Vickery K9

09/03/2026

Some people meditate. I have this. 😂

09/03/2026

We have ONE drop-in spot available for Beginner Nosework tomorrow (9/3) at 6:30 PM!

This class is perfect for dogs who are brand new and just want to give nose work a try, or dogs who are still learning the ropes and building their search skills. No prior experience needed!

$55 for the drop-in spot.

📍 Braselton, GA

Text Meghan at 803-220-8207 to grab it!

09/02/2026

What makes a good detection dog? The answer is a little more complicated than just “a dog with a lot of drive.”

I actually have a pretty good example of this living in my own house. Kieran is basically the Ferrari of dogs. He is very high drive, high arousal, intense, fast, and wants to put everything he has into whatever we’re doing. For me, he’s incredibly fun to train and work, but I’ve also spent a lot of years learning how to handle dogs like him. And just like a Ferrari, having all that power is only useful if you know how to drive it.

Kieran isn’t even two yet, and a huge part of raising him has been intentionally channeling all of that intensity into the dog I wanted him to become. Today, he’s pretty darn close to my perfect dog. He’s incredibly capable, loves to work, and has learned how to turn all of that intensity into something productive. But he’s also a lot of dog. That’s not a negative; it’s part of what makes him so good at what he does. It also means he wouldn’t necessarily be the right dog for every handler.

Lark, on the other hand, is different. He’s still a medium-to-high drive dog, but he has considerably less arousal and intensity behind it. He’s naturally more chill. He has plenty of desire to work, but there’s a little less Ferrari and a little more daily driver. For a less experienced handler, that can make him much easier to train, live with, and maintain. There are pros and cons to both, and neither one is inherently better.

That’s one of the reasons I don’t love talking about detection dogs simply in terms of “high drive” or “high arousal.” They’re not the same thing, and more isn’t automatically better. When I’m looking at a dog for professional detection work, I care about hunt drive, persistence, independence, environmental confidence, resilience, potential reward systems I can utilize (ie food/toy drive), problem solving ability, arousal, and the dog’s ability to regulate that arousal and continue working effectively. I need a dog who genuinely wants to hunt and will keep working when the answer gets difficult, but I also need a dog who can think while they’re doing it.

And all of those traits exist on a spectrum. The right combination depends not only on the work we’re asking the dog to do, but also on the person who’s going to be handling and living with that dog. A dog can have all the raw ability in the world and still be a poor match for a particular handler. Part of selecting and developing a professional detection dog is looking at the entire picture: the dog, the job, the handler, and whether those pieces actually fit together.

That’s also why I don’t think there’s one universal picture of the “perfect” detection dog. Different jobs place different demands on dogs, and different handlers are going to be successful with different types of dogs. If I’m helping select a dog for professional work, I’m not looking for the most dog I can possibly find. I’m looking for the right dog for that particular job and handler.

A lot of this carries directly over into scent sports. If I were intentionally selecting a dog with the goal of competing at the upper levels of nosework, many of the qualities I’d want would be the same ones I value in a professional detection dog. A dog with exceptional hunt drive, persistence, independence, environmental confidence, resilience, and the ability to work through difficult problems is going to have a pretty nice set of tools for either job.

Where sport becomes different is that the door is much wider. A dog doesn’t have to meet the standard I would expect from a professional detection dog to be successful in nosework. There are plenty of dogs who wouldn’t be appropriate for operational work that can become really nice sport dogs, compete successfully, and have a whole lot of fun doing it. Maybe certain pieces require more training or thoughtful handling, or maybe there are limitations we learn to work with, but that’s part of developing the individual dog.

And then there’s an entirely different starting point that I see all the time as a trainer. Instead of saying, “I want to do upper level nosework, help me find the dog for that goal,” someone comes to me with the dog they already have and says, “I think we’d really enjoy doing this together.”

I love that too.

In that situation, I’m not trying to turn that dog into my idea of the perfect detection dog. I’m figuring out who that dog is, what they naturally bring to the table, what we can develop, and how far that particular team wants to take it. Maybe they don’t naturally have strong hunt drive. Maybe they’re hesitant to leave their handler. Maybe they give up quickly when something gets difficult, or the environment matters too much right now. Within reason, we can develop a lot of those qualities. That’s part of the skill of training — not just recognizing the traits that already exist, but knowing how to bring out more persistence, independence, confidence, engagement, and desire to search in the individual dog you’re working with.

That dog doesn’t need to be Kieran. Honestly, most dogs don’t. They don’t need to be professional detection dogs, either. Sometimes the goal is serious operational work. Sometimes it’s chasing upper level sport titles. And sometimes it’s enrichment, building a better relationship with the dog you already love, and discovering something really fun that you can do together.

There is no single perfect detection dog. There’s the dog, the handler, the training, and the goal. Figuring out how all of those pieces fit together is a whole lot more interesting than simply asking how much “drive” a dog has.

