Area search or “air scent” usually refers to search dogs that use air scenting techniques to search areas. Air scent dogs work with their nose in the air, will ignore ground scent and will follow and locate people by catching the "hot" scent of people on the wind. Air scenting techniques are very effective for covering large areas quickly and can produce high probabilities of detection if conditions are good for air scenting. They don't need a "last seen" starting point, an article to work from or a scent trail, and time is not an issue. Some air scenting dogs are also trained to scent discriminate, meaning they can be pre-scented on an article from the missing persons and can pick this person from others in the search area. Air scent dogs usually work off lead. Most are trained to find the victim, alert the handler when the victim has been found, and the return the handler to the victim. This is called a re-find.

Trailing dogs are trained to follow a specific human scent, which may or may not approximate the path the person took because of factors affecting the dispersal of scent such as wind and temperature. To start the dog is started on the trail at the point where the victim was last seen (PLS). Trailing dogs will follow the route of scent deposited on the ground as a person moves through an area. A trained trailing dog can follow the steps of someone who passed by several days earlier, discriminate between it and another's trail, and follow it over hills and through marshland. Dogs can even trail people in cars, from the scent that blows out of the window or through the vents of the car.

Cadaver or HRD dogs are used to locate the remains of deceased victims. Cadaver dogs can locate entire bodies (including those buried or submerged), decomposed bodies, body fragments (including blood, tissues, hair, and bones), or skeletal remains; the capability of the dog is dependent upon its training.

We have both land and water certified HRD dogs.