Hello,

I was curious about the military k-9 adoption program. I see these dogs are eligible either by age, injury, or training failure. How suitable would one of these dogs be for adoption in a family with three kids. I am able and willing to take one of these dogs if they wouldn't eat my children. Malinois or Shepherd I don't have a preference. Are they spayed and nuetered? If anyone is familiar with this program please advise

Steve,
Do you have a background in dog training? Most of the military service canines will be high drive dogs and will likely need someone with good training skills to control the dogs. You may want to consider this before bringing a working dog ( even a retired one ) into a home with children.
If you're an advanced trainer never mind the caveat <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

 Quote:

Originally posted by Will Rambeau:
Steve,
Do you have a background in dog training? Most of the military service canines will be high drive dogs and will likely need someone with good training skills to control the dogs. You may want to consider this before bringing a working dog ( even a retired one ) into a home with children.
If you're an advanced trainer never mind the caveat <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Will,

I am new to training dogs for anything other than pets. I am a police officer but not a department handler at this time. I do have a 10 month old female GSD but she is not a working dog I took her because the owner couldn't handle her. It sounds like I should "practice" on this dog and see how I feel in by the end of the year.

Hey Scott,
With you being an LEO and your dept. having a canine program already, are you looking down the line to become one of the handlers? If so, a retired drug dog may be an excellent training tool for you and save your dept. some of time and money if they allow you to train along side their dogs just for the retired dog to stay in practice and for you to pick up the handler skills.
You can always float the idea past your supervisors, if they consider it, you'll need to see if the Lackland crew would be agreeable to telling you the commands used and the dogs capabilies- however, they may balk at the idea due to fear of liability or some other type of lawyer-driven BS.
Just a thought.... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

does anyone know if there are any MWD's available for adoption in the UK after they are retired of are they taken back to the US and retired there.

I have owned GSD's for 5 years and appreciate working temperament and high work drives and would like to offer a home to dogs for retirement be it by age or injury

thanks

Neil <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

a retired drug dog may be an excellent training tool for you and save your dept. some of time and money if they allow you to train along side their dogs just for the retired dog to stay in practice and for you to pick up the handler skills.
--------Will Rambeau --------- Just a question as well as my personal opinon.

If a military working dog (MWD) is retired for age reasons, why would any Fed/State/Local agency want to spend their budget dollars on an animal that has been determined to no longer be in working condition? This applies for MWDs that are retired for health reasons. MWDs are being retired for a reason. In most cases it is because they can no longer perform the job they were intended to perform. Some may be released form the training program because THEY do not want to give the response a Narc or Explosive dog should give. Some cases may because the dog ends up not having the prey or defensive drive needed to do the protection and patrol side of training. This must also be taken into consideration for legal and liability aspects.

Remember that they performed their service in a military environment. They do not go home with their handlers at the end of the day. They have been worked a good portion of thier lives in 12 hour shifts and housed in kennels well away from the base populace. These dogs have lived and been treated their entire lives as a working dog, Not a pet.

If anyone should adopt a former MWD they should do so to allow the MWD to retire in peace and live out its last few years in a none stressful evironment.

Derek

From my experience we had a drug dog for the correctional facility here in MO that worked until she didn't have the stamina to do 100 cells a day, so they retired her to the handler. The handler had this dog from day one, and recognized that the dog needed to work. It's all she knew, so she donated the dog to a small department that didn't not require so much of the dog... ocassional bust, a search here and there..

Lackland AFB does place dogs that wash, but the screen the family/person to make sure that the placement is good. Not all the dogs are high drive. They get dogs donated to them with some requirements, then when they get them and put them through their pases they find that the drive isn't what they need,desire isn't there, or a number of things.
They also have a puppy program. They farm the pups out to family/individuals and evaluate and train them like the dogs for sight/hearing/disability are.