09/02/2026

A little throwback to baby Kieran. 🥹

Just a tiny spotted menace who had no idea he’d grow up to have a real job. 💙

08/31/2026

One of the questions we get asked all the time is what kind of dog makes a good detection dog? And honestly, this group is a pretty good example of why there isn’t one simple answer.

K9 Water Leak Detection dogs come in all different shapes, sizes, breeds, backgrounds, and personalities. There isn’t one magic breed for the job. What matters much more is finding the right individual dog with the drive, confidence, persistence, and ability to do the work.

And when you look at the dogs currently doing this work across the country, you can see just how different those individual dogs can be. So, we figured they deserved a proper introduction.

There’s our very own K9 Kieran with Vickery K9 here in Georgia, K9 Otis with K9 Water Leak Detection in Oklahoma, K9 Flash and K9 Flare with Dog Day Acres Labradors & Detection Services in Iowa, K9 Pigeon with Drop-Point Leak Detection in Oklahoma, and K9 Eleanor and K9 Lux with K&J Plumbing in Oklahoma.

All of these K9s and their handlers are certified through the K9 Pipeline Detection Association (K9PDA) for K9 Water Leak Detection.

Different breeds. Different personalities. Different ways of approaching the work. But every one of them was selected and developed for the same purpose: Using trained K9 detection to help locate treated water leaks.

Different dogs. Different teams. One mission.

08/30/2026

08/29/2026

Young Lark is certainly loving the dock diving game!

I had a few minutes of downtime between classes and lessons today, so the dogs got some time in the pool. On a whim, I decided to see if Lark would actually track a toy off the dock yet — and he did!

I love seeing him already starting to put that piece of the game together at just 6 months old. He sure is a fun guy!

08/28/2026

There is a strange and beautiful thing that happens when you train other people’s dogs. They aren’t yours. But somewhere along the way, they become a little bit yours too.

I often think about what a privilege that is — that so many people choose to share these incredible souls with me. That I get to have a place in their lives, to know them and love them, and to carry little pieces of them with me.

Some I know only briefly. Others I get to see week after week, month after month, sometimes for years. I learn their quirks and their expressions. What makes them light up. What makes them think. I celebrate their wins, laugh at their antics, worry about them, make plans for them, and look forward to seeing them again and again.

And over time, I watch them grow and change. I remember who they were when we first met and get to know every version of them that comes after. And somewhere in all of that, they become part of the fabric of my own life.

People trust me with dogs who are pieces of their families and pieces of their hearts, and in return, I get the extraordinary gift of knowing them and loving them too. Over the years, my life has been made so much richer by dogs who were never mine at all — except that, in some small way, they were.

And the privilege goes beyond the dogs themselves. Through them, I get to know some pretty incredible people, too. People whose lives I get to become a small part of, just as their dogs become a part of mine. I get to learn with them, laugh with them, celebrate with them. And I get to know them alongside their dogs, watching them learn each other, grow as a team, and build this incredible bond along the way. To be trusted with a place in that relationship, to get to witness it and, in some small way, help shape it, is incredibly special.

And that’s also what makes losing one so incredibly hard. This week, that loss came far too suddenly. And I’m heartbroken. There was supposed to be more time. More lessons. More laughing. More growing. So many more plans coming to life. There was so much living left to do.

And goodness, did this dog know how to live. So much joy, so much personality, so much character. He was the clown of the show, endlessly goofy; there wasn’t a day I spent with him that wasn’t filled with laughter. And the wiggles. Oh, the wiggles. He was quite possibly the wiggliest dog I have ever known, his whole body in perpetual motion. I don’t know that I’ll ever think of him without remembering those wiggles.

It’s still hard for me to wrap my head around how quickly life can change. How someone can be so vibrantly, unmistakably here, woven into the rhythm of your life, and then suddenly there is a hole where you were so certain there would be more.

I don’t have a neat lesson to pull from a loss that feels this unfair. I just know that some souls burn so damn bright that even a painfully short amount of time with them changes you.

I also know how grateful I am. Grateful for every lesson, every laugh, and every moment I was lucky enough to be part of. I got to watch the bond between a dog and his person deepen, watch them become a team, soak in his joyful exuberance week after week, and have a small place in everything they were building together. And because of him, this incredible friend came into my life. That feels like one more piece of him I get to carry forward.

There should have been so much more time. But even through all of the heartbreak, I’m so thankful I got to be part of their story at all. What an incredible privilege it was that, for some of it, he was a little bit mine too. ❤️

08/28/2026

This. ❤️

08/27/2026

Happy National Dog Day! 🐾
These APHIS detector dogs are helping protect U.S. livestock by sniffing out New World screwworm - supporting our trained experts during animal health inspections, providing another layer of protection for U.S. animals.

Here, Under Secretary Dudley Hoskins provided our hard-working canine pal with a refreshing water break.

Join us in celebrating these dogs’ incredible skill and service! 🐶