German dogs to sniff out wildlife at building sites to speed up work

Sniffer dogs are being trained by Germany's Deutsche Bahn (DB) to find protected wildlife at planned major building sites to speed up projects, the railway group said on Tuesday.

Humans have so far been responsible for finding animals that need to be moved to a safer place while construction goes ahead, but the dogs are set to take over the job in 2022 following training that should finish by the end of this year, DB said.

"The use of dogs for construction projects is new in Germany. Thanks to their fine sense of smell, dogs can find protected species at any time of year and in almost any weather," said Jens Bergmann, DB's director of infrastructure planning.