Jason Tkach: I'm Jason Tkach. I work for Tampa Police Department.

JT: Going on 10 years this December.

JS: When and how did you get in the K-9 unit?

JT: I've been in K-9 since March of 2005. It was my career goal at the police department and I was able to achieve that in March of 2005. From day one when I hired in, I told them I wanted to be on a K-9 unit.

There were several things you have to do to be eligible. One is be an employee for two years, and then you have to go through a try-out and interview process before you can make it in the K-9 unit.

It’s a highly desirable position and the turnover rate in K-9 is very low. Once guys make it to K-9, they're true animal lovers and guys that really want to do police work with dogs. They usually spend their career in K-9 because it's just something [where] either you love it or you hate it.

Once you make it to K-9, you're issued your dog and your dog, whatever breeder they select — my dog came in from overseas — the Republic of Slovak. He was imported to Miami, the city bought him from a vendor there and then he was transported up to Tampa and then he was delivered at my home just before I started my K-9 school.

The dogs are assigned to us and they live at the house with us and the city provides a kennel for them at the house.

JS: What's your dog's name and how old is he?

JT: K-9 Bosco. He's 5. I named him after a police officer on a show called “Third Watch.”

JS: How old was he when you got him?

JT: He was about 13 months, so just about a year old. They try to get them right around just over a year to 2 years because the training is so intense that you can almost apply too much training to a dog where it doesn't want to learn any further. You have to get them at a maturity level where they're about a year old, where they can sustain that constant training and accept it and keep moving along.

JS: Tell me about the training process.

JT: When you receive your dog, your dog is delivered to your house, and then you go to K-9 school. That takes anywhere from four to six months. I was a new handler at the time, so you go through a full K-9 school, which is a minimum of 400 hours. It’s approximately four to six months and that includes the patrol school. A patrol means a dog is used for search — locating bad guys — and then also an odor school, which would either be narcotics or explosives. My dog is a narcotics and patrol dog. Then you'll spend your time in school working on patrol work and narcotics.

JS: Why do police departments use K-9 units?

JT: To show they're a valuable service to the department, general police K-9 Bosco cost the city of Tampa in 2005 about $6,500. The reason the city is willing to pay that money to where dogs are even up to $8,000 — and that's untrained dogs — is because dogs within a short period of times can pay for themselves, especially narcotics dogs.

Or being used to search and locate bad guys, they're like a tool, which saves an officer's life or keeps him safer. That's why the city is so willing to spend that money on a dog.

For example, my dog, within his first couple of months on the street, we got called out to a traffic stop and he ended up locating some narcotics and $25,000 in cash, which the city successfully seized. That money was put into the city's general fund, which doesn't just go to the police department, it goes to all your departments — your water, your trash, your parks department. So everybody in the city benefits from the money the dogs seize.

That was just one stop where Bosco was able to find and locate illegal narcotic money and the city was able to benefit from that. So $6,500 doesn't seem like a whole lot of money when he can do that consistently. Over the years, usually our narcotics stops, we're looking at a couple thousand dollars at a time with the narcotics, not even the narcotic value that he has successfully seized for the city.

Since he's been on the street — approximately four years — he's well over $50,000 seized — probably even closer to over $100,000 on narcotics stops alone. And that's currency not including value of evidence of narcotics, vehicles and other things he's been able to successfully seize and locate for the city.

JS: What's a typical day on the job for you and Bosco?

JT: We’re a day shift K-9 unit and we'll sign on to the city. We're in special operations so being a large city, we do not generally have to answer domestics or other police calls that general patrol will take, as like a domestic call or a parking complaint. We don't have to answer those. We will respond as back up, but we try to remain available for when a unit does conduct a traffic stop and does need a narcotic sniff of a vehicle. Or if an alarm goes off at a house and we have an entry point where we believe somebody’s inside or somebody fled and they ran into the woods or they ran into a neighborhood. We'll respond to those calls and Bosco will be used to safely clear the residence or search an area to locate a bad guy.

JS: Is there an incident that comes to mind where Bosco acted heroic?

JT: Yeah, we were just on patrol and we received a call to respond to a specific location about a felony battery. There wasn't a whole lot of information coming in at that point and we only deploy our dogs in the patrol sense on felonies because our dogs are trained to bite and apprehend criminal suspects. We don't deploy them on misdemeanors.

