Service Dog Struggles To Bark On Command

Having a dog as a pet can be a wonderful thing, but oftentimes people get them for very specific reasons. There are people out there, both young and adult, who would benefit from the companionship and agility of a well trained service dog. Veterans need them for comfort, children need them for help.

So many organizations have been founded around the world in order to raise and train such animals, one of which being 4 Paws for Ability. Their latest trainee is this ball of golden yarn here, who is supposed to give an vocal alarm for his owner whenever necessary. It seems, however, that the fluffy guy has much to learn still.

"Bolt (Superbolt) is a service dog in training for an organization that trains service dogs for children and veterans with disabilities called 4 Paws for Ability (https://4pawsforability.org/). For many of their alerting tasks, barking at the right time is crucial. My boyfriend and I are both trainers - he actually trains Bolt's sister, Pria - but neither of us have ever trained a dog with such hilarious attempts at barking as Bolt. They are both a few months older, around 9 months old now, but he continues to need a few tries at 'barking' as displayed in the video before he gets a full bark out," says Bolt’s trainer.

At first it looks like Bolt is up to some fooling around, so instead of releasing his voice, he snaps his jaws a couple of times. But after some cheerful coercing from his trainer, he whimpers at first and just 20 seconds later produces a sort-of bark. Hey, at least he got his praise. Good job!

4 Paws was founded by a woman who used to suffer from a rare neuromuscular disease called Myasthenia Gravis. Karen Shirk used to need a ventilator to sleep because of her condition, but when she applied for a service dog, all the agencies declined her because she was “too disabled”. She had a dream of creating a place where people who are in need of a service dog wouldn’t be judged by the severity of their disability. They started with just two dogs back in 1998 and today they are one of the biggest organizations in the States.

4 Paws for Ability offers Assistance Dogs for children with autism, after Karen noticed that agencies would often place dogs with these children that have not been trained in the necessary set of skills. So the team created a program complete with safety features that would “give families back their lives and provide behavioral interventions to help the children with their daily interactions with others.”

Today 4 Paws For Ability is the largest organization whose primary mission is to place service dogs with children and one of the only organizations to have no minimum age requirements. They place almost every type of service dog available and never turn down a child who does not “fit” into one of the traditional service dog categories. Their Multipurpose Assistance Dog is a dog that encompasses all those children who do not fit into the traditional service dog types and/or who have disabilities that fit into more than one type of dog trained.