i've been thinking about training a service dog up because of some shit i'm dealing with. (memory, mental illness, some sensory stuff.) (i've been writing down potential tasks and i've done some research, asked around couple rescues and found something that looks promising) does anyone on here have an sd/sdit or experience with them?
I don't have anything to add except that I too would like to acquire this knowledge. I've been thinking more and more that a service dog would be a good idea for all my issues.
apparently greyhound sds are a thing that people have! i found someone on tumblr with one and i am going to pelt them w/ questions 8D (i was kinda nervous about that, because i'm looking at greyhounds and mostly when you see sds you see some flavor of retriever or poodle) apparently if i go through the local greyhound rescue i can get a prison-trained dog that's trained in certain tasks for sd work, though i'd still need to work with a trainer after i got them obvi for more specialized stuff and things like public access. which would be very cool, as the dog plus partial training would come in at under a thousand dollars, which makes the whole shebang significantly cheaper than the service dog prospect puppies i've been looking into. this post also serves as a bump 4 the thread because i'd love to hear from more people with sds, past the ones i'm following on tumblr and other places.
Pretty much any dog can be a service dog if properly trained, but the people who provide training+a puppy definitely prefer retrievers. Greyhounds are great dogs though, sturdy and very mellow, so I imagine getting one to be a service dog would work out really well. All the ones I've met have had ridiculously good personalities for it. (We're working on training Fen up; he's still too young to get into a full training regimen, but our trainer is pretty optimistic since he's calm and pretty sedate for a husky and we're getting in on getting him acclimated to public spaces really early on.)
My aunt has a pup for anxiety/panic attacks and other general issues! And by pup I mean she goes for the biggest dobermans she can get. Her former one was super good without much training (he would even do headcounts on hikes without being told) and her current one is a bit more of a princess, but they were both very sweet and...very huge. So yeah I'd say look into size early on?? Aunt likes hers ~intimidating~ but you might wanna go for a dog that's not gonna require Big Eater Chow (or a dog that WON'T take up your whole three man couch ;D )
my family used to train service dogs! one of the mops I live w currently is ~3/4s trained. Idk about other countries, but every state in the US should have a service dog agency, and usually they're happy to teach people how to train their own service dogs, and how to make sure other people like landlords can't give you shit for having one
