The West Yorkshire Police Dog Section consists of a range of dogs of varying breeds and roles. We range from General-purpose police dogs through to a range of specialist search dogs.
A variety of breeds are used within West Yorkshire and we now have our own breed programme to cope with the ever expanding use of dogs performing duties to compliment the needs of the modern day police service.
The majority of our general-purpose dogs are German Shepherds, but we do have a small pool of Malinois’s. The specialist search dogs range from Springer Spaniels to Labradors and will ‘find’ explosives, drugs, firearms and money.
The general-purpose dogs are tasked with a multi-role including tracking, searching for persons and property and criminal work.
All our dogs are trained using a system of ‘praise and reward’, which not only brings out the natural abilities of the dog but also increases the bond between dog and handler.
At the moment dogs come from a variety of backgrounds including members of the public donating to us, dog dealers and breeders. We are constantly on the look out for dogs to be trained as police dogs.
We generally look at dogs between the ages of 12 months to 2 years of age. The dogs need to ‘look the part’ and be possessive. It is important that the dogs are social and play with a ball or some similar object.
Initial police dog training dependant on role lasts between 8 to 14 weeks and all dogs are licensed by accredited instructors before being allowed to work on the streets operationally.
All our dogs live at home with the handler through their working life and upon retirement become a family pet remaining with the handler.
The breed programme was started in September 2005 and all of our litters are born at the Breed centre based in Wakefield and at 7 weeks of age the puppies are placed with either dog handlers or ‘puppy walkers’.
The development of the puppies are managed by our breed staff and a structured pattern of training is in place for the socialisation and environment development of all pups.
We are always on the look out for ‘puppy walkers’ to help us allow the programme to grow. The criteria for such a role is;
- Generally fit and healthy people as the pups need a lot of exercise.
- A person who is at home most of the time as the pups cannot be left on their own for long periods.
- Home environment that is conducive with a large breed dog, such as large secure garden.
- Children are not a problem but if not of school age can you give the puppy the time it needs to allow for its development?
Food, veterinary costs etc are met by us, but you need to understand that at around 12 months of age the puppy will be returned for training.
If you think you could offer us a good home for a puppy please contact the Dog Training School on 01924 293135.