FOSTERING A FUTURE

Aspen is a five-month-old dog guide in training and has been to conferences, potlucks, business meetings and concerts. She’s been canoeing on Toronto’s Humber River and even went winter camping in Ontario’s Killarney Provincial Park. Every day of the past three months has been an adventure with guide dog foster parents, Kaydi Pyette and Geoff Whitlock, from train, streetcar and escalator rides to visits to the grocery store, malls and even the airport. Aspen’s green working jacket brings her lots of attention, and she laps it all up. “Raising a dog guide puppy means we have a buddy everywhere we go, and get to enjoy her company in many places where pet dogs are not allowed,” Pyette says. “We’re the volunteers, but we feel like the lucky ones! Aspen makes us laugh every day,” says Pyette. Adds Whitlock: “Mundane tasks — grocery shopping, banking and riding public transit — are more engaging by viewing them through the puppy’s eyes. Everything is a first for her and it forces us to slow down and be present.” All food and medicine is covered by the organization.It takes a special family or person to foster a future dog guide puppy, says Alex Ivic, director of Dog Guide Programs. About 65 per cent of foster puppies graduate as a Dog Guide and then enter one of six programs. The dogs that don’t make the grade are available for a career change. Some work for Canadian Border Services doing detection work. “Our foster families also have an option of adopting the puppy they raised,” Ivic says.