Because I just saw one. An officer was wandering through our school cafeteria and chatting with the campus rent-a-cops, not in any apparent hurry. He had a police dog with him. I’m sure it was an official police dog, because it was wearing a harness that said POLICE in big bright letters on the side.
The dog was a golden retriever. I’m trying, but can’t for the life of me come up with a reason why a golden would be a police dog. They’re smart and physically agile, sure, but not particularly scent-driven (certainly not compared to a beagle or other hound), nor aggressive and strong, nor much of anything else. They’re so popular as pets because of their playfulness and willingness to take commands from just about anyone, which seem like traits the police wouldn’t want.
My home town had a golden retriever as a drug dog. Regardless of their lack of scent-drive, they can be easily trained to focus on a specific smell. IIRC, all their drug dogs were rescue animals from the pound, so they didn’t worry about a specific breed.
A wide variety of breeds are used as drug dogs. Temperament and individual trainability will be more important factors. I suspect just about any dog breed can easily smell the drugs. Goldens are also a popular search and rescue breed. A site concerning drug dogs in schools observes:
Just on reading the title of your post, I thought “Maybe it’s a PR dog for kids.” Then in the post, you mentioned it being brought to a school.
That’s not to say the dog might not have other official duties, but police departments do have budgets dedicated to education and public relations. Dogs are a great ice breaker with kids that makes it easier for the cops to get past negative connotations attached to their reputation or uniforms.
For reference, my wife has volunteered with several different police forces over a couple of decade, and often participates in PR-focused work.
They can be trained well too, and then, if you want to bust some drug dealer passing stuff on to an associate in a train station, they’re not going to be able to resist coming over and going ‘aww, who’s a cute widdle doggy den?’ and you’ve got them!
Those who resist this pull may be suspicious characters. If they have kids with them, they’re definitely suspicious characters.
The beginning of dog training programs just teach general principles like socialization and obedience. Once the dogs have learned these basic skills, they’re moved on to specific training like police work, rescue work, or handicapped aid. And some dogs don’t take to the advanced training they were originally intended for and end up getting switched to a different program. So a golden retriever might have originally been intended as a seeing-eye dog but was unable to adapt to that program and was switched to police training instead.
I think they start with something like 10 trainee dogs for every seeing eye dog that graduates. The ones that aren’t suited as service dogs for the blind are repurposed for other services–companion dogs for autistic kids, the deaf, drug dogs, and so on.
[Hijack] This is not the case for K-9 corps police and military dogs, and by “K-9 corps” I mean German Shepards and Rotties etc. that are trained to pursue, detain, and, if commanded, attack. They have as high if not higher wash-out rate, and those that flunk out are returned to the breeder and in almost every case destroyed. The traits that make for a good K-9 do not make for a good personal service animal, much less a good pet.
ETA: I know you didn’t say anything inconsistent with this; it’s not a response so much as a factoid.
A friend of mine is part of the Beagle Brigade at the Philadelphia Airport. As far as I know, her beagle is just used to detect contraband agricultural products. Other orgs might use beagles in other capacities, they are very good sniffers.
As someone who took her seeing-eye dog in training to college classes every day, I can say that even college students can’t resist a cute puppy. Especially if their housing doesn’t allow pets.
