When you think of a police dog, the image that instantly springs to mind is of a scary, teeth-baring hound. Having visited the force’s four-legged companions at Wiltshire Police HQ in Devizes, it seems the reality is very different.

You wouldn’t want a great big German Shepherd chasing you down, of course, but off-duty these crucial members of the crime-fighting team are just like any ordinary dog.

Of the 13 general purpose dogs and 11 specialist dogs Wiltshire Police has, I met two of the recent additions.

PC Ali Davies is the handler of Lorrie, a German Shepherd, and Bodhi, a springer-cocker spaniel cross who works as an explosives search dog. Both live with her at home.

“They get a lot of love and attention,” said PC Davies. “I don’t want to say they don’t have any personal attention because they do, they work with us for a lot of the time.

“In theory they’re with me more often than my pet dog is, but you don’t want to coddle them. Those two only live outside, we’re allowed them in the house, but they do have to sleep outside.

“Everything else is the same, they have to be fed once or twice a day, depending on their diet. They’ve got to be walked twice a day, cleaned out, looked after, groomed."

Police dogs, overall, tend to have quite a long work-life span but it may differ depending on the dog's job. General purpose dogs work for eight years and search dogs work until they are 10.

Wiltshire Police dogs made headlines when Anya, a German shepherd, saved her handler from a knife attack in 2008. Anya was stabbed in the chest when she leapt to the defence of PC Neil Sampson after he was stabbed during an attack.

Griffin, a cocker spaniel, retired in 2014 after 500 drug detections including a find of over £3,000 on a woman at a festival.

PC Davies added: “Every dog is different, Lorrie is rubbish with other dogs so I can’t walk her in places where other dogs are being walked because she’s a pain.

“Bodhi is good, I could walk him anywhere. He’s just like a pet except he’s trained to find things.

“Lorrie should be suspicious of everyone she meets. I don’t want her to just be happy walking through a park and see people, she should just think ‘hmm... that person over there could be a criminal’ so we have to go careful with how we walk them.”

Do these highly-trained police dogs ever come across criminals in their spare time?

PC Davies says it hasn’t happened to her yet, but it is not uncommon: “

If Bodhi indicates on someone that means there could be a bomb, but luckily I’ve not had that yet when I’m out walking.

“Other colleagues have had incidents, if they live in built-up areas or if they know of a job that’s come in locally they might take their dog out for a walk, even off duty.”

PC Davies said that any dog can become a police dog, but they do have to go through some rigorous training.

She said: “The big dogs take about three months to train but of course every dog is different, and the small dogs take between two and three months but again.”

“On my course with the big dog, it was extended a little bit because there were certain areas where the dogs were struggling on certain things but it takes about three months on average and it’s all based around positive reinforcement and the ball.

“It’s all about repetition of things, it’s introducing the item you want them to sniff for and then positively rewarding them for it.

“They sniff it, they freeze, they have the ball. Once they sniff it 12 times, according to the course, that’s embedded in their brain that that’s the substance they have to remember.

“When they’re taught to track you’ll start with something small and stamp on some ground and put food down so they think ‘ooh, there’s food and this grass is slightly different to that grass there’ and then you do it again before eventually just removing the food."

I know when I see a dog, one of the first things I want to do is say hello. PC Davies says it’s the same with police dogs, but people should always ask the handler first before approaching.

She said: “Lorrie’s very good but I’d always expect somebody to ask me if they can stroke my dog. You’d be surprised the amount of people who just walk up to you and think they can stroke your dog, even at work when you’re wearing the uniform and they’re in a harness with police written on the side.

“With her, if someone asks me to say hello then they can, and we do encourage people to come and speak to us and say hello, even if it’s just to ask if they can pet them.”