Police pups bound ahead in battle to lick crime

When 23-year-old Zhao Yingxi collected her first police dog for training in 2020 she had little choice in the matter.

She and her fellow dog handlers had drawn lots for the puppies and she ended up with Ujan, a 1-year-old male German shepherd that already weighed a whopping 40 kilograms.

Zhao is a slight woman, and it's hard to imagine the then novice dog handler training such a large, strong animal. When she first encountered Ujan, the young canine's body almost filled its entire kennel.

She thought of exchanging the dog for a more docile one, and the start of its training didn't go well. "Ujan is a demanding dog and I had a really hard time," she said.

The puppy refused her simple command to sit, for example, and Zhao felt she had no affinity with the dog, which made her feel depressed. "Other dog handlers also took care of Ujan, helped train him, and took him to the sports ground for competitions such as tug-of-war. He behaved quite well and excited with them, not like with me," she said.

The frustration continued and Zhao and Ujan were the only team to fail the first assessment. After that, she adjusted her mindset and encouraged Ujan more, allowing him to rest between training sessions.

The situation improved, and Zhao adopted a different training approach for Ujan. Instead of disciplining him, she focused on activities he enjoyed.

In China, police dogs play an important role in criminal investigations. Their handlers have developed training methods so the canines can search for blood, track narcotics, hunt out material evidence and even combat criminal suspects.

There are more than 14,000 police officers nationwide handling over 29,000 police dogs on active duty, data released by the Ministry of Public Security last September showed.

Public security organs at all levels should have police dogs as a supporting force, and each category of police work should have a proportion of canines based on needs, according to a ministry regulation.

The Beijing Police Dog Breeding Center is the base for the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau criminal investigation corps ninth division, and currently houses more than 300 police dogs on active duty. The center breeds new puppies on a regular basis, cares for retired dogs, and maintains a special cemetery to honor meritorious police dogs.

Instead of relying on cruel, outdated training methods to control what are generally believed to be fierce dogs, the center fosters a scientific, humane and rewards-based system.

If such training methods are used at an early stage, a police dog's overall behavior is better, although individual differences among dogs exist, experts said.