My hometown sheriff dept is pursuing getting a K-9 and in my opinion is pursuing this without the proper research and guidance. It’s a small county and not a lot of activity. They are looking at buying the trained dog from Vohne Liche Kennels in Denver, Ind.

They are looking at the Belgian Malinois and want to train him in locate drugs, and/or discarded evidence, search for lost or missing persons and used as a bite dog in criminal situations and other uses as they state but didn’t list.

I feel that this is too many disciplines to train one dog for.

The whole trainer program is only 5 weeks and a cost of $15,000.00.

What are your opinions on this and what recommendation do you think should take place.

I would like to use your comments and title/experience but wont if anyone don’t want to be.

Feel free to email me at rw@verizon.net

Does the training package come with maintenance training included? Have they considered who will be the decoy for the dog team? Do they know what certifications are required by your state/jurisdiction? Is the dog guaranteed to certify?

In my opinion, 5 weeks isn't enough time to teach someone to be a handler and become an expert on conducting maintenance training and dealing with the inevitable training difficulties that will come up. Heck, I don't think 5 weeks is enough to even become a dual purpose dog handler. I went through the DoD 10 week program and I had just enough information to get myself into trouble. If your department is going to take a deputy with no dog experience and make him/her a K-9 handler they need to hire/contract a trainer with a ton of experience to oversee training and management of the program otherwise it's doomed to fail.

I've personally seen threee attempts to start programs in the manner you described and all of them failed after about 8 months or so. The dog team gets it's training and is good until the team doesn't get enough training to maintain it's skills and the green handler doesn't have the ability to correct the deficiencies. Inevitably, the team becomes so bad that it's a liability and has to be sold/retired.

A dog with the proper abilities should be able to handle all of the tasks you mentioned. The debate between single and dual purpose dogs is on-going so I won't go into it here.

My credentials: I'm TSgt Brian Vanderbunt. I've been in the USAF for 14 years and a Military Working Dog Handler since 1998, two years of that as a kennel master (program manager). I've handled both dual purpose bomb and drug dogs. I went through the 10 week basic handler course and a 4 week trainer course. These credentials aren't that impressive but I now know enough to know that I don't know everything.

Roger,

The disciplines required of the dog as you stated is not too much. Most patrol dogs do all of these things, and sometimes more.

I have to agree with everything Brian said but with one additional comment. 5 weeks is definately not enough time to train a new team. 10 weeks sometime is enough if you have a new handler that easily grasps the concepts taught. 5 weeks with a mal and new handler is a disaster. Im not picking on the Mal, only in my experience it takes a strong, experienced handler to work this dog and stay in charge. Good luck.

Howard Knauf

Roger,


As a suggestion, if the SO is located in a county that has an active State Police canine program or a larger city with it's own canine program, hook up with them for training. I've yet to run across a police department canine program that will not help out a fellow law enforcement canine. In that instance, you would benefit from thier experiences and be able to train with active programs in your area.

DFrost

$15,000 seems a little high for what you are talking about. I really don't think that is his price - might be a total by the time you add lodging, meals - etc into the price.

I have seen some of Ken's dogs after they come out to work the street. They are a fine dog. I think the Sheriff is looking at a honest vendor/trainer.

If I was to buy one - he would be in my top 5 choices.

As Howard says,five weeks to get a green handler working safely with a Mal is not enough and not just any handler can work one safely,there has to be a strong bond or its a disaster area.
Paul

I'll chime in here. Particularly since I run bi-annual dual purpose dog courses that consist of 270 hours of work prior to completion of a basic school.
If the dog is well grounded in their work (a well started dog) and the handler motivated this program works. But, what is essential is that the program have follow up. It is also essential that the program is really 270 hours (I've been around 400 hour courses where there were 15 dog teams and they worked the dogs on a couple of excersises a day and called it 8 hours).
Small groups and individualized instructionb works well.
Even programs over seas have 9 week programs that don't have more hours than this.
The key is follow up. here is an example: a department sends their handler down for a dog which is well on its way through narc work and apprehension work and scent work prior to the handlers arrival. They work 6 days a week for 6 weeks or a bit more. A big part of the work is training the handler how to do maintenence work at home. Once home within 30-45 days they either return or there is an on site visit. i do this frequently with satelite training workshops where I get together with teams that have been through the course from the area. We address problems, organize group training sessions to support their need for ongoing work and do certifications.
My expreiences are that you get out to 10 weeks with a poor handler away from home and their support systems and their families doing without them they begin to loose focus on the task. They would rather bust butt and get done and get home to work than hang out. The reality is that there is too much sit time in most 10 week courses. If the 5 week course isn't a push hard course and has a bunch of sit time it ain't worth anything.
If they don't have a support system in effect before they are done with their course 10 weeks isn't long enough, in fact 20 weeks isn't long enough.
Just my 2 cents. But it is a result of over 100 dogs placed this way.

When we put my dog on the street we went away for 5 weeks... 12 hours a day. Slept in a motel with the dog and only went home on the weekends.

The nice thing when we got my dog was that we told the trainer (Nick Blackford) what we wanted as the end product. We decided on a passive narcotics alert and we wanted the dog trained in BOTH bark and hold and find and bite. They trained the dog prior to my arrival so that the entire 5 weeks was focused on me learning to handle and maintain the dog. There were two teams training together with 4 instructors. We have always had access to "tech support" over the phone whenever needed and have quarterly visits to the training center for evaluation of where we are in our training and what we need to fix.

Too many vendors cut ties with departments when the k9 team walks out the door. I like vendors that have enough pride in their finished product to WANT to have continued input with the dog's training.

I agree that the success or failure of any K-9 team is directly related to the on going in-service training. This has to be done without fail. Training never ends.

Five weeks does not sound like a lot of time. However, though not an expert on the way VLK does things you would be hard pressed to find a better more conscientious vendor. They do tons of business and have placed dogs all over the world. Having observed the operation the dog would not be green. If not already a finished basic patrol and narcotic detection the dog would be well on his way. There is a good work ethic there and they seem to make the most of their time.

The key to success would be to find a reputable trainer and have a commitment to keep training on a regular basis for the entire career of the team.

I agree with Kevin, if the class is an honest eight hours a day then it could be sufficient if the dog is already trained. I'm just used to seeing 15 teams and maybe two instructors so you spend the majority of your time waiting around to work your dog and you really only get maybe two out of eight hours of training.