This is Ford. He’s an Australian Sheppard who’s deaf, and half blind. I adopted him about a week ago. Even with his disabilities, he is just happy to be your friend.
If you wanna follow Ford as he grows up, please give him a follow on instagram
Hi Ford!!! I’m sure you’re the bestest boy aren’t you?
Absolutely 100% the bestest boy
What a good boy!
You didn’t mention how much experience you have with deaf or sight impaired dogs, so I’m sorry if what follows is old hat to you.
Deaf Dogs Rock has a great set of resources for teaching your deaf dog sign language, training them with a vibration collar for recall (no shock capabilities, ever), and learning about what life with a deaf dog can be like.
While certain environmental safety needs are different for blind or partially blind dogs can be different, much of the training follows very consistent expectations for the human component. Here is a good article from the Humane Society about caring for pets with sight impairments.
Speaking specifically to some training to work on as life skills for you two to navigate the world:
BAT 2.0 is a tool to help desensitize dogs to stimuli. It’s highly recommended to employ this to help teach impaired dogs that being touched unexpectedly leads to treats and pets. One of the games in the toolkit is often called “Look at that/look at me” or Engage/Disengage. This can be adapted to be more of a “notice that/sit at my side” if that’s better for you.
