Hawk's Schedule

8/4 Lake Mills
8/12 CCSDA Training

October 3, 2011

Free Agents

We have been unemployed for the past month with no indication that another puppy trainee was in our future.  In the past we had another puppy before all the hair was cleaned up.  If that is ever possible; we probably still have hair samples from each of the twenty dogs that have shared our home during the past four years.

Being free agents offers an opportunity to look for the best situation to raise a successful guide dog.  With that in mind, we recently contacted Leader Dogs for the Blind.  Leader Dogs is located in Rochester, Michigan  and they are affiliated with Lions Clubs.  The waiting list for a puppy, once accepted, is six to twelve months.

While we wait for our next baby guide dog (apologize for using the term so often, but I just heard it a few weeks ago and I love it), we are looking into doing some temporary training and puppy sitting.  Our nephew has a puppy, Rex,  in need of some remedial training who we may help out.  In addition, Lisa has been walking our first guide dog trainee, Buddy in the afternoon.. 


Reading through the puppy raiser FAQ, I spotted this item that is important for puppy raisers to remember:
Unlike working guide dogs, businesses are not required to allow our puppies onto their premises—it will be your responsibility to get permission from the owner or manager of an establishment before entering with a puppy.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The statement may be true if you are calling yourself a puppy raiser only. I consider myself to be a trainer and not just a "puppy raiser" and the law here states that businesses cannot keep a trainer out or charge more just because the trainer is accompanied by a service dog.