■ Above: Mutual-aid agreements between agencies work best when intra-agency training
occurs prior to critical incidents that require an exchange of K- 9 services.
up to the OIC if a call for K- 9 mutual
aid comes in and one of our teams is
working. It has to be something pretty
major for an off-duty K- 9 team to be
called out for another agency. It
happens, but with all the other teams
that comprise the overall training cadre,
it’s rare that an agency cannot find a
K- 9 team already on the street.
Our experience with this type of
arrangement has been extremely
positive and well received by all
involved. Provided you can get all the
brass to play nicely in the same sandbox, you should see immediate benefits
from such an arrangement.
this type of cooperation because they
have 24/7 K- 9 coverage in house, but
for the smaller PDs, it’s a way of
making their K- 9 units more effective
and efficient.
Dick van Leenen replies: In Holland,
it is policy and very common for K- 9
units from different police departments
to assist each other. That way, patrol
officers always have a 100-percent
backup during calls. Of course, the
larger police departments don’t need
I have a new dog. He is a
19-month-old Dutch
Tracy Bowling replies:
resolve. There are many reasons why
some dogs are inclined to that behavior. A handler can spend much
time analyzing the reasons for the
barking in an effort to find a solution.
However, you may never identify
completely the reason or reasons for
the behavior. We can always assume
the obvious reasons, such as boredom,
separation anxiety, or resentment of
confinement, but sometimes none of
those reasons are totally correct and, in
fact, you may never identify why a dog
feels compelled to bark constantly
when confined.
PHOTOGRAPH: COURTESY OF ACEK9.COM
Often, if the problem is not solved
quickly, it only gets worse. Incessant
barking can cause additional stress to
the dog and can result in escalation of
the problem.
It is always good to attempt to identify the root cause of a problem to best
determine a solution. However, even
when we feel we can accurately
identify the root cause of the barking,
it may be extremely difficult from a
practical standpoint to solve the problem. For instance, we can do little if
boredom is the root cause of the barking because we cannot keep the dog
constantly engaged in doing something
interesting. So from a practical standpoint, we may not always be able to
provide a consistent solution to the
problem.
You say you have tried many of the
common solutions and nothing helps.
If the normal corrective techniques
have been properly applied and did
not correct the barking, then I would
suggest you try a bark collar. Several
different technologies are available.
Some use vibration, noise, or a combination of the two to activate the
collar. Some collars emit irritating or
ultrasonic tones when the dog barks.
Some collars release a spray to discourage the barking. Some are
designed to provide a static shock to
the dog when barking occurs. Those
models come with both manual and
automatic settings that increase the
level of static shock if the dog persists
in barking. Which collar will work
best for your dog is something you will
