Just applied to rehome a withdrawn guide dog. Any experiences??

[monkeywithacowface]

So am finally at a stage where our lifestyle would suit having a dog, Have been trawling rescue centres for months but it seems an impossible mission and I don't have faith in my abilities to find a reputable breeder and I'm not handing over £800 to a puppy farmer! So have decided re-homing a withdrawn guide dog could be the answer. Am also hoping to miss out the trauma of the very little puppy stage!

Anyone have any experiences with withdrawn guide dogs? Are we likely to be successful as I have no idea how many they re-home each year. Have specified preferring a youngish dog (up to 2) without serious health issues so hope that won't go against us.

I would LOVE to do this!

No idea or experience but sounds fabulous. Good luck!

Be prepared to wait.....the list is usually very long.

Why not apply to the Labrador breed specific rescues as well? A good breeder who shows will also have young trained dogs that they held onto as show prospects that didn't pan out.

Yeah it said you may hear within 6 months and then if approved there is a live applicant list so not expecting it to happen soon. That's OK though it has taken several years to get to the point of deciding to get a dog so I can wait a bit longer.

The wait is long particularly if you do not want health issues. Normal guide dogs cover existing health issues for the rest of the dogs life. You only have to cover new problems.
Failure rates due to non health reasons are very, very low.

Thanks 7th I hadn't thought of that. Will take a look.

A friend looks after guide dog puppies when they are in training and one failed recently basically for being too lively and she had first choice on whether she wanted to keep him or not and so she did, I imagine the list would be long but I think it is an ideal way to rehome a dog hopefully with few issues.

My boss has done this and it has been a huge success. Not sure how long she had to wait but not long I think.

I puppy walked for Guide Dogs 2015/16. My lovely puppy went into advanced training but didn't qualify. She was adopted as a pet by a lovely family, she is now 2.
I had a feeling she wouldn't qualify and knew that I would be given first refusal, but I knew that she really needed to be with a busy family, not a quiet single person such as myself. I applied to rehome a guide dog and was lucky to be offered my lovely boy who was withdrawn due to health reasons but only 5 years old.
There are about 5 applicants per dog, and they don't have a waiting list but try to match the available dogs to the current applicants. So yes, you may be successful. You won't regret it, they are beautifully trained.

Thank you good to hear positive stories. I'm preparing myself for the fact that it may not happen. I'm sure there are lots of other applying too!

I also know of someone who adopted a failed police dog (spaniel) but I'm afraid I dont know how they got it or how long they waited

We had a black lab that didn't make the grade to be a service dog as he couldn't not sniff out food. The dog lived with us for over a decade without any issues, he came at the still cute puppy stage, but was slightly older and we didn't have hardly any training to do with him. He was a lovely dog and like Insay for over ten years we had no problems but sadly he did end biting my little sister when she was around four, step dad said it was my sisters fault and not dogs fault but sadly dog also went in to but another family child who absolutely wasn't doing anything to. 'Wind him up'

I'm not sure if we were on a list though, stepdad was partially sited and was registered blind and often looked after guide dogs, I'm almost certain we were offered our lab rather than us asking for one, I'll double check with my Mam.

I'm going back well over 20 years now though so it's all probably different too.

Did you ever get a guide dog ? X