In this case, it was a felony battery between a boyfriend and a girlfriend. While I was responding to the scene, the map on the computer was showing one location, but I kept hearing them talk about a different location [over the radio].

Well, when the first units arrived on scene, they met this lady who had been battered by her boyfriend where he had punched her so hard that he had broke her jaw and she was missing teeth that ended up being stuck in his hand. That's how hard he hit her. At that point, he fled in a vehicle with some stolen property and that's all we knew at the point.

Then I changed locations because they actually spotted the vehicle at a pawn shop. There was additional information coming in that he had stolen firearms inside his vehicle that he was trying to pawn.

Now, at this point, we knew he was armed and that he had already committed a violent act against a female. A unit found the car and tried to stop it. At that point, the vehicle fled. They pursued it for a short period of time to where a female was driving this car and [the suspect] was the passenger. They stopped the vehicle and he fled on foot.

At that point, I responded to that area. They lost sight of him so we set up a perimeter of approximately four city blocks and a helicopter was overhead and they showed me the last point that had seen him.

I brought out Bosco — he's put on a 15-foot leash and he's given a command, which is called "detain." What he's going to do at that point is he's going to try and initially locate a track. But, we weren't able to pick up a track amongst all the other people that were inside our perimeter.

What we did next was we conducted an area search. What I do is I'll let Bosco enter a yard where the suspect was last seen. We'll let Bosco see if he can pick up human odor from the suspect in the yard. What we'll do is clear each yard. What that does is allow the resident of that home to know they can enter their house safely and that there's not an armed suspect or a bad guy hiding in their bushes or underneath their house and they can enter their home.

We'll have our perimeter, which is approximately four blocks and we went yard to yard and continued to search the yards with no response. Bosco wasn't picking up any human odor.

We arrived at probably the last street and it was a warm day and K-9 Bosco was starting to get tired and I could tell as he was slowing down a little bit in his search pattern — breathing hard, panting. We continued to search.

We had about a half block to go out of the four blocks and right in mid-block of the last block, his whole attitude changed. He started to pull, he started to breath faster, he became more energetic and he started pulling straight down the street. At that point, I knew he found human odor and I knew we were getting close to the suspect.

I called the helicopter and I said, "Come down a little bit, watch us, I think we're on a track to the suspect." At that point, we brought in some officers, Bosco went past a couple of houses and right to one house where he stuck his nose in a vent in the bottom of the house and kept running around the house sticking his nose in each vent opening.

At that point, it was an indication that I knew the suspect was underneath the house. At the same point, the other officer that was with me saw a broken water line leaking water on the ground and a board removed from the crawl space underneath the house.

At that point we knew the suspect was underneath the house, we called in some more units and surrounded the house.

Now, this gentleman had just hit his girlfriend so hard that he broke her jaw and he had her teeth still stuck in his knuckle as she explained after he punched her. Plus, he had just broken into a house and we didn't know the extent of the story yet, but he was supposed to be armed because he was trying to sell or pawn those firearms.

And this is where Bosco's value comes in. At that point, I issue a canine warning. I'll tell them "This is the Tampa Police K-9 Unit, identify and surrender or I will send a trained police canine to find and apprehend you." I said that in a very loud and clear tone into this crawl space. No response.

I gave it the second time. No response. At that point, Bosco wanted to jump over a fence. I put him over the fence, I jumped over the fence. We found another entrance underneath the house and I gave the warning again. No response. I gave the warning one more time. Again, no response.

I looked under the house with a light and I could not see anything or anybody under the house. It was probably a three-foot crawl space [with] piles of sand with several small walls dividing it up where you couldn't see around the walls. Very dark.

At that point I have no other option but to release Bosco to go under the house to find the bad guy. And without the K-9, an officer would have to go underneath there and locate and possibly risk getting shot by this bad guy.

Now, Bosco lives at the house with me and he also is a tool of the city. But, he also is a member of my family. He lives with me. I feed him. He's out with my wife. We care for him like a family member. And we understand that he's a tool of the city, but if my dog was shot, killed, or hurt, I'm going to cry, my wife's going to cry, we're all going to be upset. It's like a family member. It's a unique tool that is living and breathing that lives at our house. In this situation it was a prime example.

I stopped for a minute, I gave him his command, said a quick prayer, and I sent him underneath. And he shot underneath. At that point, it was very dark and this guy is supposed to be armed. I have to unholster my weapon at that point. I have a light at the end of my weapon, so I'm searching around with my weapon and the dog goes around the corner and all I could see was the back end of Bosco and he lays down because it's such a tight crawl space.

