Guide Dogs For The Blind
By R.C.Moonstruck
What Is A Guide Dog?
A guide dog is a dog trained to help a visu-
ally impaired person. (Otherwise known as a
blind person.) To do this, the dog literally
sees for it’s owner to keep the person safe
and enable him/her to travel around unac-
companied by another person.
Guide dogs are trained to do many things.
Guide dogs can push elevator buttons, pick
up things the handler has dropped, stop at
street curbs, etc. These dogs are extremely
smart and talented.
By law, these dogs are allowed anywhere
the regular public can go. They accompany
their owners into stores, public transpira-
tion, and restaurants. They are allowed in
concert halls and schools. Anywhere the
handler goes, the dog goes to.
“Guide dogs are very smart, very healthy,
well-mannered, and very eager to work for
praise.
The Labrador Retriever is the right size to
ride in buses and cars, and on trains and
airplanes. LAbradors have a great double
coat of fur that lets them live in a variety of
climates.” says Gary Gintzler, who works for
Guide Dogs For The Blind (GDFB), a pro-
gram who breeds, trains, and adopts out
many guide dogs every year to people
across the country.
From The Very Beginning-
1
Guide dogs are usually bred by non-profit
organizations that are dedicated to breed-
ing, training, and adopting out guide dogs.
Guide dogs can be any breed, but the most
commonly used breeds are German Shep-
herds, Golden Retrievers, and Labrador Re-
trievers. The breeding stock is chosen care-
fully, using only the dogs demonstrating the
characteristics desired in a guide dog the
most.
About 80% of the puppies born go on to be
trained as guide dogs. The other 20% go on
to become companions or other types of
assistance dogs such as bomb/drug sniffing
dogs.
GDFB is non-profit and adopts guide dogs
out for free to blind applicants. Where does
GDFB get their breeding stock? “We are
very fortunate to have our own breeding
program that was started in the 1940’s. Al-
most all of our dogs are bred from our care-
fully selected breeding stock. We use a small
number of dogs from partnership exchanges
with other schools. The Labrador Retriever
has proven to be the most successful breed;
most of our dogs are Labrador Retrievers.
We use a small number of Golden Retrievers
and a small number of Lab/Golden
crosses.”
Learning The Basics-
When the puppies are ready to leave Mom,
they go to a puppy raiser.
By R.C.Moonstruck Guide Dogs For The Blind

These volunteers socialize the puppies with ing, or isn’t suited to guiding and is found a
new places and things as well as teach them permanent home with a loving family.
simple obedience skills. Basically, these
Even if the dog is ready, he must work hard.
people get the puppies ready for the real
Only about 75% of all dogs complete train-
guide dog training.
ing and graduate because of the difficulty in
After about a year, the puppies go back to the process.
the training school to start learning more
about being a guide dog!
Walking The Walk-
Gary talks about some of the problems they
come across while training the dogs- After the extensive testing, the dog moves
on to learning the more advanced concepts
“Being a guide dog takes all the right stuff.
of becoming a guide dog.
There are many reasons a dog might not
become a guide. Some dogs have medical First, the dog learns to walk like a guide- on
issues like allergies. Some dogs are too in- the handler’s left side, slightly ahead.
terested in other dogs or animals. The work
This also means ignoring distractions, main-
is very hard, and some dogs just do not want
taing a steady pace, walking in a straight
to do the work.”
line, and responding to corrections given by
the handler.

