CHULUOTA, Fla. — Becoming a police K9 takes time, patience, and a whole lot of training. One Seminole County resident has made a career out of getting dogs ready for the police force.

  • Ed Reyes' training center in Chuluota
  • He trains K-9s from around the southeast
  • It's a 12 week training program
  • WATCH ABOVE: Asher Wildman takes us through some of the K9 training exercises ▲
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Ed Reyes has had an interesting career path.

From 1978 to 1998, he was a professional jai-alai player. In 1980, while playing in the Tallahassee area, he started to wonder what he could do off the court in the off-season.

That’s when he became inspired to train K-9s professionally.

“I was going to the park around the Tallahassee Police Dept. and there were K-9s around," Ed Reyes explains.  "I pushed my stroller around and I started talking to the K-9 people, and I said I want to be a K-9 handler, I want to train dogs.”

Ed began training in 1989. Since then, he has opened up a training center in Chuluota. It’s where he teaches future police dogs how to track, attack, and find drugs or explosives. Dogs spend 12 weeks attending classes. Each class lasts about 6 hours.

"You have to find the right temperament for the dog," Ed said. "They have to have the hardness to withstand the repetition of what they are going to do, and train ability is a must. You have to find a dog with the highest train ability of them all."

 

Ed doesn’t just train K-9s. Ashley Shaughnessy is at Ed's training center with her German shepard Ghandi. She brings her dog to the Chulutoa handler so her dog can have both mental and physical stimulation.

"Sometimes people can think person protection makes for an aggressive dog," Ashler Shaughnessy explained. "But if anything, it gives them an outlet for their energy, and it gives them a direction to put that focus and energy in too.”

From learning the basics to becoming a protector or law enforcer, Ed’s hope is he does in fact help K-9s eventually learn how to take a bite out of crime.

Ed is currently training two different police dogs for two different Central Florida police departments. They are expected to report to duty for their respective departments in June.