What Bosco is trained to do is bark and hold. Bosco will locate a suspect and if the suspect surrenders, Bosco will lay down in front of him and bark at the suspect, letting me know that the suspect is there and it will also let the suspect know not to move. If the suspect surrenders, I'll call Bosco back and order the suspect out.

Well, at this point, Bosco is laying down and barking in front of the suspect because the suspect wasn't moving. Then, out of my sight because all I could see was half of the dog, I hear a yelp out in pain. And immediately I hear the dog start to growl and bite and fight.

My first instinct is to dive through the hole and see what's going on, but I can't because at this point, it's not tactfully safe for me to enter there if he's possibly armed because it's just going to get me and the dog injured underneath the house.

So I have to wait and the dog has already engaged the suspect and he's fighting and he's biting the suspect. The suspect either punched or kicked him — I couldn't see — and the dog is trained at that point — he's allowed to defend himself.

Even with the crime the suspect had committed, I could have given the dog a command and bite the suspect without giving him a chance to surrender.

So at that point, they’re in a fight underneath the house and I can't see them. I'm searching with my gun and my light. I don't see them. Bosco finally digs into the ground and starts to pull to where I could see him because I'm reaffirming the command to bite the suspect and they're struggling underneath.

Bosco wears what's called a patrol harness. It has a City of Tampa patch on it and it says "Police" on it so he's identifiable as a police K-9. At that point, the suspect had reached one hand underneath the harness and had fought and got another hand under the harness and was trying to pin Bosco into the wall as Bosco is biting him.

Well, Bosco was strong enough to pull him out from behind the wall so at this point I could shine my weapon light and my gun on the suspect where I could see that he did not immediately have a weapon in his hand. And at that point, I knew that it was safe for me to holster my weapon and dive in — because I had to crawl on my hands and knees to get to him.

So at that point, I crawled through the hole and by the time I got to the suspect, he's still fighting the dog actively trying to harm my dog by smashing him into a concrete wall.

At that point, I gave him several orders to stop. He continued to fight. I was able to strike him one time with my fist, which was able to disorient him. He released the dog, fell back and he was disoriented where he stopped fighting for a minute. Bosco stopped fighting. I ordered Bosco to stop. Bosco laid down right next to him and we tried to handcuff the suspect. At that point he said, “I give up. I give up." So we tried to handcuff the suspect and at that point he decides to fight again so I immediately — Bosco is trained without command from me to re-engage the suspect to protect me now. 

Bosco re-engages the suspect and it's a violent fight in a 3-foot crawl space that's very dark. As his history — he had already fought and broke the jaw of a female — so this guy is definitely a fighter. So now we're down there struggling and fighting. I yell out over my back to the other officer to call for additional officers.

Another officer comes in. Now we have three of us fighting a guy who's refusing to give up. After one point, Bosco disengages, goes to rebite and at the point where I see him go to rebite, he goes to rebite the gentleman in the neck, which I stopped him from doing because it could turn into a fatal bite.

The next thing available was the gentleman's head, which he bit the suspect on the top of the scull and at that point and he sunk in and he got final hold on the suspect's head, he started to violently shake the suspect's head. That was the only thing that finally stopped the suspect from fighting.

Finally the suspect stopped fighting, we were able to handcuff him, I called Bosco off of his bite, held Bosco back and two other officers entered into the crawlspace and actually had to pull him out from underneath the house.

After it was all said and done, we were informed that the suspect had committed several burglaries — 25 or more, we're not sure. He had broken into a deputy's home — an off-duty deputy — stabbed the dog with a screwdriver, critically injuring the dog, broke into the deputy's safe and stole all the deputy's firearms.

After they started researching some things, they went back to the suspect’s residence and they found a safe buried underneath the pool. They had dumped another safe into the river. They found loads of stolen property. This guy was just a violent, violent person. Ultimately, we were supposed to go to trial, but he took a plea agreement and I believe he's dong 10 or 12 years in a Florida State prison right now.

I'd say most people — 98 percent of people surrender to police alone. When you bring in a police canine, 99 percent surrender at the site of a police canine. This was that 1 percent that was going to fight no matter what.

We had researched underneath the house. He was supposed to have that firearm, but there was a bunch of dirt and debris and we were never able to locate that firearm he supposedly had.

