[nagdu] lots and lots of very overweight dogs.

[Sonja O]

Often times service animals, who are working for the disabled community are unfortunately overweight for many reasons.
Many disabled handlers don't have the physical nor the monetary sources to exercise the dog to provide a balanced lifestyle.
It's not just a challenge for the vision impaired community.
I have to pull myself together everyday to provide the appropriate exercise and playtime for my service dog. It's really challenging at times, but he thanks me with excellent health and weight and a balanced temperament and really good work ethics.
Having a disability and a working dog is not always easy, even though those dogs give us more freedom, independence and enhance life quality on several levels.
I wish there was some understanding in the social network to help out on keeping the dogs fit and healthy or even an organization, which could provide daily exercise for our furry partners for very little money or just voluntarily.
It's very strenuous to do service dog work for a dog. Doing it overweight is even more strenuous and harmful.
Yes, it's important and so essential to bring up this subject and to keep our working partners fit <3
Best to you all, sonja and chief 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jul 11, 2015, at 9:53 AM, Vivianna via nagdu <nagdu at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> hi all,
> well, i just got back from the national convention.  i have to say that there were lots of extremely overweight dogs there.  don’t people know that this is the worst thing that you can do to your dog?  
> i am sure no school takes away dogs due to their weight or, they would have had to bring busloads of crates to take away all of those poor dogs.
> if your dog should weigh 70 pounds, for example, but, he weighs 92 pounds and feels like a bowl of jelly, he certainly is not a healthy dog and, most likely he is not being worked very much either.
> i saw a woman feeding her dog potato chips during general session.
> maybe NAGDU should have someone speak about the dangers of being fat next year?  not sure it will do any good, but, i would go listen.
> kevin wurly from WE fitness also said that, the blindness community has the highest percentage of overweight people of any group of people, 90 percent of blind folks are overweight.
> very interesting.
> regarding the ownership of your dog.  i, frankly, don’t think any school will take a dog because it’s overweight.
> i actually called animal control on my neighbors and, they told me that they could not do anything unless the dog has no food, water and shelter.
> in this particular case, the dog had none of the above but, they still did nothing and, the neighbors still have the dog.
> unfortunately, if someone really wants to abuse their dog, they will be able to do it. all we can do is try and educate folks and hope they are nice responsible people.
> 
> Vivianna
> 
> 
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