Police dogs are used for a variety of things, such as sniffing out drugs, bombs, dead bodies, attacking, and search and rescue. For a dog to be able to do all of these amazing things, they need to be properly brought up. The majority of police dogs are German Shepherds, however Labrador Retrievers and several other breeds may be used depending on what they’ll be trained for. The way they’re brought up and utilized varies between police departments and countries, however they are all pretty similar.
Where do they come from?
While some police departments will take dogs that are donated by their owners, it is becoming more and more common to have police dogs imported from Europe as they’re bred with a much more strict standard than American dogs. In fact, by the time these dogs are brought into the States, they’ve already received international certification.
First thing’s first
Before becoming an official police dog, they must go through extensive obedience training to ensure they are well versed in obeying their handler without fail. This is particularly important when it comes to attack dogs, as their handlers need to be able to control when they attack, how much force they use, and when to stop. On a related note, it is often assumed that dogs are given commands in a different language so that other people can’t tell them to attack. This is simply not true. The dogs are trained in the language of whichever country they’re raised in. This why dogs from Europe are often given commands in a different language. It’s a lot easier for a handler to learn a few words in another language than to re-train the dog and possibly confuse it.
Drug Sniffing
Dogs that are trained to sniff out drugs are putting their unbelievable noses to work in such a way that no human or machine could do. When they’re being trained to sniff out drugs, they’re actually trained to associate the scent of drugs with their favourite toy. The ‘toy’ is often a white towel that the trainers use to play tug-of-war with the dogs. The towels are stripped of any particular scent, and then slowly introduced with a scent of a drug, say, marijuana. After a while, the trainer will play a little game of hide-and-go-seek with the towel and the drugs. When the dog finds the source of the scent, it will start scratching and digging to try and get the toy. After a while it starts to learn that whenever it finds the drugs, it will be rewarded with a toy.
A few amazing things about them
-They can smell humans buried as far as 12 feet deep.
– They’re able to search an area 4 times faster than a human can.
-They can differentiate between identical twins.
Living Quarters
Search dogs will live with their partners 24/7, 7 days a week. The same goes for attack dogs, however they live under stricter rules and sleep in their kennel. Most police dogs live with their handlers after retirement.
Police dogs are often put on the front lines alongside their handlers when it comes to the fight against violent criminals and rioters. It’s because of instances like this that sometimes lives get lost. Service dogs spend their lives doing what they do alongside police in order to help keep things safe for us every day civilians, and that’s incredible. There really is no loyalty like that of a dog.
Gotta love these guys.
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