{"id":14,"date":"2017-04-08T21:53:36","date_gmt":"2017-04-08T21:53:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/?p=14"},"modified":"2017-04-08T21:53:36","modified_gmt":"2017-04-08T21:53:36","slug":"professionally-trained-police-dogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/professionally-trained-police-dogs\/","title":{"rendered":"Professionally Trained Police Dogs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Professionally trained Police dogs<\/a> are considered one of the greatest assets a police officer can have, they save lives, catch criminals, cover ground quicker than a police officer can, act as a deterrent in crowd control, detect contraband such as money, drugs, guns and explosives as well as do much, much more. Police dogs are expected to perform a variety of tasks and enjoy doing so!<\/p>\n

For the variety of jobs performed by police dogs a variety of breeds are often called upon, including but not limited to; German Shepherd Dogs, Belgian Malinois, Springer Spaniel, Labrador Retriever. Each breed of dog excels in different areas.<\/p>\n

During crowd control just the presence of a police dog can act as a deterrent and\u00a0 prevent trouble from starting whereas the same situation with more officers but no police dogs is more likely to erupt into unrest. Police dogs<\/a> are trained to track people who are lost or criminals on the run, using their remarkable scent tracking abilities a trained police dog can sniff a human scent and track the path used by the person they are tracking.\u00a0 If the person continues to run away the police dog is trained to chase after them off the lead, jump over any obstacles in the way and when they catch the criminal they will bite and hold them on the ground until told to release by their handler. Police dogs are trained so they can not be used against their handler.<\/p>\n

Detection dogs<\/a> are trained to sniff out a variety of materials such as money, narcotics, gun powder and explosives. These dogs have such a powerful sense of smell they can sniff out a gun that has not been fired in years and they can sniff out drugs that a person has been in contact with even if they are no longer in possession of the drugs. With the risk of a terrorist attack continuing to rise, more and more police dogs are being trained to detect weapons and explosives.<\/p>\n

Trained police dogs<\/a> are normally titled as “single purpose” and “dual purpose” depending on if they have been trained to perform one or two roles with dual purpose police dogs being more expensive. In order to provide serving police dogs with a decent home and continue to improve the bond between the dog and their handler, the dog will usually live with the handler and their family. In the event of the handler going on holiday the police dog will enjoy a stay in an approved kennel, despite the enjoyable stay these wonderful dogs can never hide their emotion when they see their handler return to collect them – always a heart warming moment.<\/p>\n

General purpose police dogs normally work until they are around 8-10 years old with detection dogs working slightly longer, once the dog retires they either continue to live with their handler or are found suitable alternative accommodation. Some police forces breed and train their own dogs whilst a lot of smaller forces will purchase pre-trained dogs. Most police forces are willing to take ownership of a dog if the original owner can no longer look after them providing the dog would be suitable to work as a police canine. A simple call to a local police authority and they will arrange to send out a professional to visit and assess the dog. Dogs do not normally start working as a police dog until they are around 12-15months when they are considered to be mature enough.<\/p>\n

Detection dogs<\/a> are usually trained to either sit down or point their nose towards any contraband they find, they are specifically trained not to touch the contraband for two main reasons; 1) to prevent possible contamination of the evidence and 2) most importantly for the dogs safety. Drugs can be very dangerous to dogs as well.<\/p>\n

It should be recognised that police dogs also make fantastic pets when at home. A lot of dog handlers have children at home and when the dog is not on duty they will be just like any other family pet that is great around children. Surprisingly but interestingly, if there are other pets in the house the police dog will not always become the “alpha”.<\/p>\n

Although police dogs are a tremendous asset to any police force unfortunately they do come with a substantial cost. Such costs involved include; the price of purchasing the dog, the handler’s wages, food for the dog, the dog’s welfare, training and testing the dog, this is the main reason why police forces can not increase the number of dogs they have in their squad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Professionally trained Police dogs are considered one of the greatest assets a police officer can have, they save lives, catch[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[5,7,8],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions\/15"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/k9sale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}