JS: What kind of injuries has Bosco received on the job?

JT: On that occasion we were thinking he was struck in his rib area. And just like me or you, it's a discomfort so he yelped out in pain, then he protected himself. We checked him and he didn't have any visible injuries so he was fine to go.

We were searching for a robbery suspect who had fled into a field. It was a swampy field with a bunch of debris, metal, everything in there. Bosco searched the whole field, cleared it to make sure the suspect wasn't in there and by the time he was done, he ended up having a 1-inch by 1-inch gash along his left flank. He never slowed down or anything. I didn't even notice it until I was putting him back in the car that he had this large cut on his hip.

That day we went to the vet and the vet was actually looking at the cut, cleaned it out and we got a call for a stolen vehicle. So we left the vet's office and went right over to the stolen vehicle. Three people had jumped out of a stolen vehicle and Bosco still had this large cut on his leg. Deployed him from the scene where they were last seen. He immediately located two suspects hiding in a bush and then right around the other side of the residence located a third suspect hiding in a bush.

They thought there was possibly a fourth and we're talking about a large city area — about three to five blocks. This was in the summer time, well October, but it was very hot. It was an unusually hot day. I think it was around 98 degrees. We had searched the whole city block and it was so hot that at one point we came to an in-ground pool and Bosco jumped into the pool to cool himself off, got out and we continued to search.

I break him every 10 minutes, load him in the police car, let him get some A/C and water, then we continue to search — again so the residents can safely return to their homes. And he did that all while he was injured.

These dogs, they love what they do and injuries like that really doesn't phase them. They're not like me and you. They'd rather come to work when they're sick than stay home. When I'm off, he wants to be at work.

JS: Does Bosco get regular check ups from the vet?

JT: Yep. We do have a vet that has a city contract and we bring them in. They are annually checked. Bosco had a lump on his head. I took him into the vet and they ended up removing it. It was an infected gland. And he just got five stitches taken out of his head yesterday. We responded to a burglary right after his stitches came out and he was out searching for 45 minutes in a heat index of 105 degrees.

As Bosco picked up the track, Bosco entered a yard and the suspect walked out and surrendered to a police unit in the front. And Bosco was able to locate the suspect's shirt, a watch and a rubber glove that were used in a home burglary. That was right after his stitches were taken out yesterday.

These dogs are extremely valuable. In a situation like that, we had a two-city block perimeter. That would have taken at least three officers to search each yard and they couldn't have done it as effectively as a canine because he really doesn't use his eyes. He's going to use his nose for sense of smell. And he's going to check places that we would never see. Like the suspect that was underneath the house, a regular street unit would have never located him underneath that house. Bosco never saw him, he smelled him. That's just the value of the canine.

JS: How long is a typical K-9 dog's career?

JT: We base it on their health. Bosco is 5 this year and I'm hoping he'll be able to work until about 8. The city of Tampa, they allow us to retire our dogs when they see fit. When they slow down or they become up in age. Because of the great service they do provide to the residents of Tampa, the city allows us to retire our canines at relatively good age where the dog doesn't just retire one day and then he's limping around your yard the next day where he can barely walk.

They actually allow the dog a retirement life where he'll go out and live out his life with the handler at their home. The city releases the dog to you and he becomes your dog. He will spend the rest of his life living with you.

We'll go anywhere from six to eight years as a patrol dog.

JS: Can you tell me again what type of dog Bosco is?

JT: Bosco is a German shepherd. He came from the Republic of Slovak. We import our dogs because they have such high breeding standards over there. He's 5 years old and he weighs 89 pounds.

JS: Is there anything else you'd like to share about Bosco?

JT: I'm so proud of my dog I could sit here and talk about him all day. We don't have any children so he is like a child to me. You know, that's one unique thing about this profession is that you use an animal that make decisions and enforces law with you, which is so unique. And the bond me and Bosco have is unbelievable. It's hard to describe because I come to work for 12 hours a day and I bring him with me. So he's at my side for 12 hours a day and then I go home and we're together while we're at home. So we spend as K-9 handlers more time with our police canines than anybody in our family or anybody we know and that's the bond you build with your dog and it's indescribable. You treat them almost like family members because you’re always with your dog. It’s a unique, special bond you have with your dog.

EP 50 – Dog Walkers

Twinkle VanWinkle, “Listen!” associate producer
Amanda Briggs, owner and dog walker, Downtown Doggie, Indianapolis
Interview: July 2, 2009

Twinkle VanWinkle: Can you start by saying your name, business and location?


