The puppies face an intensive training regime

The four English springer spaniels - Sox, Cleo, Gillie and Buster - have started their bid to be top dog on a search and detection training course.

Specially trained dog handlers from the Scottish Police Dog Training Centre in Glasgow will lick the eight-week-old pups into shape.

Each pup was specially selected because of its police search potential.

Inspector Alan Davies, from the training centre, praised the pups for their enthusiasm.

He said: "Springer spaniels are used for specialised search and detection as they have a terrific personality, tremendous drive, are enthusiastic, agile and most importantly have a great sense of smell.

"They are the perfect dogs for the job.

Dog appeal

"Unfortunately, it is really difficult to get dogs suitable for training. For example, we might take a look at 20 dogs and maybe only one or two would be suitable.

"For this reason, for the last two years, we have been breeding our own dogs and thankfully this has been quite successful. "

He added: "So far we have eight operational dogs deployed throughout the force area and hopefully we will have the same success with our breeding next year."

Sox will soon be patrolling Glasgow and Prestwick airports

Sox, so called because of her having four white paws, is off to the Ports Unit where she will cover Glasgow Airport, Prestwick International Airport and the Troon Ferry Terminal.

The other three dogs will stay at the training centre and then, when older, they will be allocated to Search Support Handlers who work throughout the Strathclyde area.

Inspector Davies appealed for breeders to get in touch if they could help provide future force dogs.

He said: "Because of the importance the dogs play in today's policing we are always on the look out for new dogs, particularly German Shepherd dogs.

"They are our general-purpose dogs used for tracking, searching and detention of criminals.

"We would be keen to hear from anyone who either breeds German Shepherds or knows of any that would be suitable for police work to contact us at the training centre.