squirrels represent the animal kingdom’s best candidate for uncovering drugs since they possess an excellent sense of smell, can maneuver in small areas and can climb to heights that would be inaccessible to dogs.

https://nypost.com/2023/02/14/chinese-police-trained-squirrels-to-detect-drugs-at-border/

*groans & awaits the inevitable appearance of “peanuts” joke*

maximus otter
 
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