K9 Bellator International

11/10/2024

New school for 2025 in Australia 🇦🇺

🐾☀️ ®

13/09/2024

Seminar Aftermath. We will share some more photos in the coming days.

We hope everyone travels safe back home and look after yourself ☺️ Especially those that drove from the other side of the country.

12/09/2024

At this time of year, we are fortunate to have many renowned dog training experts visiting Australia. We are incredibly grateful to Jerry Bradshaw from Tarheel K9 for sharing his knowledge and expertise with us this week. He is helping us with the development of our young dogs, fine-tuning our experienced dogs, and ensuring our almost-retired dogs have some fun. Most of all he is teaching us how to be better dog handlers and trainers.

Various agencies and members of the private sector are coming together to broaden their understanding of different dog deployments and controlled methods for managing aggression in a positive way. It’s inspiring to see the dogs excelling in their training and the spark getting ignited from within.

Everything in dog training is a process, and every step is a picture we need to paint for our dogs. And when we think we have reached the finished product, our dogs are ready for retirement.

Dog Force Australia

31/08/2024

This little machine recently flew to Perth to do a job for the UFC.

Detection is dynamic, especially in operational detection dog deployments. The dogs deal with so many variables. The job doesn’t start when the dog arrives at the location. It starts from the moment the dog hits the road.

The operational searches are quite different from the training scenarios we can simulate in Joy’s case. They entail searching for an extended period and big open areas, either in the early mornings or late in the evenings, being exposed to different weather conditions, and working through various environmental challenges.

Genetics does play a role. A dog that is intrinsically reinforced by the search or ‘pointing’ can work in our favour, but it can also present a significant challenge during training.

In Joy’s case. She is a fu***ng weapon. She tackles any job that comes her way with determination and perseverance. On top of that, she is incredibly cute, but don’t let her looks fool you; she happily takes out a Malinois if needed. 😆

18/06/2024

For the past 20 years, Jerry Bradshaw and his team at Tarheel Canine Training, Inc. have been conducting nationally and internationally acclaimed seminars for Police K9 Units, MWD Units, and sports enthusiasts.

Through Jerry’s podcast, you can experience the top-tier training material offered at these seminars. As a seasoned expert in the field, Jerry is directly involved in overseeing all training programs at Tarheel Canine, specialising in Dual-Purpose/Narcotics Detection K9s and Personal Protection K9s.

His track record as a two-time National Champion in Schutzhund and PSA speaks volumes about the expertise and quality of training you can expect.

Get ready for an intense and comprehensive 5-day seminar focusing on “High-Risk Deployments & Controlled Aggression Basics.” This event is specifically tailored for Law Enforcement & Military patrol dog teams, as well as private training organisations involved in preparing dogs for these fields. Sports enthusiasts in the IGP and PSA fields are also welcome to attend.

Interested participants should make themselves familiar with the attached program before registering.

https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/jerry-bradshaw-5-day-seminar-tickets-928153390777?aff=oddtdtcreator

10/05/2024

Go Crash ❤️

21/04/2024

Are you interested in becoming a detection dog trainer or are you a handler looking to deepen your understanding of the training process? Our training program is designed to cater to both!

You'll learn about different methods of training detection dogs and explore their advantages and disadvantages without dismissing any of them.

The goal is to expand your knowledge and skill set in dog training and teach you how to apply these methods when training and deploying detection dogs in an operational setting.

Our program will dive deeper into reinforcement and reward strategies, the use of different markers, how to create hope and motivation, and the basic mechanical skills with indirect rewards.

You'll learn how to teach an animal ‘how to learn’ and become operant. This course is meant to open your mind to different ways of thinking when it comes to animal behaviour.

As a dog handler, you may already have a solid understanding of the fundamentals. However, when faced with environmental challenges or false positives or negatives, it can be overwhelming.

By learning how to problem-solve, you can overcome most of these challenges on your own and feel confident in your abilities.

If you're a dog trainer, our course will help you understand the bigger picture of training detection dogs and the challenges that come with operational searches or the transition towards it.

Holding a leash seems simple, but do you know how much you're holding your dog back or how much you accidentally cue your dog while working with them?

You'll learn how to work with your dog on a leash, how to work search patterns, and how to task your dog.

Our course will answer most of your questions about detection, including how to imprint a dog on odour, what tools to use, how odour behaves, and why we should implement blank, blind, and double-blind searches.

You'll also receive hands-on practical training, as we understand that each person learns differently.

We want to give you the tools to be able to write a training plan and how to collect data. We know that data can be really confronting, but it provides room for growth.

Our training program is the culmination of everything we have learned over the years, including our own experience as operational dog handlers.