Amanda Briggs:  My name is Amanda Briggs. I own Downtown Doggie walking service in downtown Indianapolis, Ind. 

TVW:  Can you give me a rundown of a basic dog walking?

AB: Generally I will spend half an hour walking anywhere from one to five dogs everyday. So we’ll go from the Irvington neighborhood to Fall Creek Place or Broadripple, mostly downtown – even on the canal. I’ll go to the home. I’ll pick them up, whether they have a key they give me or a garage pass or anything like that. It’s just real simple. I’ll just go in and get them and we go for a long walk and they go back to their beds and take their naps when they’re done. That’s pretty much it.

TVW:  Do you have any breeds you don’t accept?

AB: I do not. It’s really based on temperament only. I know with certain insurance companies, like with the policies, one that I am insured through, they do not allow me to walk certain types of breeds. Such as the Staffordshire terrier, which is known as a pit bull. However I do walk pit bulls, I’m just not insured to do so. I do it as based on temperament only. Like I don’t allow any of my other dog walkers to walk them, but I would definitely walk them and I wouldn’t charge anymore for that breed. I think with all dogs it depends on how the owners treated them, that’s how they’re going to treat you.

TVW: Have you ever had a run away dog?

AB:  I’ve never had a runaway dog, per se. I haven’t had a bad experience. I was once walking to giant dogs – one was a German Shepard, one was a giant schnauzer mix over in the Irvington neighborhood. As I’m walking, it was a hot day in August, in the middle of the afternoon. I get these two dogs out, and usually they chase cats and I can grab them catch them before they take off.

This day they both just stopped.  I was like what is going on? I look up and I see something in the middle of the street, and I can’t figure out what it is. I get a little bit closer. By now both dogs are really pulling on the leash. They are wanting to get at this thing, whatever it is up there. I’m looking and looking. I’m not kidding you; there was a big old pig up there in the middle of the street in Irvington.

I was like what on earth is going on? That pig started coming towards me. Those dogs really wanted that pig. That stupid pig just kept coming up closer and closer. I’m pulling with all my might to control these dogs. Finally I was able to get them where I could wrap their leashes around a telephone pole. I’m trying to shoo this pig away, and he kept coming closer. They dogs were going crazy. It was insane.

Eventually the pig stopped, found some garbage on the side f the street and started eating it. I was able to grab the dogs. I ran the dogs back home, came back to see if that pig was still out. He was, so I’m calling people. I’m going to door to door knocking. Nobody was home because it was the middle of the day. I mean it was just insane. 

A guy drives by, this older guy. I said excuse me sir I need your help. There is this crazy pig running around. He said, “I’m not helping. I saw that pig two weeks ago.” It was just awkward. It ended up that I couldn’t find the pig after and he ran off. 

So a couple of weeks passed, and I was walking. There was a guy sitting on his front porch and he actually told me he owned the pig. He owns a lot of exotic animals in Irvington. Somehow the pig got out of the fence and got loose. It was insane. That was one crazy story.

TVW: What are some questions you ask pet owners?

AB: I usually start by asking what type of dog do you have. Is he friendly with other pets? Is he going to be ok with a group walk or would you prefer solo walk? Does he have any aggressive tendencies? Does he have a favorite toy that he likes? What of food does he eat? Is it allergic to any kind of treat? Just things like that. How does he react if kids are present? A lot of general questions. I mean it’s got to be pretty thorough because you run into everything when you are walking dogs. I mean literally everything.  There are some dogs that are scared of birds; some dogs want to eat birds. That is just nuts. So you just have to be prepared for everything.

TVW:  How do you deal with dogs that misbehave?

AB: It’s really you just have to control the situation. Whether I’m out walking a dog and there is another dog that comes towards us, lunging towards, you just have to pull the dog back and try your best to get the other dog to go away. What I find that’s best is to carry a spray bottle of water. Usually dogs do not like to be squirted like with water. It’s like a shock almost to them. So that’s usually what I would carry, like a bottle of water with me.

TVW: Why did you choose to become a dog walker?

AB: It started outside of Chicago. I was working at a camp. The owner of the camp was going out of town and she needed someone to watch her dogs. She had three hairless cats, too. I said, “Ok, I can do that,” for the weekend. So I did it. I really enjoyed it. So she told her neighbors. It kind of just spread while I was living up there.

