The havanese dog breed’s traits have helped it see plenty of action in a wide spectrum of work roles, although at heart, the havanese is very much a companion dog. The dog’s playful and optimistic disposition and rapidity at absorbing training helps it accomplish tasks that have to do with assisting and helping other people. The Havanese can therefore be a model pet therapy and assistance dog, capable of inspiring and calming people with physical and emotional problems and conditions. In fact, many havanese become expert signal or hearing dogs, with the help of havanese training.
Hearing dogs are an example of dogs that fulfill some very high level type of work: imagine being trained to be the “ears” of the hearing impaired. Many organizations carefully pick and teach their dogs to be effective companions for hearing impaired people. These dogs maximize their Havanese training to the fullest, capable of giving notice to their charges that they just heard an important sound or noise, such as a doorbell, or a smoke alarm, or the clock alarm. Many dogs are also taught how to respond appropriately to sounds coming from outside the home. For example, if the dog hears someone calling the owner’s name, or any important noise, the dog may put its paws on the handler, or nudge it. For some noises, like the telephone ringing, the dog may take the handler to the noise source; in the case of others, such as a fire alarm, the dog leads the handler away from the source of the alarm.
If you think that all assistance dogs come from tried and tested breeders, you are wrong! Most organizations actually have used dogs found in shelters, because these entities are also interested on rescuing dogs, aside from the motive to help the disabled. Some organizations also welcome donations of dogs. Havanese have a reputation at signal work since they are first and foremost loving and dedicated, not skittish when it comes to sounds, love to please their humans, and actually have a work ethic. Nevertheless, all dogs regardless of breed must take a temperament test before starting on Havanese training. Dogs are first taught obedience, and then are socialized with a wide variety of people and situations; last of all, they start what is called sound alerting training. Some dogs finish training in three months, but most dogs take around a year to complete training. Dogs are taught to differentiate and sort out a large number of sounds and to respond correctly to various sounds when physically signaling their handler. This means that the dog needs to know the difference between a phone ringing and a fire alarm sounding off, and aside from that, learn that handlers need to be taken to the ringing phone, but taken away from the fire alarm.
Hearing dogs, similar to most assistance dogs, have access to all public structures. To avoid getting them confused with pet dogs, hearing dogs wear a bright orange leash or collar. Many groups get their hearing dogs capes or jackets of a specific color to differentiate among them. While most hearing dogs are professionally prepared by known organizations, plenty of hearing impaired individuals are starting to train their own dogs.
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