MEET one Northumbria Police’s newest canine recruits.
The mix of Dutch herders and Belgian Malinois are only eight weeks old, but next month the pups will go with their handlers and begin initial familiarisation training.
Although they are a mixture of two breeds, they all come from the same litter. These pups practically have Northumbria Police in their DNA as their father is the force’s very own PD Tag, owned by PC Paul Cooper who is responsible for relicensing and training our police dogs.
After 18 months of living with their handlers and getting familiar with their surroundings, they will start the general purpose police dog course.
Then upon successful completion of the course the pups will be fully fledged general purpose police dogs, who are trained to work in a variety of conditions and scenarios. Their skills include searching for missing persons, tracking suspects from crime scenes and recovering recently-discarded evidence.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here