[NAGDU] Poodles and doodles

[Tami Jarvis]

Tara,

I'm on my second owner-trained poodle guide, who just turned 4 last 
week. I got both from a breeder here in Oregon. My first, a female named 
Mitzi was 7 months old when she arrived on my doorstep. Loki, a male, 
was 11 weeks old when we picked him up to bring him home. They're the 
only guide dogs I've had, so I can only compare them to the other common 
breeds from all the anecdotes I've heard over the years.

Poodles are super smart, super high energy and super high alert. This 
can add up to really great work, especially if you like adventure and 
new places and challenges. Other times, it all adds up to a total PITA 
which must be managed with care. Just cracking down on a wound-up poodle 
makes things worse and can create ongoing problems, so they're not the 
dog for control freaks. On the other hand, they'll do anything, anything 
at all, if you just ask them to and let on that it will make you happy. 
It's very difficult for them to just be quietly out of the way when 
stuff is going on around them, and that's the part that drives me mad in 
training and in their early work. They're quite vocal, though they can 
learn to be quiet on the job. They tend towards separation anxiety. They 
need a lot of play and exercise to expend excess energy. I remember when 
somebody asked how much time people spend playing with their guide dogs 
every day. All the lab owners said about 15 minutes. A poodle guide 
owner said she plays at least an hour a day after a very busy working 
schedule. That, I could relate to.

The grooming does get expensive, especially if you like to keep the dog 
trimmed down and have it done frequently. I've also found that when my 
dog gets fluffy in the face, it is more irrestistible to the general 
public. It was a bit of a problem for Mitzi, who is a bit more 
standoffish with strangers and would get a little stressed from the 
extra attention. Loki loves the extra attention, though he's finally 
learned to manage his friendliness. Mostly.

One thing that seems to be very different is that the poodle can appear 
to be totally distracted from the work while guiding their handler quite 
safely through impossible obstacle courses. The handler won't know the 
obstacles are even there unless some panicked member of the sighted 
public brings it to their attention because it looks to them like the 
dog is out to get the handler killed. Both of mine are really predictive 
and like to make decisions way ahead of time. I really like that, but 
it's confusing when there's an obstacle a block or two ahead that I 
can't detect, so I have a long argument with the dog over its insistence 
that we need to detour. Every now and then, I decide it's time to put my 
foot down and make that obnoxious dog do what it is supposed to do. I've 
been wrong every time and gotten us into big trouble. Mitzi took great 
delight in saying "I told you so," but Loki just sort of sighs and gets 
on with extricating us from whatever mess I insisted we get into.

hth,

Tami



On 04/30/2018 06:57 PM, Tara Briggs via NAGDU wrote:
> Hi all! I am wondering about poodles and poodle lab and poodle retriever mixes. If any of you use those dogs as guides? What was your experience like? Where did you receive the dogs from? Thanks for any help!
> Tara
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
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