New puppy recruits to join Hong Kong police dog unit amid looming canine retirements
21 working dogs, or around 15 per cent of the total workforce, will have to retire by next year – but pup replacements are already in training
Hong Kong is facing an ageing population and work force – and so is the city’s squad of crime-fighting canines.
Twenty-one working dogs, or around 15 per cent of the total canine workforce in the Police Dog Unit (PDU), will have to retire by next year when they reach the age of nine – the equivalent to a human aged between 60 and 68 years old.
“Because we were facing this retirement wave of our working dogs, we had to plan one to two years ahead to either breed the dogs, or find opportunities to buy or adopt them from overseas,” the unit’s Chief Inspector Lee Cheuk-wai said.
The unit was established in 1949 with four patrol dogs. Since then, it has expanded to a total of 201 dogs, with six different breeds that serve different purposes.
For example, German shepherd patrol dogs can help control a Lan Kwai Fong brawl, while agile springer spaniels with their superior sense of smell act as search dogs for narcotics and explosives.