This fundaraising page is for the memory of Retired West Mercia Police Dog Boots.

Boots was a retired general purpose GSD who was licensed with Warwickshire & West Mercia Police in his junior days, he was well known as a strong willed and often excitable boy and could be quite the handful at times.

Having been deployed with a few handlers within the force, who all tried to guide Boots and train hard with him, it became apparent that Police life wasn't best suited to Boots and he was retired early at the age of 2yrs old.

Following Boots' retirement, the Police kennels for West Mercia placed an advert to seek his new home and journey, there was, of course, a lot of attention and many offers to take Boots on and provide him with that well deserved retirement. After a mad dash to 'dog proof' the home and garden, a couple of house inspections and some fence work later, the authorisation was given for Boots to be homed with me in South Wales.

It was a journey that would develop and provide its own challenges, rewards and bond over the coming weeks, months and years. Boots wasn't the typical family pet, through his turbulent history as a stray and subsequent Police training, Boots had developed some bad habits, such as barking at other dogs. Actually it wasn't isolated to dogs, it would be any other form of living animal that he could see. Thinking back, they didn't even have to be living, he once had a stand off with a neighbours stone statue of a dog on their driveway...

Walk time was always like a lottery, you never quite knew what was going to happen, we would often go for a trip up to the local common and have a run around the vast pastures with a solid game of ball. Boots was obsessed, he would play this game for every second of his life if he could! We had many a hikes, walking along the common for several miles just taking in the views and surroundings, grasping the given oppourtunities to work heavily on not chasing and eating the local wildlife! This went pretty well, in fairness to him, well until that first time that he realised that sheep will run if chased... I still think my knee hurts to this day from his escapade through the mud and ice, dragging me along behind him like an uncontrolled slay in the antarctic.

Within the house, Boots generally ruled, he knew he wasn't supposed to be on the sofa, but theres only so many times you can tell him no before he stops listening and you give up trying. The same went for the bed too, up until he decided that at 3am his own shadow in the bedroom mirror was a threat and needed to be barked at... It's safe to say that when a loud GSD barks at the end of your bed, at 3am, in the dark, you wake up so fast that you don't even remember what country you're in anymore.

As with a lot of PD's and RPD's in this modern age, Boots had himself a Twitter account, he was and still is quite the star, making many friends all over the world, connecting with other dogs and animals, children and emergency service personnel. There was never a shortage of antics, from his insistence to drink from the toilet on a regular basis, jumping in to the bath with me uninvited to surprising the Amazon delivery guy with a display of 42 pearly whites via the bay window, it was like having an over-excited child most of the time.

With the sudden passing of Boots it's been quite hard to accept at home, the house is silent and still when it shouldn't be. It is a lot to take in during a challenging time for us, but through the pain and saddness I am hoping to bring some good from this and raise funds for the West Mercia Retired Police Dog Fund - operated by Sharon Cope, kennel manager for Warwickshire & West Mercia Police kennels, this fund helps to provide for the retired police dogs from these forces, ensuring that their new retirement is spent in the best ways possible. The fund helps towards medical costs, other significant event costs and general well being of the dogs. The welfare fund can be found on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/k999oaps/

I would like to take the oppourtunity to thank every person who has messaged, tweeted and generally shown support and shown us all just how much this boy meant to the world, it has been incredibly humbling to see.

Peace and love, and to all of our brothers and sisters on the front line, stay safe.

Brady x.

R.I.P Boots, 01.08.2015 - 12.11.2019