You won't find a more comprehensive program that covers everything from the basics to the challenges of operational searches.

This is a 10-day course that allows you to bring your own dog or use one of ours.

If you are interested, go to our website https://www.k9bellator.com/courses and flick us an email.

07/02/2024

Something that does not happen very often, and therefore, it is extra special. Josie is officially retired and had her retirement party last week. On Tuesday, she cleared one last venue, and on Thursday, we put one last odour out, with a solid indication, she received a shower of tennis balls and lots of love.

It is no secret Josie is a happy girl; she can stare hours into the distance, hoping a bug will fly out of the long grass or chase water drops and try to dig them out of the ground. She never ask for much, she might destroy things as her nickname is “The shredder.”

Over the years, she has worked for various artists such as Pink, U2, Elton John, Billie Eilish, Harry Styles, Ed Sheeran, The Weekend, and many others. Additionally, she has helped many new handlers start with their first search and has travelled across almost every part of Australia, taking long road trips and planes to reach her destinations.

We are grateful for the incredible work Josie has done over the years, and she truly deserves her retirement to just be a dog and enjoy life with lots of raindrops, bugs, and shoes to shred.

01/01/2024

2024 will be a busy year for us if it goes anything like 2023 did! We are off to a busy start with high quality young dogs ranging in age from 8 weeks of age to 8mths of age.

We have working line GSPs, Springers, Cockers and Labradors. Our dogs are either bred by us, or hand selected from Australia's most reputable working dog breeders.

As we raise our pups, they are introduced to kennel environments, crate training, basic obedience and socialisation, drive development, basic search activities, training a response and in some cases odour recognition & discrimination (when we know what target odours they will go for).

As you will see by looking at our page, we also love what we do and probably what we enjoy the most, is letting the dogs be dogs for some parts of their day.

As a result, our dogs are healthy, well rounded and stable in their temperament, driven and independent. They are a pleasure to work and train and suitable for a range of challenges that various deployment types present. We supply police, military, prisons, biosecurity, conservation and private sector organisations.

Our dogs are not cheap! Preparing good detection dogs costs a lot of money in kennelllng, staffing, training equipment, feeding, vetting and the list goes on. We also have to account for the costs of raising dogs which don't make it and need to be re-homed at significant losses. Supplying working dogs is not a game for the faint hearted - but it is extremely rewarding. We know exactly what our clients need in their detection dogs, our trainers have worked, and continue to work across the industry, and we know how to provide this.

We also need lead-in time! Please think about your training needs well in advance. This allows us to handpick a pup for you and target its development to the role you want it for (potentially including the odour imprinting). We provide contracts at the beginning, due to the investment we need to put into these dogs.

We are reaching a point now where our available dogs for 2024 are starting to move quickly, so please put your orders in now and even give so thought to putting a deposit down with a plan for your 2025 training needs.

Please contact us at [email protected] or call us on 0497 690 365 to get the process of ordering new dogs for your agency, or you personally, underway.

Thanks for your support these last two years, we hope you had a great Christmas and New Year and look forward to working through 2024 with you all!

21/12/2023

15/10/2023

We might are a bit quiet but we are working hard with all dogs on their development. ☺️

Currently we have 11 young dogs in development who are getting trained each day 🔥

08/09/2023

I can’t really say we are blessed.

Because it is hard to grow a company based on working dogs. But if you hang in there long enough, have passion and perseverance, an amazing team, a genuine reason to show up every day. And when s**t gets hard you won’t give a 100 but 200%. Then s**t will come of the ground.

I can’t express how proud I am now to see the small glimpses of what I always wanted. Instead of doing it for the love of training working dogs. We have our dogs now getting trained every single day by their own trainers, they go out for exposure and socialisation and data gets collected each day.

At the moment we have the following dogs in development:
Cadaver, Explosives, Narcotics, SAR, Arson and two specialist projects.

For 3.5 years we have let Bellator be in the shadows of the other two businesses and now our focus finally can shift. 😊

08/09/2023

06/09/2023

Jaffa and Monty have started the foundation of indicating on a human scent article. These boys will be learning the art of tracking of

15/08/2023

A quick early morning warm up with our detection wall covered in dew. Before heading of to the jobs 💜

09/08/2023

06/08/2023

03/08/2023

🔥 Job opportunity 🔥

Currently we are looking at a potential person for a fulltime time job at our facility. This will be mainly our pet dog side but also one day with our working dogs (if your experience allows this).

Our pet dog facility and our working dogs heavily blend in with each other. We are just looking for that person with a spark for all dogs. From a crazy cocker spaniel to a serious malinois.

Please send your resume to [email protected]