WSU opens dorms to puppies training to be guide dogs

Chandler Fish, a Washington State University sophomore, was the envy of her dorm mates last year. Most students have roommates. Fish shared her Stevens Hall room with a guide dog in training.

“Everybody else was jealous,” said the Everett 19-year-old, who heads back to the Pullman campus today.

During Fish’s freshman year, she was a volunteer trainer for two pups through Guide Dogs for the Blind. The California-based nonprofit provides guides dogs, at no cost, to people who are blind or visually impaired.

Apricot, a yellow Labrador, was on campus before graduating as a guide dog in June. She is now a canine companion for Jessica Rathwell, 30, in New Westminster, British Columbia.

Later in her freshman year, Fish was training Doc, a Labrador-golden retriever mix. “My second puppy was very high energy — not a good fit for a guide dog,” Fish said. Dogs that don’t make the grade may end up in other types of service work, or as pets for volunteer trainers.

Apricot was the organization’s first puppy-in-training allowed to live at WSU — but not the last.

With the academic year about to begin, Fish and her mother, Tina Fish, are training two more puppies — one that will soon live at WSU. At their Everett home Thursday, the mother and daughter showed off the new arrivals. Jane and Jalina are 11-week-old black Lab sisters.

Tina Fish will keep Jane with her in Everett. Jalina will leave in about a month — after vaccinations and more house-training — to join Chandler in Pullman. Adorable in their green “Guide Dog Puppy in Training” vests, both already are being schooled in rules most dogs never learn.

There’s no sleeping on the couch or chasing the cat in the Fish household.

“The number-one thing we do is socialization,” Chandler Fish said. Training begins with basic obedience and house manners. “At four or five months old, it’s going out to places. At school, they sit in class and sleep. In restaurants, having them with us gets them used to being a working dog,” she said.

Both mother and daughter learned about Guide Dogs for the Blind through the Girl Scouts. Chandler was in middle school when she attended a Girl Scouts event called Discoveries, where she took part in a puppy-raising workshop. Through an Everett area Guide Dogs for the Blind puppy-raising club, she learned more.

Chandler and her mom remember seeing a guide dog with its owner in a restaurant. Tina Chandler at last agreed to let her daughter raise a puppy. Chandler has since learned that the young woman who spoke at that Girl Scout event helped start a puppy-raising club at WSU.

Tina Fish, who works for Volunteers of America Western Washington, leads a Daisy troop of first-graders. Her Daisies were delighted to meet her latest trainee, Jane. While her daughter was in Pullman with Apricot, Tina Fish raised another pup, Fancy. That dog is now in training with Dogs for the Deaf.

Anne Tyson, a community field representative with Guide Dogs for the Blind in Washington, said WSU is very supportive of the program.

“We like the puppies to experience a lot of things as they mature. We like raisers to take them to a few new places each week, to experience sights, smells and other dogs,” Tyson said. She listed three Cs that are good traits in a guide dog: “calm, cooperative and confident.”

The organization has about 850 dogs in training, Tyson said. Guide Dogs for the Blind delivers puppies to trainers at a regional site, in this area usually Tacoma Mall, and pays for routine veterinary care. Trainers pay for dog food and other incidental expenses — but not tennis balls. Guide dogs are never taught to fetch, Tina Fish said.

In New Westminster, Rathwell is thrilled with Apricot. She was delivered June 9, and a Guide Dog for the Blind trainer spent 10 days with Rathwell in Canada.

Rathwell, who has been blind since very early childhood, works in an electronics store. “Apricot goes everywhere with me. She’s sitting in the break room at work right now, lying here sleeping,” she said Thursday.

Apricot helps her get around, inside and outside. “More than that, it seems like she’s almost reading your mind sometimes,” Rathwell said. “It’s definitely a strong bond.”

Apricot has her own Facebook page. The lab puppies — Jane and Jalina — do, too. The Everett women miss the first dog they helped raised, but are glad their efforts are appreciated by someone needing a guide dog.

Tina Fish shared a thought on Apricot’s Facebook page: “Dear Apricot … It sounds like you are just loving working and playing with your new mama. We knew you would.”

Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; jmuhlstein@heraldnet.com.

Learn more

Guide Dogs for the Blind, based in San Rafael, California, uses volunteers to help train guide dogs for people who are blind or visually impaired. Information: http://welcome.guidedogs.com/