Posted on 05/11/2002 6:01:23 PM PDT by dighton
TRUFFLE-HUNTERS in southern France believe that an organised gang has been stealing valuable dogs trained to sniff out the knobbly white fungus that sells for as much as £50 an ounce.
Since February, almost a dozen prized chiens truffiers have disappeared in the region around Uzes, which supplies about 90 per cent of French produce.
Among them was Julie, a seven-year-old mongrel bitch whose nose for finding nuggets of "white gold" beneath the earth around certain tree roots had made her owner, Michel Tournayre, a happy man.
Six weeks ago, however, Julie - nicknamed la pelleteuse ("the digger") and valued at more than £1,500 - was stolen in broad daylight.
"I saw a car drive up to her kennel, then speed off," recalled Mr Tournayre miserably. "I was only a few metres away, but by the time I got there, my lovely Julie was gone."
He alerted police and recruited fellow trufficulteurs to search for his dog, but to no avail. He later learnt that at least seven others had been stolen from a nearby district, two of which belonged to the president of the regional truffle producers' syndicate.
That was enough to convince Mr Tournayre that an organised crime ring was responsible. "It's clear they know exactly where to look," he said. "They take only the best in the kennels."
Trufficulteurs are so concerned that they are planning to set up a national hotline to record all disappearances. Suspicion is growing that some stolen animals are being offered to buyers abroad. The Umbrian region of Italy supports a thriving trade in the black variety of the fungus, although Italy's truffle-hunters have also lost dogs this year.
It is also possible that rival French hunters might be buying stolen animals on the quiet. Truffles tend to fetch the best prices in France between November and March, when competition between hunters reaches a peak and poaching from a rival's plots is not unknown. Supplies of the white variety - considered far superior to the black - are snapped up by five-star restaurants around the world.
Not surprisingly, truffle-hunting is traditionally a secretive business in which the location of the most productive "beds" in remote woods is kept within families. Many hunters avoid prying eyes by working at night with dark-coated dogs - missing Julie is coal black - and take circuitous routes to shake off stalkers.
Pigs are also used in France to root out the spores of truffles from beneath oaks, poplars and willows, but are more likely to gobble up the precious nuggets. Dogs are considered easier to train, but it still takes at least two years to rear a good hunter.
Owners are now becoming increasingly reluctant to send their best animals to the rural shows at which the truffle-hunting art is demonstrated, said an official of the regional syndicate.
He reported that an exasperated Italian hunter, who had also lost two dogs this year, had contacted the syndicate to inquire "if there is a machine capable of replacing dogs".
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2002.
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