The remote training collar is one of the best tools, if used correctly to correct your police service dog in a situation that would require an officer safety issue.
We cannot ask our police officers to go up and correct their canine that is engaged with a suspect, Officer Safety just went out the door, but with a remote training collar trained correctly on your canine you can make a correction at a distance and be safe.
Students, Police Officer, Private security companies that use the remote training collar must understand their canine must be completely trained or 90 percent before conditioning your canine to a remote training collar. The conditioning process should be at least one to two weeks depending on each canine’s temperament. The remote I use has a pager on it as well as you can stimulate your dog with small amounts of electricity as you condition your dog, and then use the pager to praise your dog when your dog has done the skill correctly. You will find the right level on the remote to motivate your canine, my canine works very well on a level 21, which I can hold in my hand. Some canines require more of a level to motivate the canine and others require less, you will find the right location for your dog. Most collars have a nick and or continuance mode, each canine will work different as your training progresses.
Too Many people use the remote collar as punishment and our attempting to do short cuts to work their dog, when in fact usually they put their dog in avoidance to the remote collar, causing training issues and handler dog conflicts. This type of training will usually take a well versed trainer with the remote collar a long time to fix the mistakes that have been made, if they can be fixed at all.
I start on the 6 foot lead conditioning the canine to the low stimulation, and the pager for praise. Every exercise your dog has been taught in obedience on a 6 foot line should be thoroughly worked with the use of the remote collar. Basically with small amounts of stimulation you are teaching your canine to escape the small amount of electricity, and he or she learns the faster he does what he or she is asked the faster he or she escapes the small tingle underneath their neck. Usually in this training I will have a cat in a vari kennel making noises and so on, so the remote collar training can be done under distractions. I go to field where there are bunnies, and in my area even deer.
After you have completed the 6 foot leash skill level, you can move on to the long line. Again going through all skill levels you have taught you dog, {come when called}, sit, down, playing with the prey toy and releasing the prey toy when told to. You can go to two ball prey training where the dog learns to do skill levels with the use of small stimulation continuance until the canine completes the skill level and then when you praise your canine you use the pager button while praising your canine.
These are very easy ways to teach the skill level to be done very fast and the canine learns to escape the small amount of electricity by doing the skill level fast.
Your canine learns to release the prey toy and very nice obedience, and not to chase bunny rabbits, cats, horses, or any other type of animals. The canine learns to do his skill levels for the handler.
I than take the training of the remote collar to tracking training in the city, where you have dogs running at fences, cats, dogs that are loose, and so on. Again this training takes longer than normal police service dog training. The purpose of this training is to teach the canine his skill levels after he has learned them without the remote and now with the remote, and if you have taken your time and done the 6 foot, and the long line training, than you should have little problems tracking in the city, usually only small corrections are needed to fix distraction problems, so the canine can complete the track and find the bad guy. It’s a hard Job to have’t to tell your administrator that you could not track or find the bad guy hiding because my canine was trying to fight or distracted by other animals.
The remote training collar along with tracking training methods, which is another article, will allow you to track off leash at a nice slow moving pace for the safety of the police officer and the backup officers. As a canine officer if you carry a thigh mounted holster, remember to do all of your training and shooting from that thigh holster. Because when you are on a track or area search with your canine your Job is to watch your dog and control your dog, keeping the canine in your site at all times. You should have an arresting officer and shooting officer who will do all the talking as far as commands are concerned. Your Job is to control your dog and recall your dog back to you, and if you need to shoot to protect yourself or dog or other officers learn to do it from your thigh mounted holster. You have too many other responsibilities, to have your handgun out and at the ready until the time comes, and then you should be proficient from the thigh holster.
Written by Retired Canine Supervisor Richard Tom Brenneman
Part one www.kansaspolicedogs.com