Then, basically the camp over booked and I had to leave for about a month. I had to find somewhere else to live, so I moved into my friend’s condo. She had a mini pinscher at the time. I built a relationship up with this mini pinscher. I really like it and I walked it every single day. I still worked at the camp. I was watching the owner of the camp, her friends’, and neighbors’. So it just really spread.

Then when I moved to Indy, I took a job where I was actually using my degree. But I decided real fast I did not want to work in the corporate world. I did not like it. I just felt like it was just tedious and I was tired of dealing with nonsense from coworkers. I just did not care for it. I was getting up early, making no money.  I just thought if I’m going to really invest my time, my heart into something, I want it to pay off in the end. Whether it is just like a sense of accomplishment. I think just generally being happy. I think just getting up in the morning and not having that feeling of, “Oh, I do not want to go to work today.” Like with this job I don’t feel like that ever. I’m happy.  I get to go and play with dogs all day. I get to meet people when I’m out walking. Even everybody in the neighborhood knows who I am.  Like this restaurant here, they will basically give me my lunch everyday. It’s the best feeling ever. I love it. It’s just great. It’s a fun job. So that is how I ended up dog walking.

TVW: What's the average distance that you walk the dogs?

AB: Some dogs really need a lot of exercise and they like to run. So if I am running with the dogs twenty minutes straight, we’re going anywhere from two to three miles sometimes. Little dogs like Max; we don’t walk as far – six, seven blocks. I think ten blocks is a mile. I think that’s usually how it works. I would say a minimum of ten miles a day, a maximum of 15, 16. It depends.

TVW: DO you go to the owner’s house and get their keys?

AB: Generally, the first time we meet, we’ll determine whether I’m a good fit for them, if they’d like me to walk their dog. At that time I give them an application to fill out. They’ll also put a schedule together on how often they want me to walk their dog, things like that.

We’ll then have a second meeting where they’ll give me a key or any garage passes or anything like that they want me to have – parking pass, like downtown. It’s obviously difficult to find some places to park, so they’ll provide me with a parking pass if they have to do so. I’ll have a key to their home, go in and walk them on whatever schedule they selected.

TVW: Who is this doggie with you?

AB: This is Max. Max came from Chicago. His owners are a young couple. They work here in the city. So it works out really well.

TVW: Can you tell me about payment, how you think it’s different than a lot of businesses?

AB: You know most businesses, once a service is provided, people tend to pay them right away. With mine, the system is a little bit different. I invoice every two weeks. For instance, I’ll walk Max from June 1 to June 15 and then he is going to get invoiced on the fifteenth.

His owner will then have like seven days to pay the invoice. There have been times where I have walked dogs and I’ll leave and invoice and they won’t pay. I build a relationship up with these dogs, so I’m going to keep walking these dogs, until they tell me they don’t need me anymore, trusting they are still going to be paying me. They have that seven days where they can still pay. Sometimes, like a month has passed and they’ll say, “Oh I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you.”  Then they will just move away. So then I will have worked for a whole month and not have a paycheck for that.  Most people will pay.

I mean, it is about trusting that you are going to pay you.  And then I think at the same time, “Of course this person is going t pay me. I have a key to their home. Why wouldn’t they pay me?”  I think people just don’t think about it sometimes. There’s no consequences.

I’m obviously not going to come after anything. It’s not like they are paying a light bill where all of sudden their power is going to get shut off. It’s like, these dogs, I care about them. They are physical creatures. I just feel like I want them to be taken care of basically. So I’m going to keep walking them until their owners tell me they don’t need me to and trust that they are going to be paying me for that service. It’s kind of different.

TVW: What do you charge?

AB: A typical group walk – that’s five dogs in one walk – it’s $13 per dog. If there are two dogs in the home then it’s $15. It basically goes up a couple of bucks for each additional pet. A solo walk is 30 minutes and it’s $25. However, it’s really based upon how often the dogs need walked. Max gets walked everyday, so he has a really great rate. It really just depends on what the client’s needing.

TVW: You also do pet sitting?

AB: Yes I do pet sitting. That is a little bit different. That is generally $40 a night. That would require me going into your home, staying overnight. Your dog would get a minimum of three walks. They get food and water, plants watered. Whatever you would need I would be there to provide that. I also just opened a doggie daycare to provide that service. It’s the same rate. It’s $40 to bring your dog to the doggie daycare and stay overnight.