JOINT BASE LEWIS-McCHORD, Wash. — Meet Tracker, a five-year-old, sixty-pound Belgian Malinois and a graduate of the Military Working Dog School at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas. He's also one of the Army's first five openly transgender military police dogs, assigned to the 42nd Military Police Brigade at Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

"We took to each other pretty quickly," said Spc. Jeffrey Grassley, a military policeman and dog handler partnered with Tracker. "I mean, it's a little weird that they tell me to call him a 'him,' since he's obviously a female dog, and there was that time last month when he was laid up for a few days after he gave birth to a litter of puppies, but we've really forged a close working friendship."

Tracker, who was raised as a female dog under the name Regina, first identified as a male during the initial breeding and selection process the military uses to screen potential military working dogs.

"Looking back now, it was pretty obvious that she was — sorry, He — was a little different," said Tech Sgt. Walter Flaherty, one of Tracker's trainers. "He didn't really say much, obviously, but you could just sort of tell."