Ore Sniffing Dogs

Yesterday I attended one of the most interesting presentations I have had the privilege to attend in a long time. The presentation was by Peter Bergman of a company called Oredog SA and yes, from the name of the company, it’s to do with ore and dogs. Dogs that can sniff out ore deposits!
Astounding Right??!!

When we got the pre-presentation brief we all thought there was no fracking way dogs can be used to sniff out ore. Needless to say, the presentation was well attended. At first I was skeptical thinking, this would be another geology dirty joke, but then about half way through the presentation I was sold. I now love the idea, in fact I dig it. It is a pretty intriguing concept and meeting the man behind the dream was indeed fascinating. Peter comes off as an eccentric, gneiss, hammered and stoned geologist who is insanely passionate about geology and has the typical field geologist look complete with a scraggy beard.  I must say, in the field of exploration, there is no boulder man. He certainly goes where few have been because apparently dogs have been used in mineral exploration from way back, a tradition that had since been discontinued. This ore sniffing dogs ‘innovation’ is a cheap ore locating method that has long since been taken for granite and he revived it in a big way.

  Rex and Peter

source:https://twitter.com/swedenoredog

I don’t know what rock I have been hiding under because despite him being on the discovery channel, SABC news and all sorts of magazines, all the news about him just seemed to fluorite over my head. I’d not heard of him before yesterday! In my defense, work has been hectic and my latest news apatite was being spoilt by celebrity buzz, twitter, vines and all that other social media garbage that we feed ourselves. I have my faults but no more from here on end. Howz that for a 2016 resolution? And starting the year off in the presence of a person who thinks out of the box certainly inspired me to do the same. One thing is for sure, if we had a Quartz Illustrated, he’d be Mr. January. What a way to start the year!

  

 

Anyway, Peter and Oredog certainly bring an interesting dimension to mineral exploration, and as far as expensive geophysics techniques are concerned, let’s barium!