Passing The Test-

When brought back to the training school, Intermediate Training-

the dog is faced with a test. He must pass
this test in order to go on to learn the more
advanced parts of training a guide dog must
learn.
The evaluator looks at the puppy’s health,
memory, attention span, awareness, eager-
ness to learn, and intelligence.
The dog cannot be aggressive or nervous,
and cannot go crazy over another dog or a
cat. If the dog doesn’t pass this test, then
either the dog isn’t ready to start the ad-
vanced training yet- in which case he will go
back to his puppy raiser to continue train-
I asked Gary about the guide dog’s interme-
diate training and he replied- “Guide Dog
Trainers or INstructors use many tools and
skills to train the dogs.”
“A good trainer has to have patience and
has to be a hard worker. Each instructor
trains about six dogs. We use food rewards,
happy verbal praise, and a little noise box
called a ‘clicker’. The clicker is a way to tell
the dog exactly when they do something we
like. We even use blindfolds to test all of our
dogs. Our training vans let us drive to dif-
ferent routes each day to teach the dogs
new skills in a variety of places. We do our

2
By R.C.Moonstruck Guide Dogs For The Blind
training in towns and cities. Instructors are
always on the go. We even work with dogs in
stores, restaurants, and at the mall.
We train the dogs to work in a straight line,
from one curb to the next. We train them to
stop at curbs. We train the dogs to move
around obstacles. The dogs are taught to
back up for cars and to stop for traffic.
Dogs learn to work in buildings and eleva-
tors and on stairs.”
I also asked Gary what he thought was the
hardest thing to teach a guide dog. He said
that food refusal was definitely that. “All the
dogs have to learn food refusal. Dogs love
food. To keep the team safe and healthy, a
guide dog can only take food from the han-
dler. They are not allowed to take food off
the ground or in from other people. We start
teaching the dog food refusal at the begin-
ning of training and we work on food refusal
all throughout training. We want our dogs to
work confidently past food, knowing that
the treats come from their handler.” He
says. Intelligent disobedience is also a hard
one.
“All dogs have to learn basic obedience and
guide work. Commands like “sit”, “down”,
and “stay” are all obedience commands.
With obedience commands, the dog does
not get to choose if he does them or not.
Commands like “forward”, “right”, “left”,
“hop-up”, and “halt” are all guide work
commands. The dog only follows these
commands if it is safe. We call this intelligent
disobedience. If the command is unsafe, the
dog can refuse. If at the top of the stairs a
trainer says “forward”, the dog will refuse
3
the command until the trainer finds the top
step with his or her foot.”
The Perfect Pair-
The last part of a guide dog’s training is
learning to work with the person he is paired
with. The person receiving the guide dog
must be taught all of the commands and
what the guide dog is supposed to do.
Guide dog schools work extremely hard to
make sure that the pair will be happy with
each other and will be able to work to-
gether. Schools generally pair young, ener-
getic dogs to young, active people, and
calmer, low-key dogs, to older or more laid
back people. When the pair is finally to-
gether, some schools have ceremonies
where the puppy raiser gets to meet the new
handler. These are considered one of the
most emotional times of the whole training
process.
Pooch Retirement-
Retirement for guide dogs is usually from 8-
10 years old. When a guide dog reaches this
age, the handler has the option of keeping
the dog as a pet, or returning it to the
school.
If the dog is returned to the school, then the
puppy raiser will be contacted and asked if
he/she would like to have the now retired
dog as a pet. If she cannot keep the dog,
then the school will find a loving, forever
By R.C.Moonstruck Guide Dogs For The Blind

home for the guide dog to live in the rest of http://www.flickr.com/photos/panos_kaza

his or her life. They deserve it, right?! nelis/

Who Can Get A Guide Dog-

If you would like to apply for a guide dog,

please visit this link-

http://www.guidedogs.com/site/PageServe
r?pagename=programs_adult_apply_bookle
t

For More Information/Further Reading-

http://www.guidedogs.com
http://animals.howstuffworks.com/animal-f
acts/guide-dog1.htm

Dibsie, Patricia and Koontz, Dean R. Love

Heels: Tales from Canine Companions for
Independence. Yorkville Press, 2003

Patent, Dorothy Hinshaw. Right Dog for

The Right Job: Ira’s Path from Service Dog
to Guide Dog. Walker Books For Young
Readers, 2004

Davis, Marcie. Working Like Dogs: The

Service Dog Guidebook. Alpine Publica-
tions, 2007

Many thanks to GaiaRambler | Panos Ka-

zanelis, who took the image under the title. If
you would like to see more of his photos, go
to