[nagdu] what do you do with your dog when you go away?

Julie J julielj at neb.rr.com
Wed Jan 19 20:01:17 UTC 2011


Gary,

I think it really depends on the needs of your particular dog.  When I go on 
short trips where I don't take Monty, which is infrequent, I leave him at 
home with my family.  He might have to be alone for a few hours, but 
generally someone is here for a good portion of the day. I'd say I go for a 
overnight trip like this about twice per year.

On the more rare occasions when I go on a longer trip, I leave him with the 
dog boarding lady.  When he's there he gets to run amuck in her backyard 
with the other dogs.  He doesn't get a ton of opportunities to run with 
other dogs and for Monty this is a very good thing.  He really needs wild 
doggie time.  It's not a typical boarding kennel, but more like a private 
home environment.  Monty would not do well in a typical kennel situation, 
like what my vet has to offer.

Belle, on the other hand, does just fine at the vet for boarding.  She's 
fine with other dogs at boarding lady's house, but does not thrive on wild 
doggie romping.   She is also fine at home alone for much longer than I'd be 
comfortable leaving Monty without someone here with him.

All that said, you have several trips all very close together.  I think I'd 
see if I could work it out to take him on one or two of the trips. No clue 
what the paperwork process is like, but I do know of someone who took her 
guide to Turkey many years ago.  Of course lots of people travel back and 
forth from Hawaii with service dogs.

Best of luck!
Julie




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "GARY STEEVES" <rainshadowmusic at shaw.ca>
To: "NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users" 
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 19, 2011 1:19 PM
Subject: [nagdu] what do you do with your dog when you go away?


> Hello Everyone:
>
> As many of you may recall, I'm a fairly new dog guide handler. Over the 
> next several months I must go away almost once a month. Bonn germany for 5 
> days in February, Turkey in end of march for 8 or 9 days, Montreal at the 
> end of april for 4 days and then a holiday to hawaii in May for 10 days.
>
> I'm curious what others do with their dogs when they can't take them with 
> them?
>
> I have several options for many of these trips. The first one is that 
> bogart stays at home and will just have to be at home alone while Susan, 
> my girlfriend is at work. Her thought is that although he will be stressed 
> with me gone and being at home alone for 8.5 hours, it will be in his 
> familiar surroundings with his toys, our guinea pigs and my smells (and 
> Susan of course0).
>
> Second option is my supervisor at work has offered to take him for any/all 
> of these trips. She has two dogs at home and her husband stays home all 
> day. He takes them out for a couple of walks a day and they have a back 
> yard. Bogart really likes her which could be both good or bad.
>
>
> We have another friend who also have two dogs, a whipet and an older lab, 
> with a back yard and  robert works from home most days.
>
> The last option which I am looking into now is if the local guide dog 
> school, who my dog is not from, would offer any kenneling services (for a 
> fee of course) or access to any of their puppy raisers who would be 
> intersted in looking after bogart for some of these trips for a fee as 
> well. My thought is this option, if possible, would best keep bogart's 
> training at a reasonable  level. :)
>
> Do any of you have thoughts on what you think would be best. I've left a 
> message for my trainers at my school as well to bounce these options off 
> her too but the more thoughts I have I think the more I can look at pros 
> and cons.
>
> Thanks
> Gary
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