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Article: Banned from the U.S. as disease carriers, African pouched rats save lives at home by sniffing out land mines
- Article from:
- AP Worldstream
- Article date:
- August 4, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightProvided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Dateline: MOROGORO, Tanzania
The import of giant pouched rats has been banned in the United States
after the exotic animals were blamed for the spread of monkeypox,
but back home in Africa the animals are being trained for humanitarian
work: sniffing out land mines so they can be dismantled.
In their little red, black and blue harnesses, they look like miniature
sniffer dogs. But their trainers at Sokoine University of Agriculture
say the African pouched rats can do a much better job than dogs _
and they do it for a bit of banana.
"Rats are good, clever to learn, small, like performing repeated tasks
and have a better sense of smell than dogs," said ...