A POLICE OFFICER AND HIS DOG

Lux picked up the scent and tracked two women to a thickly wooded
area not far from where they'd tried to steal a truck.

He barked, letting his handler, Cst. Barry Roy, know that something
was in the bushes.

Roy called out to the women, but they refused to budge.

So Lux went in snarling, his new titanium teeth glinting as he barked.

He pulled one of the women out Roy thought the other girl would follow.

"I'm surprised it took coaxing," he said.

"Lux can inflict a lot of damage."

Roy has been teamed with Lux, a five-year-old German Shepherd from
Czechoslovakian, for more than three years, the last two with the
Ridge Meadows RCMP detachment.

The two helped catch the two women, who were attempting to steal a
truck on 238 Avenue, in January.

Roy thinks being a service dog handler is the best job in the RCMP force.

"We get to go to the best calls," he said. "I get to work with
everybody in the detachment and know members on every watch. I rely
on their support, but I also work independently."

Lux's speciality is narcotics. He is trained to sniff out crystal
meth, cocaine, ecstasy, heroin, hashish, marijuana and magic
mushrooms, but he often helps at other calls.

"Lux loves to work," Roy said. "That's when he is the happiest. I
put him on a harness and he gets a spring."

As a general duty dog team, Roy and Lux can get called out at
anytime. They average three to four calls a day when the detachment is busy.

If police have a search warrant for a house where they suspect
drugs, it's less obtrusive for Lux to go in and sniff them out than
an officer.

And a dog can search a car in about three minutes.

Lux can find lost property or track a lost person.

Roy first applied to be a police service dog handler eight years ago.

"I was told I was No. 365 on the list."

All dog handlers are regular members of the RCMP who volunteer for
the police dog service.

Roy had been an RCMP officer for six years before he became a quarry
aE" a volunteer who works for years with experienced police dog
handlers to learn basic skills.

A quarry's duties vary. They help with training and play the bad guy
at practices aE" fleeing crime scenes, resisting arrest, running
from police, hiding in buildings and acting aggressively.

When clad in a bite suit, made of thick canvas or linen, or when
wearing a padded sleeve, a quarry gets to be a police dog's chew toy.

Roy quarried for four years before he got a puppy.

Potential police service dogs are monitored monthly and are tested
at 49 days, then four, eight and 12 months.

Roy went through three puppies before he got Lux, who passed all the
tests and entered basic training at 14 months.

Because standards are so high, a dog entering the RCMP training
program has only a 17 per cent chance of being accepted.

It takes 125 to 150 dogs to find 35 to 45 teams to graduate.

Training as a dog handler isn't for everyone.

It's one of the toughest jobs in the RCMP, Roy said.

"You are crawling through blackberry bushes and mud and over fences,
keeping pace with a dog."

Dog teams are the most heavily tested section of the RCMP.

Now, eight years after he graduated, Roy has two local quarries
training with him.

Quarry Cst. Bruce Ternan just got his puppy.

Lux can't hold back his excitement when he see Ternan. He tugs at
his harness and barks.

He knows it is time to train.

Ternan lays a track. Lux memorizes his scent.

"Lux, sue," Roy shouts firmly

The command tells him, "I need to get my head down and follow that smell."

He follows the scent through trees and finds a reward at the end.

Roy has different rewards for Lux for different tasks. When he finds
a person, he gets his orange bouncy ball.

He also has different collars that tell him what task he's on. He
wears a different collar on a pursuit and another one for a riot situation.

"He likes his toys," Roy said. "He's not big on food rewards."

In fact, Roy never uses food as a reward for Lux. He isn't a pet,
Roy said. "As much as I love him, he's a working dog."

Lux is on a special raw meat diet.

"He's a big investment," Roy said.

There are 120 police dog units across Canada. The estimated cost to
train a member and dog team is $60,000. A healthy dog like Lux costs
less than $1,000 to maintain annually, although he recently broke
two canine teeth. He's had them replaced with titanium ones. Roy
points to them when Lux barks in response to his command.

"Lux isn't afraid of anything," Roy said. "He's a happy go-lucky
dog. But when I put him to work, he's is very focused."

Roy and Lux left the local detachment for Alberta at the beginning
of the month.

They've been replaced with another dog team.