Putnam Service Dogs provides free Service Dogs and follow-up support to people with physical
disabilities other than blindness for residents of the United States. This includes hearing alert dogs.
We don’t provide PTSD, Autism, or Emotional Support dogs, nor do we warrant consistent seizure alert dogs. Therapy dogs are not service dogs, so we do not train Therapy dogs either.
Currently, the wait for our Service Dogs is about a year, depending on your needs, and the capabilities and temperament of our pups in training.
We need volunteer puppy raisers and vacation fosterers to produce more Service Dogs! Please ask your friends to apply.
We foster the nurturing bond between humans and dogs, and treat dogs humanely and
respectfully during their raising and training. We expect our recipients, their families, friends, caregivers, etc. to treat our Service Dogs as they would any treasured friend. A lot has gone into creating our Service Dogs. Graduated Service Dogs are a rare, precious gift as not many dogs have the necessary temperament and intelligence to function as Service Dogs.
During our application process, your training period with your dog, and our follow-up support, we will ensure the safety and humane treatment of our Service Dogs. Our Service Dogs remain our dogs, even when placed with their recipients. We will be asking you to submit information for us to ensure a Service Dog is appropriate for you, and to assist us in our matching process. We will be seeking reliability of the dog being taken out to safely eliminate at least 4 times/day, and to be exercised sufficiently every day. Our Service dogs cost over $25,000 to raise and train, and many hours have been devoted to the socializing and training of the dog. We seek recipients who are motivated to be the best friend/handler of this very special dog.
We will take our Service Dog back at any sign of neglect or cruelty. We will not allow our Service Dogs to pull wheelchairs, or function as a brace. If you use a wheelchair, or do so while living with our Service Dog, if you can’t propel the wheelchair yourself, we expect you will get a power wheelchair. We expect you will use some method other than our dog to assist you as a brace. These activities can harm our dogs.
We give you the huge gift of one of our Service Dogs and follow-up support services, and we expect you to treat this very special dog with reverence, and knowledge, and to meet it’s basic living requirements competently and humanely.
Our Service Dogs are individually trained to be a Mobility Service Dog, or a Hearing Alert Dog to match the needs of their recipient. Their skills can include retrieving dropped items, pushing elevator and automatic door button, tugging open doors and drawers and closing them, turning lights on and off, getting help, assisting in dressing, alerting to sounds – ringing phone, knock on door, etc.
Our dogs are not trained to assist people with autism, perform guide work for the blind, to be reliable seizure alert dogs, to respond aggressively or provide personal protection, or to assist with the management of mental illness as a primary condition.
We will begin graduating Service Dogs at the end of 2018, and have younger classes in training (see our puppies).
Please complete the following application. All * must be completed for the form to submit.
Applying does not guarantee you will receive a dog.