Drug dog Tasman’s tale: from wags to riches
Three years ago she was leading a life of crime, stealing tennis balls from a court in Blenheim and mastering the game of catch me if you can.
Saved from a life of homelessness, the crossbreed stray has overcome a stroke to become one of the country’s best drug dogs.
A Wellington District Police Facebook post explains. Known as Banjo, she had no owner and roamed. Caught and taken to a pound, she was given a seven-day death sentence.
But something unique about the tan and white pooch granted her a stay of execution and that’s when the police got a call.
The pound explained they had a stray that seemed to have the qualities of a detector dog, but she wasn’t what the force was used to. All detector dogs had been either labradors or shepherds.
The police put her through some simple drills, took her on the spot and she was later flown to their dog training centre at Trentham, Upper Hutt.
At the same time, Senior Constable Matthew Fage was about to begin a nine-week drug course. He was to be partnered with a new dog after his last working companion died suddenly.
Fage was asked to train a german shepherd and Banjo.
Training wasn’t smooth sailing but Banjo was meeting her targets. In the end, she ran rings around the other dog, graduated, and Fage decided to take her on.
She needed a name so Fage settled on ‘‘Tasman’’ – Tas for short – as a reminder of her beginnings in Blenheim and as a token of his support for the Tasman Makos.
Fage, who had worked with German shepherds for 19 years, said the pair received some sideways glances. Colleagues would tease, ‘‘It’s not bring-your-pet-towork day’’.
‘‘Tasman is a little bit different,’’ he said on the Facebook post.
She’s a real character with a zest for life but Fage could tell she was a victim of abuse.
‘‘[For] some of our commands, we raise our hands and the sight of that used to make Tasman cower and urinate herself as she thought that she was about to get hit.
‘‘She’s well-loved now and has grown out of it but it’s very sad to know what she potentially went through in her past life.’’
Tasman had only been working with the police for less than a year when she became paralysed one morning, dragging her back legs.
‘‘I let her out of her kennel one morning, I went inside to make a coffee and when I came back outside I found her.’’
Fage rushed her to the vets, who weren’t sure what had gone wrong. It turned out Tasman had suffered a seemingly incurable stroke of the spinal cord.
But movement in her right leg came back about an hour later. After a lot of treatment, her left leg is now 90 per cent functional.
Last September, Tasman and Fage were second at the police dog national trials.
Fage said his little stray had come a long away. ‘‘I have absolutely loved every minute of being her handler.’’