To tell if our bloodhounds are in work or play mode, check their leash. When Holmes and Duke have their leash clipped to their regular collar they’re all puppy – wrestling with each other, getting belly rubs, and stepping on their own oversized ears. But as soon as that leash switches to their official work harness these hounds are all business.
The pups, now five months old, have advanced from following a simple straight track to zeroing in on a scent article – in this case a glove another deputy has been keeping in their vest to absorb their unique smell – and following it on a long track with a lot of distractions. “That’s really the bread and butter of these hounds, latching on to a specific smell and then following it to its conclusion,” said Pasco County Sheriff’s Office lead bloodhound trainer Corporal Rob Wilkins. Apprehension dogs like German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois only follow the freshest scent in an area, but bloodhounds can pick out a specific odor and keep it in their minds for hours.
Deputy Anthony Ashworth brings little Duke to the glove laying on the grass and gives him the command to smell it. Down goes the nose, and with just a quick sniff Duke is ready. “Seek-track,” Deputy Ashworth commands, and they’re off to the races. Duke bounds through the grass, down a well-traveled pedestrian path with the smells of many other feet, and into the woods where he finally finds a man hiding… with a cup of kibble of course.
“It’s crazy to see the transition from week one to where we are now,” Deputy Ashworth said. “To see them coming out here on day one, putting their nose to the ground and finding the guy, to now we have two people walking out and splitting off, and they’re using scent discrimination to follow the correct trail.”
Being able to stick to one scent without being distracted by another one is vital to a bloodhound’s success. During training two people walk out side by side, one drops a scent article, and later they split in different directions. The bloodhounds ignore the distraction track and stick to the target. “It doesn’t sound like a lot but in our world that’s like the Superbowl because we need that dog to pay attention to the correct odor,” Corporal Wilkins said. When they hit the streets they might have to follow a lost child’s track through a busy park, an active neighborhood, or a mall, and the scent could be hours old. “It’s asking a lot of the little guys but they’re all just killing it.”
The pups are always having new elements introduced to their training. “Recently we started high hides – someone hiding in a tree,” Corporal Wilkins said. “They have to learn what that odor ‘looks’ like. When a subject is in a tree the odor comes down in a bell shape, it doesn’t fall straight to the ground.” The dogs need to learn what that scent pattern means and figure out that they need to look up. Whenever they add a new challenge they temporarily relax other factors. “I don’t want them to have a negative experience. I want them getting out of the car thinking I can win everything.”
Duke and Holmes are part of a litter of 11 siblings, all of which have gone to law enforcement agencies around the country. Three of the pups are with Pasco and all five are being trained at the Pasco K-9 facility. This group of hounds is proving to be so exceptional that they’re incorporating training elements most bloodhounds don’t get. For the shepherds and Malis, training is done with a toy reward. When they do something correctly, they get their tug toy and playful interaction with their handler – that’s all the reward they need. Bloodhounds, on the other hand, are usually trained only with food rewards. However, as an experiment, the trainers decided to add a tug toy as a secondary reward. “Typically they don’t want anything to do with toys,” Corporal Wilkins said. “But we introduced it, and they are about 80 percent committed to it. They like it, they carry it, they’re not really going to tug with you because they’re not a tugging type of dog. But it has a value to them, and I think that value will increase.”
Anything they can do to reward the dogs for correct behavior will only reinforce it. A big part of training – and something that can be hard for some handlers to learn – is the praise voice. Deputies often learn to pitch their voice low and speak seriously, which can help them maintain an aura of authority in many situations. They soon learn this doesn’t work with dogs, which respond best to high-pitched, excited praise.
Trainers have also started something else that is very unusual with these remarkable bloodhound brothers: obedience. Most working bloodhounds learn just one thing – how to track. Bloodhounds are notoriously stubborn and resistant to any training that doesn’t involve their nose. “Nobody does obedience with bloodhounds,” Corporal Wilkins said. “We’re trying. I’m not going to make any promises, but the dogs are taking to it really well.”
Right now they’re using marker training, with the goal of convincing the dogs to get on a board. When they accidentally touch the board they’re rewarded with an excited “Yes!” and given a food treat. (They get something a little tastier than their usual kibble during obedience training since it’s not as fun or natural to them as sniffing.) Eventually they figure out that the board is a food button and get on it willingly. “We call the board kindergarten. Once they’re there, they can start learning.” Next they’ll learn sit, down, and stay. There’s no punishment for mistakes, just withholding the treat and a gentle “uh-uh.” The puppies are eager to please though and are starting to figure out what their handlers want. “They’re so much better at it than I would have anticipated. If I’d known this maybe we’d have done this years ago. It’s pretty impressive. We’ll take it until we hit a wall.”
Duke and Holmes are doing equally well but have different personalities when they track. “Holmes is a more methodical tracker,” Corporal Wilkins said. “Duke is a little more reckless. He’s smash and crash. Both are effective, just different.” He doesn’t want them to be too fast at this point though. “As their drive increases and they get bigger and stronger and the game becomes more valuable to them they’re going to go faster. My first dog was almost a sprint, because I let him go too fast when he was young… and I paid the price for it later.” When they are adult dogs with long legs and amazing endurance, their handlers will have to keep up with them for miles and miles.
Handlers are learning as much as their dogs, taking an active role because training will be ongoing through their career and they won’t always have an instructor to guide them. “When they do maintenance training down the road they need to know how to problem solve,” Corporal Wilkins said. “The goal is for these guys to have all the information.
Both handlers are enjoying the training and eagerly anticipate the day their bloodhounds make their first official catch. “K-9 is something I’ve always wanted,” Deputy Ashworth said. He has been in law enforcement for seven years, with prior experience in West Virginia. “I hadn’t thought about bloodhounds before, but I’d heard great things. Someone I knew from where I used to work had a bloodhound.” He sees great value in bringing bloodhounds to the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office to search for missing persons or to track suspects. “I think it’s going to be a game-changer.”
Duke seems to be looking forward to the job. At Deputy Ashworth’s home he has a happy puppy life. “My wife loves him, and I’ve got a German shepherd who is just ecstatic, she loves to play with him.” But as soon as little Duke sees that his handler is in his uniform and ready to go he runs to the truck. “When I open up the back door he’s jumping up and down and then he climbs up in there, ready to go.”