Durham Regional Canine Unit

Hemmi, of the Durham Region Canine Unit

Strolled out into the backyard this morning only to discover a police officer lurking in the bushes just behind my place.  Just over the fence from him a municipal worker was cutting park grass with a Ride-On lawnmower.

I wondered if I'd stumbled onto a man hunt or crime scene.

Seeing my raised eyebrows, the officer said, "Laying a track for my dog."

"Excuse me?" I said, seeing no dogs around.

"You've heard of the K-9 unit?" he said.  "I'm laying a scent for my dog."

The officer was holding an elongated sack that I realized he was using to lay down the scent.

"I have to wait until the grass is cut.  The dog'll follow the scent better then."

"How long will it be able to follow you?" I asked.

"We try to keep it to real world scenarios," he said.  "The dog will follow me in about half an hour, but it can follow my scent up to two hours or more."

"You need a vicious dog like Maxwell here in your outfit," I said, indicating our golden retriever, who was sitting quietly at my side and hadn't even barked once at this stranger lurking in our backyard.

The officer smiled.  "Beautiful family dogs, those."  His dogs were German Shepherds, I learned later, specially trained abroad in countries like the Netherlands, Holland and the Czech Republic, and cost about $6500 apiece.

It was time to take Maxwell for a walk so we parted ways.  Five minutes later during my walk I spotted the officer laying down a scent in the woods near our place.  Half an hour after that I was cutting the grass in the backyard when I saw the officer's partner with their dog, dutifully following the scent.  I had been wondering what the dog would do about the rather high fence separating our neighbour's backyard from the park and said as much to the second officer when he got close enough.

"It's not the dog I'm worried about," he said, and sure enough I watched with amazement as the German Shepherd leapt to the top of the fence in a single bound and climbed over without either hesitation or a single command from the officer.  Despite his quip, his well-padded outfit and the knapsack on his back the officer climbed the fence almost (but not quite) as gracefully as the dog.

I watched for another couple of minutes as the dog followed the eccentric path the first officer had left, tracking it with the sort of single-minded focus my dog (as wonderful as he is) only ever manages to achieve when tackling, say, sleep.  Scanning the photos of the Canine unit's dogs later, I determined that I had been watching the work of PSD (Police Service Dog) Hemmi (though I could be wrong).  According the the unit's <a href="http://www.drps.ca/internet_explorer/our_organization/unit.asp?Scope=Unit&ID=43">website</a>, Hemmi and her eight canine colleagues "responded to over 2,143 K-9 calls, over 2,900 routine calls, located 139 people and recovered 111 pieces of evidence" in 2011.

It's good to know the citizens of Durham are in such capable canine hands. Er, paws.