Joeri Goedertier, who owns and operates Redwood Krest K9 Center in Battle Ground, Washington, has trained a number of world champion dogs in his career. Photo courtesy Redwood Krest K9 Center.
By Patrick Wagner
In the old days, a snarling junkyard dog was a security mainstay for business owners looking to deter thieves and prowlers. But what about in the world of high-tech surveillance systems and the emerging legalized cannabis industry?
It might sound far-fetched, and certainly wouldn’t fit with everybody’s security plans, but one world champion dog trainer said several of his clients have recently invested in canines for protection among the marijuana trade.
“I have sold probably 10 to 15 dogs in the past 12 months to this kind of sector,” said Joeri Goedertier, who has won eight IPO/Schutzhund world championships for training canines. “Because it’s big money, all of these guys are carrying money. … The guys who don’t want to be armed can get a dog like this.”
Goedertier now owns and operates Redwood Krest K9 Center in Battle Ground, Washington. He was previously a K9 instructor for the Secret Service.
Goedertier said most police dogs only receive a couple months of training. However, his guard dogs are trained for 24 months before being put into service.
“It takes a long time to train a dog like that, for real-life scenarios,” he said. “That’s when you’ll have an excellent trained dog, one that can execute commands and turn on and off.”
For one of Goedertier’s dogs, the price is a far cry steeper than picking up a purebred house pet. The prices start at $25,000 and typically run upwards of $38,000, depending on the level of training the owner requires.
“Since 2001 I have sold one or two dogs in the Seattle area,” Goedertier said. He pointed out that Seattle is not generally known as a high-crime area, “but in the last two months I have sold 12 dogs in the Seattle/Bellevue areas.”
Goedertier also addressed the facts and fiction surrounding his industry.
He said that the typical solutions to guard dogs found in film, like throwing a steak or drugging treats are myths; trained guard dogs accept food from only one or two trusted sources, he said. Simple gimmicks and plot devices do not deceive a trained animal and research shows that guard dogs can be capable of detecting changes so subtle that even the people affected do not notice.
“I have trained a dog for cancer detection at a doctor’s office and a dog who detects high and low blood sugars if you’re diabetic,” Goedertier said. “The dog will know and will lick your hand. Then you’ll know, ‘Hey, my blood sugar is going up or down.’”
But before anyone puts down tens of thousands of dollars to purchase an animal needs to first ask themselves if they are buying a dog for personal protection or if they buying a dog for a business.
“I only do executive personal protection. What we are interested in is providing people with protection for an individual — where the owner goes the dog goes,” Goedertier explained. “You don’t want to allow a dog to just go sniff and do all that stuff. His main job is to protect you. That is what he is trained for.”
Typically guard dogs come with a big price tag upfront. Many professional trainers list starting prices around $10,000 for a dog trained to law enforcement standards. Standard training for police dogs tends to be around four to six months, and after the dog gets paired with an officer, there is typically six to eight weeks of orientation for the duo before they are ready to get out on the street.
Ironically, some police K9s that had once been trained to detect the scent of marijuana are now being retrained in the wake of legalization in Washington and Colorado.