Training a husky to be a police dog? Many dog lovers would probably look on with pity. But a post-95s policeman from Lincang, Yunnan, was having a blast, managing to train his "good-for-nothing, good-for-nothing-eater" husky, "Bu Chai," into a police dog tasked with police propaganda duties. He even filmed some short videos of Bu Chai's daily life, which went viral on Bilibili. Netizens who were usually amused by "Bu Chai's" destruction of the police station were moved to tears upon learning of "Bu Chai's" unfortunate passing. In an interview, Officer Xue told reporters from Yangtse Evening Post/Ziniu News that he has now moved on from his grief and started a new life with "Bu Chai." Documenting his life with his dog is his hobby, and he will continue.
Er Gou and Bu Chai's bizarre training routine has netizens in stitches.
Huskies are affectionately known as "Silly Huskies" by dog owners, and for good reason. According to experts, Huskies are called "Silly Huskies" because of their low obedience; they'll pretend not to hear commands they don't want to obey, making them extremely difficult to train, leading many to believe they're stupid. Huskies are also called "Silly Huskies" because they're so energetic and playful; taking a Husky out isn't you walking it, it's it walking you. Finally, Huskies are called "Silly Huskies" because they love to destroy things around the house.
The content creator @Husky'sPoliceDogDream is Officer Xue from Yunnan, who works in forest firefighting. He has a background in software engineering and enjoys photography and sports. Having previously trained police dogs in the military, training his husky, purchased from a pet store, into a police dog was a pure personal challenge. In a special police unit on the Yunnan border, he and his dog, Bu Chai, underwent formal police dog training. With the help of his colleagues, he also created videos documenting their daily training and funny moments. "Because I have a lot of duties, I often only update every 20 days," he said. Last December, after a long hiatus, the dog owner posted his wedding video. Of course, his partner is also a dog lover.
In the video, BuChai's bizarre daily routine has netizens in stitches—search training involves memorizing the scent of dangerous items and then using that scent to find the box containing them. BuChai, however, only found a sausage; during capture training, while normal police dogs generally won't approach strangers, BuChai eagerly followed them, as if they were old friends; the "no-eat" training involves placing food in front of the police dog and telling it not to eat it, the purpose being to prevent poisoning during missions. When training BuChai, it couldn't resist from the very beginning and pounced on the food.
Officer Xue also invited a dog trainer with extensive experience from the team to train it. The trainer started by addressing Bu Chai's love of ham sausages. "We would use ham sausages as bait when it was hungry, and reward it when it performed the action. Using food as a reward was quite effective. After a few months, Bu Chai learned to crawl. Later, one time when it wasn't given any food, Bu Chai lay down, and did it two or three times. We bought a big red flower for Bu Chai to wear, but of course, Bu Chai didn't want to wear it."
But BuChai doesn't follow the rules: before you even give the command, it's already sitting down wanting food; sometimes it wants food but doesn't actually eat it. The biggest problem is that it learns quickly but forgets just as quickly. Officer Xue is quite helpless, "The trainers train one, and it runs away; everyone says their blood pressure rises after training it, and one young man even had a gout attack from getting so angry." The Border Collies and Belgian Malinois in the police force probably also dislike BuChai for being clumsy and basically don't play with it.
After a year of training, the police dogs that joined at the same time had already graduated and were on duty, while Bu De had actually regressed. Netizens commented, "This isn't a husky's dream of becoming a police dog, but a trainer's daydream." Officer Xue, feeling discouraged, commented on it: "It's useless at everything, and it eats everything. Everyone says Bu De seems like it hasn't been trained at all, but I've tried my best. Its obedience is what it is, and I'm frustrated by its lack of progress." People even took care of the "Bu De" officer, giving it the nickname "Second Dog."
Officer Xue told reporters that they named it "BuChai" (meaning "No Demolition") in the hope that it wouldn't destroy the house. But the ideal was far from reality. At just over a month old, it started causing destruction. In the police station, things it can dismantle include police motorcycles, door frames, shoe cabinets, and even guard booths. "It's chewed up the dormitory door, sofa, coffee table, and shoe cabinet; we've gone through countless brooms. When it was little, it chewed through the team leader's rope; when it got older, it directly chewed up police motorcycles." Netizens commented that "No Demolition" is better suited to living in an unfinished apartment.
In February of this year, due to the heat, "Bu Chai" was left to rest in the guard post. "I saw it was asleep, so I went out to get a document." Unexpectedly, a colleague called me back, and I found the police post a complete mess. This was the largest amount of compensation Officer Xue had ever had, over 8,000 yuan gone. "The scene was like a battlefield in Syria; the blankets, pepper spray, and walkie-talkies were all chewed up. Most surprisingly, even the riot helmet and riot shield were chewed up. The riot helmet can protect against all sorts of things, but it couldn't stop Bu Chai's teeth. I was angry and wanted to hit it, but it thought I was playing with it! The blankets were okay, but the walkie-talkies were more expensive." This initially led to Bu Chai having a very bad reputation. Every time it destroyed things, everyone wanted to kill it.
To prevent it from destroying the house, Officer Xue tried various methods to outsmart it. "If I tied it up with a rope, it would dig in the dirt and eventually dig a big hole. If I put it in a cage, it would keep scratching at it and eventually broke the wire. I even tried putting mustard on the police motorcycle, but it didn't work very well; it ate the mustard too."
