From puppies to police dogs - a trainer's diary (The Final Chapter)

Katy White-Foot in her new home now known as Remi and destined to be a police dog. Don’t let the cute pink toy fool you as this will shortly be disembowelled. Good luck and best wishes to her handler, Terry

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Following last week's sixth entry of ‘From puppies to police dogs - a trainer's diary’, here is the final instalment.

The last week of puppy rearing was, without doubt, the hardest. The pups are very active and incredibly mobile. Every time any one entered the kitchen they were mobbed and people were now walking with a group of puppies riveted to each leg. When a person left the kitchen there was a uniform scream of protest causing that person to rush back in to try to quieten the racket – oh how quickly they learn to train us humans.

We were forced to exercise the puppies in new exciting places every day to stimulate and tire them. In this way they would settle down at night and sleep peacefully till early morning when they were all ready again for the next adventure. Their favourite playtime was racing round the school field chasing whoever lead the race. Fortunately we had quite a few volunteers who found it rather novel to be chased by ten furry piranhas.

One afternoon the puppies seemed to be playing quietly in the back yard which is usually a sign of trouble. When Peter and I looked out of the window we barely recognised the yard. Every pot had been rolled over and the contents dragged out across the yard. Murdered plants were strewn everywhere and dark brown peat coated not only the yard floor but each and every guilty puppy. Looking especially pleased with themselves they turned their attention to the paddling pool and having splashed around seeing if they could drown one another their next task was to drink the peaty water to see who would be sick first. It was days like these when Peter and I kept saying “It is this Sunday they will be going?”

Well Sunday came and Dave arrived shortly before 9.30am having travelled with three other members of his team all the way from Essex. Paul from GMP was conducting the puppy testing so all the equipment including record sheets were prepared in advance so that the testing could start promptly at 10.00am.

It was fascinating to watch each puppy as it went through the assessment.

The puppies were given a series of exercises to test their reactions.

Any signs of insecurity or nervousness need to be identified before time and money is spent on training the puppy.

The puppies were also tested for food drive, determination and prey drive. A good prey drive means that the puppy will be good at retrieving, searching and of course chasing criminals.

Eight were chosen for Police duties and two were selected for placement in civilian homes.

With testing and selection complete the puppies were given one last race on the school field much to the amusement of their audience and when tired they were loaded in to the police van with meaty bones ready for their long journey back to Essex.

We waved goodbye and wished them all good luck on the next stage of their careers. Peter and I were a little dazed after all the excitement of the day and we wandered round starting to put the house back to normal and clearing away all the toys and paraphernalia to be used again in the future.

Later in the evening I looked out of the window subconsciously expecting to be entertained by the naughty puppies and I think it was then that it hit me how eerily quiet and empty the house felt. It was a horrible sense of loss and the only way to shake off this haunting, lonely feeling was to take our three dogs out for a good romp – and remember the sleepless nights with never ending cleaning /feeding duties.