5 Daily Activities Grow the Bonds with My Service Dog

I first met my service dog, Koogle, when we went through hearing dog team training at the Canine Companions training facility in Oceanside, California.  Among the many things I was taught were the five things I needed to do with him every day.  The basic need for these tasks is obvious, and my first thought was they were all about keeping the dog healthy and well trained.  I didn’t yet appreciate the impact these daily actions would have on my relationship with my dog.  These are the things we do every day.

Feeding

Well duh.  Of course I need to feed my dog, but it’s the details that matter.  Labrador retrievers like Koogle have a very strong food drive, which helps make them easy to train.  On the other hand, he doesn’t know when to stop eating, and he wouldn’t make good choices if left to his own devices.  Fat Labrador and golden retrievers are common as my vet will tell you.  A fat and lazy animal would not make a good service dog, and obesity is likely to shorten his working lifespan.

Koogle exclusively eats Purina Pro Plan Sensitive Skin and Stomach dog food, both for his meals and as his training rewards.  This is the food the Canine Companions veterinary team determined was best for his individual needs.  I measure his food so he gets one cup for his morning meal, one cup for his evening meal, and one half cup in his training pouch.  Kibbles left in his training pouch at the at the end of the day are given to him as an evening snack.  I came up with the quantity he gets today by weighing him monthly over our first year together to find the amount that kept his weight at 60 pounds.  I continue to weigh him regularly to make sure he stays at his healthy weight.  All we do is stop by my vet’s office, and they are happy to let him jump on the scale.

Toileting

Again, duh.  This is just basic housekeeping, but the cool thing is that Service Dog Koogle has been trained to relieve himself on command.  I tell him “Hurry”, and he gets his business done within a minute.  If he doesn’t really have to go, he’ll either lift his leg or go squat down and let a couple of drops out.  The Canine Companions trainers call this a “courtesy squat” but it lets me know he’s good to go.

Grooming

Daily grooming consists of ear cleaning, tooth brushing, and fur brushing.  I trim Koogle’s nails once or twice a month, and he usually gets a bath once a month.  It depends on how muddy it is outside.  Labrador and golden retrievers have floppy ears that can hold in moisture, making these breeds more susceptible to ear infections.  Daily cleaning with cotton gauze reduces the risk of infection, and simply looking in Koogle’s ears lets me see if everything is good.  A hearing dog with stuffy, infected ears will not be as on task as one with healthy ears.  Daily brushing with an enzymatic toothpaste prevents plaque buildup, which could lead to gum disease and tooth loss down the line.  It’s not a simple task for a dog to go to the dentist for tooth cleaning.  Veterinary tooth cleaning requires general anesthesia and costs hundreds of dollars.  Daily brushing eliminates the anesthesia risk and the expense.

I really underestimated the importance of daily brushing when I started out with Koogle.  Yes, these dogs are big shedders, and brushing helps.  Yes, he looks good after he has been brushed, but it turns out there is more to it.  We were taught in team training that brushing helps the dog’s sense of well-being.  It’s more than that.  As I see it, brushing is like high power petting – something dogs find highly rewarding.  Research has shown that the level of the bonding hormone, oxytocin, increases in dogswhen they are pet.  It is also thought to reduce their stress level.  In humans, the act of petting a dog increases levels of serotonin and dopamine, but also increases activity in the frontal cortex, which is involved with social and emotional processes, as well as executive functions. What I’ve experienced is that our connection to one another and our strength as a team has grown through the act of daily grooming.

Exercise

A physically fit dog will most likely live longer and have more years of active service.  I want to honor the effort and expense Koogle’s puppy raisers and trainers put into him, and I don’t want him to have to struggle to jump into my pickup or to keep up with me on a hike.  Canine Companions asks its graduates to exercise their service dogs for sixty minutes a day. An hour seems like a lot of time.  Mostly I just try to keep Koogle active, rather than setting a timer to sixty minutes.  I take Koogle with me to most places I go, even if I don’t think I’ll need his help, so he gets to walk and jump in and out of my truck.  

The rest of his exercise is just play.  Koogle loves to play tug.  He regularly comes up to me with a wagging tail and a toy in his mouth.  The message is clear, “I want to play with you now.”  I try to drop what I’m doing and give him some attention.  I let him try to pull the toy out of my hand, and sometimes I’ll get up and drag him around over the slippery floor.  He absolutely loves this, and it strengthens his core and leg muscles.  I think giving my dog attention when he asks for it shows I enjoy his company and strengthens our bond as a team.  Koogle also enjoys running around the backyard with his dog buddy Alex7.  People often ask if my service dog ever gets the chance to just be a dog.  He does, and he gets some exercise in while doing it.  Occasionally, Koogle even gets to go a pool party with other Canine Companions dogs.  I think he could swim for hours.

Training

Humans need to practice skills to avoid becoming rusty, and dogs are no different.  Labrador and golden retrievers were originally bred to be working dogs, and Koogle genuinely seems to enjoy working.  His eyes brighten with focus, and his ears move up and forward with attention during training.  We work on basic at home tasks of alerting me to the doorbell and taking me to my wife when she calls my name from across the house.  I also like to do training exercises away from home because dogs don’t generalize the way people do.  Just because Koogle knows to alert me at home when my wife calls me at home does not mean that he knows I want him to alert me when a barista calls my name at a coffee shop.  And if he alerts me to my name called at Starbucks in Cleveland it does not necessarily mean he knows to alert me at the Coffee Farm in Wahiawa, Hawaii.  So, we get help from willing baristas (or brew pub workers) to practice calling my name.  

We also work on new skills.  Koogle recently learned to alert me to the sound the washing machine and dryer make when they finish a load.  It’s super handy!  Koogle sharpens his skills with daily training, and he is reassured that I reward him for his efforts.  Daily training helps me grow my skill as a dog handler, and I become more confident that Koogle and I can work together wherever we go.

In Conclusion

The pair of a person and their service dog is called a team.  It’s a fitting term because we are both looking out for one another.  Koogle trusts me to keep him fed and safe, and he performs the tasks I need knowing that I appreciate what he does for me.  The daily tasks we do together strengthen our ties to one another allowing me to better cope with and accept my hearing loss.

Is a service dog right for you or someone you love?  Visit the Canine Companion web site and learn more.