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Jaclyn Brenning

Terry Cottonaro, owner of Lost Lake Kennels in Murphysboro, didn't know what he was going to do with the black Labrador retriever.

"I just had a dog that wasn't going to make a field dog, and I breed hunting dogs," Cottonaro said. "But he loved to retrieve. He had a desire to retrieve that was just nuts."

The Jackson County Sheriff Department was looking for just such a dog to become part of the county's first K-9 unit.

In April, Cottonaro sold the dog, Major, to the Jackson County Sheriff's Department for $2,000.

The department had been thinking about a K-9 unit for the last year and a half. It had been trying to find out what type of dog would best fit the department.

"We were looking for a dog more suitable for the situations we're dealing with," Sheriff Robert Burns said.

The situations Burns described include looking for lost people, lost items and drugs. The department wanted dogs that could sniff and find, not dogs to apprehend or attack.

Major had been taught to retrieve but had no experience as a police dog. In May, he traveled to Liberty, Tenn., for eight weeks of training in article searching and tracking.

"He was trained in getting scents," said Deputy Kenny Lindsey, who has been part of the sheriff's department for two years.

Lindsey was interested in the new K-9 unit. Jackson County had never had a K-9 officer, and as soon as he heard the plans, Lindsey was hooked.

"I never thought I'd get an opportunity like this," Lindsey said. He became Major's handler and went to Liberty to train for seven days with Major at Brodie K-9 Center.

"I learned how to read the dog when he's alert on an article, to search a car's interior and exterior and to track," Lindsey said. "It wasn't hard at all, but it was very hot. It was a lot of outside work. We went to salvage yards and everything."

Another black Labrador retriever, Hoyce, will be part of the K-9 unit. Hoyce is 10 months old and starts training in September with her handler, Deputy Shauna Taylor. "I love it," Taylor said. "I can't wait to start training."

The dogs are energetic and friendly, their handlers said. Even though they are police dogs and trained as such, their handlers don't mind welcoming them into their families. After all, the dogs live in kennels at their handlers' houses. Lindsey said he trusts Major with his 6-year-old daughter and his wife takes care of the dog when Lindsey isn't home. The dogs work hard for a small reward: a tennis ball.

"Work to them is play," said Chris Morhman, an employee of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.

The Illinois Department of Natural Resources has five dogs in the state. "Chance is the southern dog," Morhman said.

Morhman has been the handler of one of the dogs named Chance for three years. Even after this amount of time, he said Chance works hard and scours places for drugs or tracks lost people just for the joys of retrieving a tennis ball.

"He plays with toys like Kong Balls, but he knows the difference between a tennis ball and a Kong Ball," Morhman said. "Whenever he sees me come to the kennel in my uniform with a tennis ball, he gets excited."

Morhman described his experience as a handler as hard but fun.

"I learned a lot," Morhman said. "I think my favorite memory is when we took Chance into the basement of a local police department after his training. They put a pack of drugs in some shelves. Chance almost took the whole shelf down. I thought, 'What am I getting into? Dogs that climb shelves?'"

Morhman said that with just one dog in Southern Illinois, he has seen results. He said people who used to do drugs at places like the Kinkaid Spillway don't go there anymore.

Jaclyn Brenning can be reached at jaclynb@siu.edu