Service Dogs: Starting Age is Vital

1/4/2021

Many things go into creating a good service dog, but age is one of the most crucial. There is a good reason why programs start with puppies bred from reputable parents, and why most owner-trainers search for puppies from a breeder or younger dogs from a rescue. Youth is paramount for this task. In this post, I'll discuss the service dog timeline, the importance of puppies, and advantages of starting young vs the disadvantages of starting with an older dog.

Service Dog Timeline

Every service dog has a timeline. The life of a service dog is wildly different from that of a pet. Service dog puppies begin learning their job from day one. They go through rigorous socialization training, then rigorous obedience training, then rigorous task and public access training - notice a pattern here? Think of service dogs like human athletes. Both go through extensive training, practice their craft all the time, their bodies have to be kept in perfect working order for their career and their bodies are asked to do more than the average dog or person. For this reason, it is best for the life and service of a service dog from them to be started young, and for their handlers to have a plan in mind for when it is time for retirement.

Unlike pets, service dogs may need to be retired as early as 8 yrs old depending on the dog, work load, and possible medical factors. Some service dogs work until 10 yr, though hopefully not much past that.
Mobility dogs may need to retire sooner than an alert dog because their job required them to do tasks that wore on their joints more such as bracing, pushing open heavy doors, dragging heavy objects, and more.
Larger dogs, like Danes, will have a shorter service life than a smaller dog.

It isn't as simple as working a service dog until retirement and then getting a second dog, though. Many handlers start looking for the next dog when their current service dog is only 6 or 8 yrs old and bring it into their life when their current service dog is still fully functional. The reason for that is because they know that it will take at least 2 yrs for the new dog to be ready. So in that time, they need to be training the new dog while the current dog is still able to work and help the handler on a daily basis. By starting your next dog’s training while the current dog is still in service helps prevent you being left high & dry when you need assistance managing your disability. When the time is right, the current dog retires, and the new one steps up to the plate. The cycle begins again.

My 1st Service Dog's Timeline

1 yr 2mo - Adopted from pups on parole program & began extensive obedience training
2 yr - X-rays done of hip joints to ensure good health & ability to begin mobility work; Begin public access & task training
3 yr - Fully trained, begin pulling heavy objects like dragging in firewood
(training/learning never really ends because there's always more to improve & the handler must do maintenance work to practice the dog's skills)
7yr - Begin preparing to welcome a second dog into our lives by buying gear, rearranging house, thinking about management, etc. Get x-rays done on Robbie to check his health.

8yr - Begin search for new dog. Will look into pups on parole again & possibly breeders depending on Sally’s condition abilities and her needs. Robbie will continue to work

9yr - Have second dog in training, Robbie still working and helping to teach.

10/11yr - Retire Robbie & Have New Dog Take Over
11yr + - Robbie enjoys life as a farm dog & retired working dog (never really a pet) until he passes on. New service dog fully functional and being awesome.

Life Doesn't Always Follow the Plan

It’s better to get a puppy, but some handlers won’t have the energy or knowledge for a puppy. And that's if all goes according to plan. Some handlers get thrown a curve ball if their service dog gets ill or critically injured, or otherwise traumatized by an event that causes the handler to retire them early. That 2yr mark of getting scans done can be immensely stressful for handlers because it's entirely possible for the results to come back saying that their promising 2 yr old dog has horrible hip joints or early signs of dysplasia and has to be washed out. At 2 years old — career over!

It’s tempting to think - "oh well I don't need a mobility dog, so I don't need to worry about good joints,” except that a healthy dog is crucial for any type of service dog work. Service dogs spend more time walking on hard surfaces than pets do. They need to be able to walk, stand for long periods, sit for long periods, jump in and out of vehicles, and more. It's unethical and unfair to make a service dog work when they have any kind of painful health condition or a condition that affects their ability to work such as being blind or deaf, or another type of disability such as missing a limb.

The Power of the Puppy Years

Choosing from a breeder or rescue, or going the puppy route will be a powerful decision. It's not for everyone, because it does take an even higher level of commitment and energy to work with a puppy. So what's the secret that gives handlers a leg up when they choose to start with a puppy? The socialization.

All puppies go through something called a fear period. Under "resources" listed below, please read the article on the Importance of Socializing Puppies Early. It talks about how until the age of 16 weeks, puppies accept anything new as friendly and not stressful. After 16wks, however, a switch is flipped and suddenly anything new is seen as dangerous and untrustworthy even if there isn't a negative association created. It's for that reason that puppies should be exposed to anything and everything early on and create positive associations with these experiences. This socialization can be started with a dog adopted at a year or older, but can sometimes be more difficult. Additionally, when you adopt an older dog, there’s no way for you to know what they have or have not been exposed to, let alone any phobias they might have until you find out the hard way.

Socialization is more important than obedience or task training for a service dog. You're thinking, "What? Tasks are what makes a service dog!" And that's true. But, if your service dog can't do basic commands or their tasks around any stimuli, under any situation, with any distraction, then they will never be able to work in public. Going out in public can be extremely overwhelming and stressful for a dog if not introduced to the sights, smells, sounds, and experiences properly.

