Seventeen-week old cocker spaniel Goose is being trained as a wildlife detection dog by his owners, Ellesse Janda and Tony Nellis to give a helping ‘nose’ to the wildlife charity as it continues surveying for water voles across the region’s waterways.

Northumberland Wildlife Trust lead volunteer and freelance social science consultant, Ellesse recently spent a four month placement with Northumberland Wildlife Trust and Forestry England, conducting water vole surveys in Kielder Forest and Water, following the completion of the Restoring Ratty water vole reintroduction project that saw over 2,000 captively bred voles released into the North Tyne catchment area.

Ellesse quickly realised that surveying for water voles in Kielder wasn’t easy with extremely changing habitats and quickly rising water levels washing away signs of water vole activity - which is where Goose comes in.