Who Owns or Has owned a WL X SL Cross .. facts not opinions - Page 27

spot on vk

And how many WL's make it in law enforcement?  100% 75%? 50%? 10%? On what do you base that figure and let's see videos to back up the claims.

Blitzen, that is an excellent question, however, let me ask you, if you were looking for your next show dog today, which dogs would you be looking at? In LE, I dont know of a single handler or trainer who cares about their dog's pedigree or paperwork, hence, most of the dogs working the streets today are unpapered, non registered dogs of questionable heritage. It does make sense though that one would look after the types of dogs that have had previous success in doing that type of work. Most of the time, that is the broker's job, not the agency's, but, then again, the broker will go after sources that have higher % of producing a good LE dog. In today's market, a lot of the dogs working the street are sport dog rejects, or the Malinois of the KNPV because its easier to find good candidates there since the dogs are trained from day one for police work and bring a lot more to the table then the sport reject.

Okay, I get all of that, but let's get down to the grassroots and talk about how many WL's actually make it in law enforcement. Let me put it another way, how many of the posters to this thread who breed WL's exclusively have actually bred GSD's that are or were active K-9s?  Not the dogs they bought from brokers or imported from the Czech Republic, how many have they bred? Out of how many puppies?

The big issue here seems to be that few WL x SL are good enough for LE, so how many WL's actually are? Since officers don't know what's a good dog and what's not, how do breeders decide which of their dogs have actually made the grade? If Melba, Bubba, and KitKat are expected to back their claims with photos and videos, then let's ask the same of everyone.

I suspect the failure rate of WL's in law enforcement isn't any lower than that of the SL x WL dogs.  It may be about the same percentage of washouts as ASL, GSL, combos, etc.  If  breeders are saying they breed WL's because their dogs do a better job as K-9's, then prove it because that knowledge that might help other breeders in the future.

BTW, HD, I had no idea that most of the GSD's/K-9's working the street today are not registered. That's a sad commentary on the breed as a whole, don't you think?

there are LE K9 trials held all over the U.S. anyone wanting a better perspective on LE dogs should find and attend one. while I'm sure there may be some in LE who concern themselves with pedigrees, wl/sl, mal/GSD, etc. I have yet to meet one.

one of the top performers I have see was described by his handler as a "dutch shepherd mix". pretty sure he would not understand that he should have a "pedigreed" dog. in fact, I don't think anyone could convince him that a pedigree would make for a better partner.

Blitzen, the unregistered dogs is part of the territory. I have no use for paper work or registrations or pedigrees, none of that will make my dog work any better or any worse. ILMD is 100% correct, street dogs are of mixed heritage and the pure bred ones are not registered because to me, it makes no difference what lines the dog came out of, what color it is, how many ears it has or how fluffy its tail is, can it work is the question.

I dont know if you remember Duke posting a vid of a puppy out of one of his litters a couple of months a go...really nice little puppy biting Duke instead of the rag he offered and someone asked him for the pedigree of that puppy. Duke's response was, "I breed these dogs for police work, no papers". That is reality on the street. 

One of the best single purpose dogs I have ever trained and handled was a female chocolate lab...or so I was told, but, if you blurred your eyes, you can swear you can see the pit in her. The dog was a demon of an explosives detection dog and I assure you, when she worked, none of her backround info mattered to me. There is an expression in police work and it says, "when a police dog bites, his looks account for nothing".

It's been quite a few years since I saw a police dog trial. I used to go to the one held in Hegins, PA and if I remember correctly, most of those dogs appeared to have been purebred GSD's at the time. The Royal Canadian Mounties still use GSD's, they have their own breeding program using Czech dogs. We were just discussing that on another breed board. http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/depot/pdstc-cdcp/sale-sal/breeding-program-eng.htm

A few years after 911 I was in NYC and had the chance to talk with a K-9 officer with a Czech GSD. It was  her second GSD, the first died from lymphosarcoma a few years after working at the World Trade Center. She told me they were probably going to phase out GSD's in favor of Malis. The GSD's they were  buying from brokers were not trained as they were said to be. A friend boards dogs for NYC homeland security, all Czech imports.  I have no idea if any of these dogs are registered or registerable. The NYC K-9 looked to me as if she might have had some rottie in her; I wasn't sure it was a GSD when I first saw it.

BTW..... OT..... I guess but the NYC officer was getting ready to retire and when I asked what was going to happen to her dog, she said the officers are allowed to keep them as pets. I thought that was a nice thing to hear after all the negatives about retired K-9's.

I do remember Duke's video, HD. Sounds to me that is impossible to know which lines really are behind many of the LE K-9's in the US?

The problem comes in when you need to recreate those dogs and no one knows where they came from.