Think about the grocery store…

Carts whizzing by making a metal, rumbling sound. Throngs of people all smushed together like sardines in the checkout lines. Loud speakers with a magical voice booming out of nowhere. The smell of glorious dead animal at the butcher stand. Tempting aromas seeping through boxes and bags that sit easily within reach of your dog's mouth. Tight spaces to maneuver in and around. People cooing and invading your dog's personal space bubble without warning to drive-by pet, throw their arms around his neck, or try to feed him when the handler looks away for moment.

These are all stimulations that a good service dog should be able to ignore with ease, while remaining calm and focused on his handler alone, ready to perform a task at any moment. And that's just the grocery store. Think about hardware stores with loud noises and machinery moving past to stock lumber shelves. Think about pet stores where they have to ignore their own kind! They can't socialize with new friends when they are working, they can't grab treats that they recognize as treats they are routinely given. That kind of self control takes years of specialized training. It doesn't happen overnight or even in the span of a few weeks. It takes years.

If you start with a puppy, you hold more control over their socialization. You are responsible. If you start with a one yr old dog from a shelter, you are gambling because you know nothing of what or how that dog was socialized for an entire year. A dog can learn a lot in a year, even if no one meant to teach them things. If you start with dog rescued at 6 yrs, your time span for mystery socialization training is even greater. Not to mention whatever bad habits they may have learned in that time that might let them be great pets, but terrible service dogs, and the simple truth that your dog will not be able to give you a worthwhile career as a service dog. Socialization is everything.

Advantages of Starting with Young Dog

Young = Puppy to 2 yr
(2 yr should be the latest you start)

More control over socialization
Younger mind can soak up more
Haven't had years of bad habits or bad training engrained
Longer serviceable, working life
Healthier body to work with
Get to know your dog's language, quirks, and personality as they develop
You won't feel as pressured to rush training and will know that "slow is fast"

It seems like many shelter dogs come with some caveat of not good with kids or other animals. If you start young, you have the chance to introduce your dog to cats, kids, horses, etc in a positive way. SDs need to be ok with kids and any animal they may come across when working. So if you do get a shelter dog, it cannot have any restrictions.

Disadvantages to Starting Older

Old = 3 - 4yr or older
If you've raised them from a pup, as a pet, & decide to transform them later on you will still face some of these disadvantages. It's possible, but not recommended to start service dog training past 3 yrs old.

If from rescue/shelter you have little to no knowledge about their past & their socialization experiences
Personality & temperament are more set in stone
Plenty of time to learn bad habits or be poorly trained, which won't set you up for success
Shorter serviceable, working life. If you start at 3, then 2 yrs of training, they are 5 when they are full SDs. At 6-7 you need to be looking for that replacement, and then get them & train. If you start at 7 yr, you'll try to rush training which hardly ever works out & you only have maybe 2 yrs of working life.
The older you start, the older and more worn down their body will be. Even if they looks & seem healthy, their body has years of wear & tear on it on the inside.
You will want to rush training. You will be so focused on training "in time" that you might miss learning how your dog communicates with you and all their little quirks.
You might not be able to teach them certain things. If you get an older dog whose history you don't know, and maybe they've never been played with, teaching the retrieve is going to be extremely difficult if not impossible. Because you have to then teach the dog how to play, then how to do retrieve with random objects they'd rather not have in their mouth like phones & slippery bottles.

Final Thoughts

Age is crucial. It is strongly recommended by seasoned handlers and trainers that your service dog be started before they are two years old. Their reasoning is sound. It's based on scientific knowledge of how puppies learn and grow, years of working with service dogs, and just plain common sense. With owner-training, I know it's tempting to start with a pet you already have or save an older dog from certain death at a shelter, but you can't have that attitude or approach with training a good service dog and expect to succeed. Think about your dog. Working life can be hard and stressful and overwhelming. It is not for every dog. This level of training required can't be rushed. It can't be accomplished by miracle trainers in the span of a few weeks or a few months. It is a years long type of commitment.

There have probably been handlers who started with an older dog who were extremely successful. If you’ve heard of such a team, please know that scenario is rare & special. There will always be exceptions to the rule, but don't let the exceptions guide you into the wrong decision. Training a service dog isn't a hobby for the weekend. Needing a service dog is a lifetime deal. It's not as simple as buying a new car when your current ones breaks. The smart plan to overlay the current dog's timeline and the new dog's timeline so that you aren't suddenly lost without the assistance of your service dog. The handlers who deal with tragic washout cases (retiring early) have years of setbacks either from trying to rehab their current dog or floundering without their furry assistive device. Washing out a service dog can be as devastating as losing a limb, because you are losing a part of yourself. As service dogs change to help us, we change to rely on them. I handle my condition differently now that Robbie helps me. If he died unexpectedly or had to be washed out without warning and we didn't have the next dog in training, I would feel so lost and would seriously struggle to live with my pain condition each day without his help. My pain would quickly shift back into being unmanageable, unstable, and even more unpredictable. The age of the dog when you start is vital to both the dog's success and the management of your condition.

If you want to save an older dog, save it. Then label it as a pet or emotional support dog. Don't put it through potentially stressful, rigorous training. Our dogs aren't robots, that can have training components and variables coded and recorded into their computer matrices. They are living beings whose needs must be considered. Think of yourself too. You are going to put years of your life into training this beautifully brilliant animal to help you manage a disability. Trust me, you want to be able to enjoy all the hard work and profit medically from their skills at assisting you. Starting older gives you less time for this magnificent creature to change your disabled life into abled, independent, confident, and so much more. Start young. It's worth it.

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