Specially trained sniffer dogs are helping researchers involved in the national scientific survey of Australian species to find important locations for conservation protection.

While detection dogs are usually used to find drugs, ecologist Amanda Hancock and her husband Lloyd, of Saddler Spring Education Centre, have trained their team of dogs to search for rare and elusive animals including the Julia Creek dunnart and the nationally endangered northern quoll.

The conservation organisation, Bush Heritage Australia, brought in the dogs and their handlers, to join 30 scientists and field researchers from around the country taking part in the national Bush Blitz program on the organisation's Carnarvon Station Reserve, 200 kilometres south of Emerald in central Queensland this week.

There, two of the Hancocks' border collies indicated the presence of northern quoll on Carnarvon Station Reserve, an area where the quoll was previously thought to have been locally extinct.

The last sighting on the property was in 2008.

"We've done another search and both dogs have come back to this spot," Mrs Hancock said.

"We have no doubt that there's quoll odour here, so it's very exciting."

Mrs Hancock said the accuracy of the detection dogs has been scientifically tested.

"We've actually just put all our research from the last four-and-a-half years to the Department of Environment in Canberra and we hope to hear by mid-October that detection dogs are a recognised method within the survey guidelines," she said.

Ecologist Murray Haseler said camera traps would now be set at the sites indicated by the dogs.

"What we want ultimately to confirm the animal is to get a photo of it, so we use motion sensor cameras, if anything walks past into this little hollow, it'll snap a picture," he said.

More than 700 new species discovered by Bush Blitz

Bush Blitz is aimed at discovering new species, locating others and building a strong knowledge base for conservation.

More than 700 new species have been discovered under the program in the last four years.

Bush blitz organiser Jo Harding said the scientific survey would provide a full picture of the biodiversity at the Carnarvon property and that will underpin future protection of the environment.

"A property like Carnarvon does amazing work to conserve what they have, but if they don't know what they have they can't make those decisions," she said.

Mr Haseler said he hoped Bush Blitz would provide important new information about the distribution of species that occur on the reserve.

"That is critical to knowing what we have already protected adequately, and where we need to do more."