Warning
© 2007 Missing Pet Partnership. All rights reserved.
In 1989, Missing Pet Partnership's founder Kat Albrecht began training search dogs (police Bloodhounds and cadaver dogs) and ultimately shifted into a career in law enforcement. Then in 1997, Kat shifted her work to pioneering the pet detective industry. In 2005 after nine years experience as a pet detective, field training officer, and certified seminar leader, Kat launched the MAR Technician program, which has since certified other pet detectives who offer professional lost pet services. Our History page explains the process we've gone through to develop this industry and our Qualifications page lists the experience and education that allows us to administer a proper training and certification program for pet detectives and MAR search dogs.
Missing Pet Partnership is striving to train and certify MAR Technicians, volunteer Lost Pet First Responders, and MAR search dogs so that lost pet services will be affordable and available in all communities. Because of problems that we've encountered with a few bad apples, we've established a Code of Ethics for our organization. Just because a lost pet resource is not listed on our website does not mean that he or she is not reputable or can't help you! It might just mean that he or she has not been able to take our training course. But understand that Missing Pet Partnership will not list a resource on our website unless we know that he or she has been properly trained, is reputable, and has agreed to abide by our Code of Ethics. Sadly, a few in this field have been making claims that their dogs can follow scent trails that are long beyond what dogs are actually capable of following. You can learn more about how long scent survives by reading an excerpt from MPP founder Kat Albrecht's book DOG DETECTIVES: Train Your Dog to Find Lost Pets.
There are also others working hard to discredit anyone else who dares to compete with them, even those who have more experience in finding lost pets and, ironically, those who trained them. Some speak of their own ethics and desire for standards, yet they refuse to abide by Missing Pet Partnership's Code of Ethics. They complain about people searching for lost pets as a hobby but the reality is that with the number of pets that go missing and the growing demand for these services, there is a need for BOTH volunteer hobbyists and for-profit pet detectives. You can learn more about the differences between Volunteer and For-Profit pet detectives (and even join the growing number of pet lovers being trained to offer lost pet services) under our Pet Detective Training section.
One concern that we've had from the inception of our training program is that anyone can take a dog, put a SEARCH DOG vest on him or her, claim he or she is trained to track lost pets, and scam money from desperate pet owners. Here's an article where a man who lost his Mini Pin hired a "self-proclaimed dog tracker" for $12,000.00. Sadly, his final impression of the tracker was that, "she milked me for all I had." To avoid being taken advantage of, we suggest that you steer clear of anyone offering services who:
- Claims that his or her dogs can track a scent trail that is older than one month;
- Claims to have a 90% or higher success rate;
- Claims to have THE BEST tracking dogs in the world;
- Seems more concerned about disparaging low- or no-cost lost pet services than in offering affordable services themselves.
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