On the trail: Bloodhound's trainer talks tracking
May 21—There's a first call for every dog in the K9 program in Niagara County, which has been going on for more than 60 years, according to Special Deputy Joe Moll. He recently took K9 Liberty on her first service call, which she completed successfully, tracked a missing child in Lewiston.
Moll, who trains bloodhounds for the sheriff's department, calls Liberty his "B-team" leaving K9 Trace to be his "A-team" who was at home when the call of a missing child came in. Moll and Liberty were training at the time, about a half-hour from Moll's home, and rather than lose those crucial minutes, Moll decided it was time to put Liberty into service.
Liberty is about 1 1/2-years old and is the latest dog Moll has trained. Moll has been working with the K9s since retiring from GM in 2005. He said he was recruited by Jim Hildreth who had heard that Moll raised coon hounds. Moll was then taken into the department as a special deputy, giving him all the powers of a law enforcement officer, but without any pay.
"That would defeat the purpose," Moll explained. "I'm trying to give something back."
Moll said he has lost count of the amount of trails his dogs have tracked, but estimated that there are 30-40 calls every year for his services. While he's no scientist, he said some who are have told him how it is that his dogs can track a human's trail even after days have passed.
He said it's because humans are always shedding skin cells.
"We get a whole new skin every 28 days or so," Moll said. "When these skin cells — they call them 'rafts' — when they depart from you, they get on the ground wherever you walk. You're leaving a trail of these things."
Bloodhounds, who've been trained and domesticated for centuries for man-tracking, can smell bacteria attacking these "rafts" like a person would smell a piece of roadkill. And everyone's personal skin cells aren't alike. Like a fingerprint, Moll said, a bloodhound can discern one person's trail of rafts separately from anyone else's.
Liberty isn't at peak performance yet, said Moll. He has nothing but great expectations for her — training is perpetual with bloodhounds — but he won't be taking her out to calls except in an emergency or if a situation like the missing Lewiston child comes up again and getting K9 Trace would waste too much time.
"She's got an excellent start," he said. "Shows extreme amounts of potential. I don't expect anything but progress."
As for the program, Moll made sure to note that when he arrived, he was coming into a professional unit, as well as that his and Liberty's services are available nationwide.
"Through my career with training bloodhounds, I've not only worked in every law enforcement jurisdiction in Niagara County, I've also worked for every sheriff's office in Western New York," he said. "On the state level I've worked with the Forest Rangers, the DEC (Department of Conservation) and the state police. On the federal level I've worked with Homeland Security, the U.S. Marshals, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation). My jurisdiction is wherever I'm requested for assistance.
"I think it's an unknown to many people that these services are available."
