The New Zealand police dogs
Master of Veterinary Studies in Animal Behaviour
2003
Monica Kyono
Abstract
The aim of this study was to identify the parameters required by the New Zealand Police
for their dog breeding and selection program. There has only been one scientific paper on
selecting dogs specifically for police dog work in South Africa. Currently, no statistical
analysis has been conducted on any of the New Zealand Police Dog Sections data. A
questionnaire was conducted covering questions on all aspects of police dog work. It was
aimed at the 120 operational police dog handlers currently working in New Zealand. The
majority of handlers rated their dog high for a number of traits and areas of police dog
work while the ideal dog rated very high for the same traits and areas. Improved stud dog
selection was the best way to improve police dog standards. Training in the regions and
the training centre rated average, as did the foster home program. In general, handlers
thought dogs and handlers were not matched well but personally thought they were
matched reasonably well with their dog. Annual reports for the years 1997 to 2000 were
statistically analysed. An ANOVA was conducted in SAS with the fixed effects; year
activity was measured and dog. The dog’s mean square and the error from the model
were used to calculate the repeatability of each activity. To verify the repeatability values
data for each activity was plotted year against year for all four years of data collected.
The activities ‘heel free’, ‘retrieve’, ‘down stay’, ‘sendaway’, ‘recall and redirection’,
‘distance control’, ‘speak on command’, ‘track’, ‘article search’, ‘passive attack’, ‘chase
and recall’, ‘chase and attack’, and ‘control’ were measured in all four annual reports.
The activity ‘search and escort’ was measured in 1999 and 2000. Year and dog effects
were all statistically significant for all activities except for ‘down stay’ where year effect
was not significant and the activities ‘track’, ‘control’, and ‘search and escort’ where dog
effect was not significant. The highest repeatability was the activity ‘speak on command’
and the lowest repeatability was ‘track’. The dog handlers ranked from highest to lowest
the traits ‘prey drive’, ‘trainability’, ‘activity’, ‘obedience’, ‘playfulness’, ‘independence’
and ‘aggressiveness’. This gives an indication of the traits that should be selected for in a
breeding and selection program. Defining these six traits into a standard definition and
ranking them in level of importance is a good start for creating standard selection criteria.
Improved stud selection, better monitored foster homes, more consistency between
regions and training centre and having more dogs for selection are improvements that can
be made. For the annual reports separating each activity into handler performance and
dog performance will give a better indication of the performance of the dog alone. If the
Police could identify the specific traits essential in each activity and have a way of
measuring the trait when the activity is being tested then repeatability on the trait alone
could be conducted. This would give a better indication into the true heritability value of
the trait as repeatability is closely connected to heritability. This will identify whether it is
beneficial to breed for the trait in question.