Wilbert the bassett hound finds safe dumped in Branksome Park Woods

Wilbert the basset hound, who is nearly three years old, was being walked in Branksome Park Woods at around 11am on Saturday, March 16, when he made the surprising discovery in a bush.

The crime-fighting hound had managed to find a black square safe, which had its door taken off, and a number of clear plastic boxes, each one bearing a white label with a different quantities of cash written on.

Nine year-old Ari Semple was walking Wilbert at the time with his dad Stuart.

Ari said: “Wilbert started woofing at this bush and he found a safe that had loads of boxes that would have been filled with cash.

“It must have been stolen."

Dad Stuart said: “It was pretty cool. I think that’s the thing about their breed, they are very good at sniffing things out.

"He’s very inquisitive.

“It must have come from a shop or jewellers or something as it had loads of boxes in I that said £20, £100, £500.”

“He was howling and we were like, 'What’s going on?' He was obsessed.”

Ari said Wilbert had been given a snack “and lots of cuddles” as a reward.

Following the discovery, Ari and his dad contacted the police who thanked them for reporting it and said they would be investigating.

Ari said while it was nice having a “detective dog”, it was “sometimes annoying” because Wilbert sniffed out Ari’s treats such as mint chocolate that he was trying to keep hidden.

Basset hounds have more than 220 million smell receptors, and the part of their brains responsible for the sense of smell is some 40 times that of a humans.