The dog's refusal to be removed sparked outrage within the police force, and taking it home only brought complaints from the entire village. Once, while on a business trip, Officer Xue left the dog in the village. "Around six or seven in the morning, it howled like a banshee, waking everyone in the village. People used to enjoy visiting my house for tea, but since the dog left, they haven't gone anymore, saying I've been raising a wolf."
The biggest controversy surrounding "Bu Chai" was that it couldn't be used as a police dog to catch criminals, making it an "unregistered" dog within the police force and a waste of manpower and resources. Later, the captain suggested letting it do some public awareness campaigns to see how effective it was. "We usually go to markets to do some anti-telecom fraud campaigns, but the results have never been very good; the flyers are often just used as seat covers," Officer Xue said. "Taking Bu Chai out for public awareness campaigns, with a megaphone hanging on its body, really grabs people's attention. People curious about how a husky can be a police dog all come over and ask for flyers. Especially children, they'll gather around to watch." Later, Bu Chai became quite popular; even when taken for walks in plainclothes, passersby could still recognize it.
From the internet to real life, BuChai's propaganda capabilities have been recognized by the police force. In March and April of this year, the captain decided to designate it as a propaganda police dog in the squadron. Although it doesn't have a formal police dog status or receive a national food allowance, BuChai has become a member of the police force, going to work normally like the officers, thus fulfilling its dream of becoming a police dog in another way.
Occasionally, incidents would occur. Once, Officer Xue mentioned in a video that "the police dog Erchai, who went viral online for not wanting to go to work, ran away and hasn't returned." Actually, it was Buchai who ran away during training in the mountains. Officer Xue and four or five colleagues searched until after 2 a.m. "That night, I dreamt that Buchai was being cooked alive. Two or three days later, an old man came to the post saying he'd found a dog. Everyone was so excited that we drove over ten kilometers to the old man's village. We originally wanted to give it a good beating, but the moment we saw it, we felt relieved that we'd found it."
Over time, everyone developed a bond with Bu Chai. Bu Chai's good qualities also became apparent: although mischievous, it was friendly and loved playing with people, becoming the "group's darling." Because of Bu Chai, the squadron experienced much more laughter. "Sometimes we'd have it pull some officers who couldn't run anymore, improving their physical fitness, and it was quite useful."
After the husky stopped dismantling the guard post, each video garnered hundreds of thousands of views, with the video of the husky dismantling the guard post reaching 4.5 million views. Officer Xue joked, "I guess he wouldn't understand why he became famous if he hadn't dismantled it. If he did, he wouldn't have peed next to the police car when I recorded videos of him doing that."
Although everyone loves buying things for it to eat, the expenses are still quite high, and Officer Xue spends half of his monthly salary on food and toys for it. Officer Xue also sometimes helps out in the family's mango orchard, where mangoes are the family's main source of income. However, he told reporters that after his short videos went viral, he won't be pursuing a product-selling model for now; he mainly wants to record his daily life with his dog.
Dogs typically live for about ten years, but no one expected the farewell to Bu Chai to come so soon. On the morning of May 23rd, around 6 AM, the pet hospital owner called to say that Bu Chai had passed away. Officer Xue said his mind went blank at the time. He told reporters that about a week earlier, he had bought a German Shepherd from a shop owner in Kunming to guard his mango orchard. The owner said the German Shepherd had been tested and only needed vaccinations. After delivering it, he left the German Shepherd in his dormitory, and Bu Chai played with it for a while. Unexpectedly, two hours later, the German Shepherd started vomiting and having diarrhea, so he took it to the vet, where it tested positive for parvovirus and distemper. Three days later, Bu Chai also suddenly started vomiting and having diarrhea, and after being taken to the vet, it was diagnosed with distemper.
Officer Xue recalled that on the way to the hospital, it fought with other dogs, and even tried to fight a large yellow dog while receiving an IV drip. It took two or three people to hold it down during the injection; the nurse tried several times to insert the needle but couldn't, and it was only after a rather overweight veterinarian held it to the ground that they managed to get it in. However, when they checked on Bu Chai again two days later, its condition had deteriorated significantly. Due to intestinal damage, poor Bu Chai couldn't eat and could only receive intravenous nutrition. When they saw Bu Chai again, it was lying in its cage, already dead. Looking back at Bu Chai's previous videos, many netizens commented, "Goodbye, Bu Chai."
“We buried it in a forest behind the training ground. It’s the highest point in our county, overlooking the entire town. Many police dogs that died in the line of duty or from illness are also buried there. When we said goodbye, we gave it a military salute, representing the highest honor we can have as police officers,” Officer Xue told reporters. “We lived and trained together every day. To me, it was like family. It feels like I’ve suddenly lost a loved one. I’m really struggling to adjust after Bu Chai passed away. Usually, when I come home and open the door, Bu Chai would rush over. But now the whole dormitory feels empty, all that lively atmosphere is gone. People used to remember to buy some snacks for Bu Chai, but now that Bu Chai isn’t here, we can’t even finish all the snacks.”
Now that he's moved on from the grief of losing his dog, Officer Xue has started filming videos of his new German Shepherd, whom he named "Continuation." He took it mushroom picking in Yunnan, and "Continuation" has also embarked on a similar training journey, albeit with some setbacks, but the destructive tendencies seem to have been passed down through generations. Officer Xue explained to reporters that he suspects the destructive behavior might be a side effect of medication used during distemper treatment, causing some concern about its intelligence and making it prone to whining during training. "I'll keep documenting my life with my dog," he said.
