Associated Press Writer

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - Texas pound puppies can turn into hero hounds with the help of animal shelter workers who identify dogs with the right stuff to sniff out bombs or rescue wayward hikers.

Often it's the trouble makers, pooches blamed for gnawing furniture, escaping fences or playing too rough with children, best suited for difficult jobs.

"Some of the stray dogs really give animal control officers a run for their money," said Charles H. "Chick" Gardner, director of the Gifted Animal Program. "Those are the ones I really want to look at."

The program trains animal shelter employees to identify canines as possible fits as search-and-rescue, drug-sniffing or guard dogs -- or even work with the disabled or in entertainment shows.

Just about any breed can be trained, Gardner said, but agencies look for different traits based on the job.

The U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection recently selected 40 dogs from shelters in the north Texas area, Gardner said.

The agency looks for focused and playful dogs, such as Labrador retrievers, Belgian Malinois and German shepherds. The agency has used drug-sniffing dogs at the nation's borders and ports for more than 30 years and recently started using canines trained to detect chemical weapons.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has 28 urban search-and-rescue dog teams in the United States, each with 70 people and 12 dogs. The team based at Texas A&M in College Station found some astronauts' remains after the space shuttle exploded over the state Feb. 1, said team manager Susann E. Brown.

But the Texas team has only five dogs and six more in training, which takes 18 months, she said. Other FEMA teams don't have enough dogs either, a shortage caused in part by a growing demand for bomb-sniffing dogs, she said.

Many agencies "tend to gravitate toward the same type of dog," Brown said, so the Gifted Animal Program is helpful in building the supply of high-energy canines with potential.

After a 21-point evaluation of a dog's traits and personality, a trained shelter worker contacts an agency if the animal seems to be a good match.

The program has placed nearly 100 dogs since spring.

"It's a no-brainer, really: The dogs are free and need homes, and they can find drugs or missing children," Gardner said.

A dog's working life isn't very long. Canines must be between 1 and 4 years old when they start training, and they can work until age 8 or 9.

"This work is very tiring for an animal," said Steven L. Thomason, the program's training director.

Nationwide, about 6 million to 8 million cats and dogs enter shelters annually, and about half of those are destroyed, according to the Humane Society of the United States. Most shelters euthanize animals that are not picked up by owners or adopted by new families after a few days.

The Gifted Animal Program is operated through the North Central Texas Animal Shelter Coalition, a nonprofit group of municipal and private animal shelters in 50 cities. In November, PETsMART Charities gave a $5,000 grant to the coalition for the program.

Training started earlier this year in the Dallas and Fort Worth area shelters, and more sessions are planned in Austin and Amarillo later this year.

The program started with Gardner and Thomason, an animal trainer and board member of the DFW Humane Society in Irving.

While working in animal shelters, they noticed the types of dogs U.S. Customs or military officials wanted during their infrequent visits and they started holding animals with those traits for evaluation.

They realized animal shelters could save more dogs if all shelters knew how to identify those qualities.

"If a dog doesn't pass the test, he's had an hour of playtime he wouldn't have had," Thomason said.

One of Gardner's own 21 dogs, a 3-year-old Catahula named Sammy, was rescued from an Aledo animal shelter a few years ago and trained for search and rescue. Sammy helped find two missing children who wandered away from their homes in Parker County, Gardner said.

He and Thomason don't get paid for their work with the program.

"It's a labor of love for the animals," Thomason said.

------

On the Net:

North Central Texas Animal Shelter Coalition: http://w.sheltercoalition.com

U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection: http://www.cbp.gov