Gromit the Kerry Hearing Dog

By Julie Schutz

Back in the dark ages, I used to show Collies and loved going to shows and watching all breeds whenever I had the time. Kept seeing a few of these beautiful blue dogs and tried to talk several of my friends into getting one just so I could get to know it. They firmly declined. The time finally came, after a whole passel of other breeds, when I finally got around to a Kerry.

We got Gromit, (aka Ardara Gromit – Ch. Kallehan’s Truth or Dare x Ch. Ardara’s Anything Goes), from Carolee Nicholls at the ripe old age of 10 weeks. We already had a 6 year old Akita bitch, Tako, and I did a lot of research on how the two breeds might get along. It sounded like it would work, with a few cautions, but that is true of any two dogs. I was right. They are good buddies.

I have always felt that having a very smart animal was a mistake. They can dream up all kinds of mischief. Tako was that smart animal. The worst thing she did was eat the couch out of our motor home, leaving us to finish a trip in piles of shredded foam. Gromit is every bit as smart but so far, not nearly as destructive.

I have been deaf for almost 20 years now due to M.S. and am very lucky not to have any other residual effects. Having a retired husband has been a big help, but I still missed doorbells, phones – and the like, all because he refused to spend 24/7 staying home waiting for MY phone to ring.

About two years ago, we learned that friends of ours have a daughter who was training service dogs in N. Carolina, but she was going to be here in town for the summer. She also has M.S., and her mom had told her about Gromit. She knows terriers and thought that, with training, Gromit could be of great help to me. She was right.

Before agreeing to put the effort into his training, she evaluated him. How reactive was he to sound? Did he notice noises? I had to laugh at that one. This is a Kerry after all. She brought some sort of ringer with her. Every time she rang it, Gromit would come investigate the sound, and she would give him a treat. This was a great game, and he didn’t want to quit.

The first thing she tackled in his formal training was a kitchen timer. I hadn’t used one of those for years and had forgotten how useful they were. She started out by distracting him and then sneaking a treat by the timer and then setting it. When it went off, she ran to the timer all excited, and Gromit came along. He soon figured out that there was a treat waiting, so it didn’t take long for him to catch on to this fun new game. The next step was to get him to come back to her and alert her. After he got his treat by the timer, she would call him and get him to jump on her for another treat. This, we decided, would be his method of alerting me, as I don’t always hear him bark. The trick now is to discourage him from jumping on other people. I was astounded to see him trained to jump up at the kitchen counter to get a treat, but he has never taken any food that he wasn’t supposed to. I know that it isn’t my training that caused all this. How did these Kerries get so smart?

She worked with him from different areas in the house, so he would realize that where ever she (or I) was, that was the place he should go to. After he had caught on a little, I got involved in the training, and he learned to alert me and not the trainer (mostly). Using the same step by step techniques, she trained him to alert me to the phone and the doorbell. The door has been the hardest thing for him. It is so exciting to have someone come to visit, and he just knows that it is someone whose life’s ambition is to be covered with Kerry kisses. I still have to encourage him to take time out from his barking and alert me. We are working on getting him to lay down about 4 feet from the door and stay until the door is closed again and he is released. Then, we go get a treat. This works great, unless it is one of his good friends and then he still breaks some of the time. One other thing that he will do is, "Go find Julie." My husband will use this when he comes in, because I usually don’t hear him. That way, I know it is him in the house, and he knows where I am.

Of course, all of this has helped put me back in touch with the world. I can relax knowing that I don’t have to worry so much about missing an important phone call. The Akita has to be kept quiet in her crate for an hour after every feeding because of bloating problems, and Gromit will let me know when it is time to let her out. Best of all, Gromit has a job and thinks he is pretty special. He is.

All of the things that he does are inside the house. The trainer felt that he was too distractible to work well on the street. I think in time, when he gets bored with being outside, maybe we could start with some things like sirens; but for now, I couldn’t ask for anything better.

To register a service dog in California is fairly painless. I know that there are several groups that train dogs and have tests for them to qualify for whatever kind of service they perform, and the laws are probably different in other parts of the country. In California, all I needed to do was to take a note from my doctor to our local animal services office where licenses are issued. The doctor said something to the effect that I was deaf and needed a dog. They gave me a special California Service Dog tag that will get us in anywhere. I did buy Gromit a red vest that says "Hearing Dog" on it, just to save on hassles. He gets very excited about wearing it and looks very proud of himself.

The really neat thing about all this for Gromit is that it is a great game with food involved. I don’t know if he realizes how much of a help he is to me, but then these Kerriess are really cunning little beasts, and I think he probably knows a lot more than I give him credit for.

Last Updated: 07/16/2007, 7:23 am