Brother Frederic with a St Bernard at the Grand St Bernard pass on the border between Switzerland and Italy. (Reuters)

St Bernard Pass, Switzerland, Oct. 7 (Reuters): Switzerland?s St Bernard rescue dogs, known for centuries for saving avalanche victims from snowy Alpine graves, are to be sold by their monk owners as helicopters and heat sensors take over their work.

At St Bernard?s hospice, cradle of the breed, Augustinian monks want to devote more time to needy people and less to the 18 dogs ? which will be sold only to new owners who promise to bring them back each year.

?They (the dogs) need a lot of time and energy. There are only four of us monks now,? said Brother Frederic, perched on a rock with a St Bernard by his side. ?Maybe we need to spend more time with people who ask for it.?

At an altitude of 2,438 metres, the home of the St Bernards is an Alpine pass on the route to Italy where the huge, shaggy dogs are said to have saved the lives of some 2,500 travellers over the past few centuries.

?Even if there was 2 or 3 metres of fresh snow, they were able to make a track in the snow so travellers could find their way, they could also find travellers lost in avalanches,? he said.

But the dogs, which eat up to 2 kg of meat a day and weigh as much as 64 kg, have not rescued anyone for 50 years.

?They?re not being sold to just anyone. All that is changing with the dogs is the ownership,? said Pierre Troillet, president of the Swiss St Bernard Association, adding the dogs were no longer kept on the pass in winter.

St Bernard himself built a hospice on the spot in the 11th century, and a community of monks formed to aid travellers and rescue avalanche victims.

The dogs could pick out narrow and treacherous paths in blizzards that disorientated even the native monks.