K9 Top Tales

Please enjoy this episode with Bill Gaskins of Integrity Noseworx: Bill served in the US Air Force as a Law Enforcement Specialist Military Working Dog Handler of 10 different dogs, Trainer for over 50 operational K9 Teams, and Kennel Master managing kennel operations all over the world. As a canine training instructor, he trained and certified 624 operational Canine Teams for deployment to Iraq a...

Dustin Stiles is a US Marine Corp Veteran and one of the first 9 soldiers to handle an Explosive Detection Dog as part of the U.S. Marine Corp  off-leash EOD K9 program, also known as a Patrol Explosive Detection Dog Enhanced team.  At the time, this was a new program which was designed to allow dogs to operate 50-100+ meters ahead of infantry or EOD teams, significantly increasing safety by ident...

Paul Bunker has decades of K9 detection experience, having worked all over the world and across many disciplines as a handler, instructor, innovator, and author. Starting more than 40 years ago training narcotics, explosives, and mine detection K9s for the military in both the UK and United States, Paul now predominantly focuses on K9 detection work for conservation, conducting endangered species...

Sometimes even a hero needs a hero - that's where Intermountain Lifeflight steps in. Thanks to my guest Darby Earle, Flight RN, LIfeflight now has a program to provide treatment and helicopter transport for operational K9s when they are injured and need emergency care. Since the program's start, two police K9s have been saved and returned to work the streets with their human partners. 

In this episode, Retired CT State Trooper Andy Rebmann, author of the Cadaver Dog Handbook, shares lots of great training information and fantastic K9 capers with his Patrol K9s, Trailing Bloodhounds, and Cadaver Dogs. Hard to even scratch the surface of someone with 50 years experience but it was a super fun conversation with a legend in the industry. Thanks for the chat Andy! Andy's bio: Andy ha...

Renee (Retired Col. Annette Renee GrandPre) has lived a life of service from start to finish. With military deployments to Kosovo in 2006 and to Kandahar in 2018, she rounded out her military career as a full bird Colonel with too many awards and decorations to enumerate, culminating most recently with the Legion of Merit award. Her civilian work as an ER, Trauma, ICU and Psychiatric care nurse in...

Fred "Big Fred" Fusco of Storm Tactical Consulting Website: stormtactical.wixsite.com/stormtactical IG: www.instagram.com/storm_tactical_consulting/ YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC0KNW8fzQrOZgCSxQXHoHzA In this episode, Fred shares his training and deployment mission experiences and what it takes for a dog to make the grade in Special Operations. Fred is a retired US Army Special Mission Unit...

Please enjoy this episode with SHANNON KRIEGER, a person who has served the United States with dedication, sacrifice, and honor. From 1999 - 2012, Shannon Krieger was a working K9 handler and trainer for Special Operations Forces (SOF) and a K9 program that would become one of the best practical military initiatives in the last century. That initiative was the Combat Assault Dog (CAD) program in U...

ATAK-9 Instructor/Trainer Spotlight #1 - Steve "Zane" Stoops: Welcome Steve of American Tactical Aggregate K-9 (ATAK-9) to K9 Top Tales. Steve has evolved through 3+ decades to become the dog man of dog men. He has vast field experience as a police K9 officer serving 20 years, international contract K9 Handler and Program Manager, and since 2004, a lead trainer for the Special Operations community...

In light of the recent and very tragic Condominium Collapse disaster in Surfside, Florida, I called on a long-time Search and Rescue K9 colleague and friend, Deresa Kenney (Teller,) who is a one of the original FEMA Disaster K9 Handlers. In this episode, Deresa not only tells of her experiences while working large scale disasters such as the Oklahoma City Bombing, 9/11 World Trade Center, Hurrican...

Rose (Rosalie) Cox is a one of a small number of women who paved the way for female handlers in the Patrol and Detection K9 world. She is one of the hardest working folks in the industry and has walked the walk starting back in 1987 as a Handler for the Utah Department of Corrections. In 1990, she joined the Salt Lake City Police Department as a Patrol Officer and quickly became a K9 and SWAT Trai...

Roy Lopez has a very impressive and long history of service, starting out as a Navy Seal, a Veteran of Desert Shield and Desert Storm, then joining the Border Patrol in 1997 where he became one of the founding members of both the US Border Patrol’s BORSTAR team and the BORSTAR K9 Program. While working his dogs Malcolm and Alex in tracking and cadaver and amassing nearly 2000 rescues/recoveries, R...

Well, this is episode #8 (not #7 - apparently I've lost track)! So many experiences shared in this episode. Sonja Heritage is likely one of the most experienced FEMA Disaster Response Search and Rescue Dog Handlers and trainers in the United States. As a former member of the FEMA Virginia TF1 and State Department Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance USAID, she has traveled the world for more than...

Coby Webb, PhD, is a nationally known Police Captain (recently retired) for a Department of more than 4000 sworn and an accomplished Handler of dual-purpose patrol/narcotics K9s and Bloodhounds. She is best known and most highly regarded for her work handling, training, judging and evaluating bloodhounds and is a recognized court expert in scent discrimination. She has consulted on hundreds of hig...

LAPD Sgt. Mike Goosby - With more than 750 criminal apprehensions walking behind a K9, Mike Goosby is one of the nation's authorities regarding tactical K9 deployment. In this episode, Mike shares some fun stories about his K9s Thunder and Luca and some great gems re deployment, living with a police K9, and LAPD K9 command and control. A couple of Goosby originals: "You can't expect your K9 team t...

Sometimes the unsung heroes of the working K9 Community are the Search dogs that locate those who have passed before they could be rescued. This episode highlights my Great Basin K-9 SAR teammates, Joe Jennings and his Golden Retriever Gunny https://greatbasink-9sar.org/ Gunny was certified as a live find wilderness K9, an Avalanche Dog, but also as a dog that would hunt for and locate human remai...

When watching animals working on TV, did you ever ask yourself, "How did they get the dog to do that?" Well, my guest Sue Chipperton has decades of Studio Animal work and knows all the tricks of the trade. She will share with us the story of Eddie, the Labrador Retriever that performs all sorts of heroic deeds while cast on Hawaii 5-0, some history regarding her work with Gidget the Taco Bell Dog,...

Linda Porter of the Canine Training Academy in Cañon City, Colorado, tells of hers and her husband John Lutenberg's unique experiences training tracking bloodhounds and Ivory and Weapons Detection K9s for the Rangers of the Mara Conservancy in Kenya, Africa, to combat poaching. Linda and John offer tracking/trailing K9 training of the highest quality at their facility - https://www.caninetraininga...

Bill Dotson is well known throughout the Search and Rescue (SAR) community as a Search Manager and Trainer/Instructor. In this episode, however, we'll chat with Bill about his early days in SAR with his Belgian Shepherd Lys, traveling for testing to Switzerland, and forming CARDA (California Rescue Dog Association.) With deployments close to home in Northern California and also throughout the worl...

In this episode, Kevin Sheldahl shares his decades of experience as a K9 Handler and Trainer for the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Department in New Mexico and now as owner and trainer for K-9 Services (www.k-9services.com). During the episode, Kevin uses some terms which may not be familiar to some listeners so the definitions are provided: DM - Degenerative Myelopathy/disc disease | FTO - Field Tr...

Welcome to the K9 Top Tales podcast where you will hear exciting, interesting, and at times heart-wrenching stories of these K9 warriors, protectors, rescuers, and crime fighters directly from their K9 handlers and partners. This Podcast trailer includes an introduction to your host, retired FBI Special Agent and K9 Handler/Trainer of 25 years, Sonja Nordstrom. You can learn more about Sonja and h...