The miniature Dachshund who (with his owner) lives with us suddenly
went completly blind this past weekend. It's possible that he was
losing some vision gradually over time, but whatever he had left
definitely disappeared over the weekend. He's fine otherwise and the
vet thinks it's SARD. Vet recently had a dog with the same clinical
picture that regained its sight after 3 days, but he said that if
Raisin doesn't get his sight back after a couple of days he probably
won't. I know that blind dogs can live full, happy lives, that you
shouldn't move furniture or change their environment, use vanilla or
other scent cues if necessary to help him find things, etc. So far
he's doing very well; he initially had trouble finding the actual
doorway when coming in from outside, but that's gotten much better.
He wanders around some inside and bumps into people's legs, but does
find what he's looking for. I'm looking for advice on preventing
problems: this dog, with a typical mini Dachshund personality, lives
with a lot of dogs that are taller than he is. He has never stayed
out of their way (although he may be starting to learn to do this now)
- - his preference was always to go outside and come inside first and
snark at anyone who gets too close. We will, of course, modify
routines for his safety. So far, he is fine when the other dogs come
up and sniff him - - they may sense that something is different or
wrong - - and it's essential that he not become fearful and snark when
another dog touches him unexpectedly. Aside from praising him when we
see that happen, does anyone have any suggestions? Is it likely that
such a ballsy dog will modify his behavior so he doesn't get stepped
on? Or, which is likely to happen first, him doing that, or the other
dogs learning to watch out for him? I never thought we'd have the
problem of him losing his confidence insert emoticon here.

Mustang Sally

sighthounds & siberians wrote in
:

The miniature Dachshund who (with his owner) lives with us suddenly
went completly blind this past weekend.

I don't have any experience with blind dogs, but just wanted to say I'm
sorry this has happened. Hope he either regains some sight or adjusts
rapidly.

--
Catherine
& Zoe the cockerchow
& Queenie the black gold retriever
& Rosalie the calico

In article ,
sighthounds & siberians wrote:
Aside from praising him when we
see that happen, does anyone have any suggestions?

Not any suggestions, per se, but experience. Saber is blind
and is basically a social retard, and other dogs tend to
take an instant hate to him. What I have found, though, is
that dogs are smart enough and social enough that they'll
eventually figure out that Saber is weird and insane but
completely harmless, and they get used to him. They even
get used to him bumping into them, which is not something
they usually have much tolerance for. We just went through
it again with Slick, and it took about 2 weeks for Slick to
understand how to deal with Saber (the one weird incident
was hearing peculiar noises and finding Saber half-way up
the stairs with Slick mounted on top of him - one of those
situations that's easier to get into than out of, I guess).

But the rules tend to be stricter around Saber - zero
tolerance for any dominance play or pushy gestures on the
part of Saber or the other dogs towards Saber, and that
helps.
--
Melinda Shore - Software longa, hardware brevis -

Prouder than ever to be a member of the reality-based community.

On Wed, 8 Feb 2006 20:51:52 +0000 (UTC), ceb
wrote:

sighthounds & siberians wrote in
:

The miniature Dachshund who (with his owner) lives with us suddenly
went completly blind this past weekend.

I don't have any experience with blind dogs, but just wanted to say I'm
sorry this has happened. Hope he either regains some sight or adjusts
rapidly.

Thanks. You can see him making adjustments already; it never ceases
to amaze me how adaptable dogs are.

Mustang Sally

On 8 Feb 2006 16:20:21 -0500, (Melinda Shore) wrote:

In article ,
sighthounds & siberians wrote:
Aside from praising him when we
see that happen, does anyone have any suggestions?

Not any suggestions, per se, but experience. Saber is blind
and is basically a social retard, and other dogs tend to
take an instant hate to him. What I have found, though, is
that dogs are smart enough and social enough that they'll
eventually figure out that Saber is weird and insane but
completely harmless, and they get used to him. They even
get used to him bumping into them, which is not something
they usually have much tolerance for. We just went through
it again with Slick, and it took about 2 weeks for Slick to
understand how to deal with Saber (the one weird incident
was hearing peculiar noises and finding Saber half-way up
the stairs with Slick mounted on top of him - one of those
situations that's easier to get into than out of, I guess).

That's a mental image that will be with me for a while. I'd
completely forgotten that Saber is blind. Your experience helps;
Raisin isn't exactly a social retard, but he is kind of a social
butthead. I think he's already figuring out that he's going to have
to make some concessions.

But the rules tend to be stricter around Saber - zero
tolerance for any dominance play or pushy gestures on the
part of Saber or the other dogs towards Saber, and that
helps.

One thing that helps here is that Raisin doesn't really play with
anyone except the IG, due to size difference and personality. Cruiser
the IG is pretty submissive except when it comes to food, and we're
all over him with that anyway.

Unfortunately, Raisin has gained back most of the weight he lost here
at the fat farm, and looking back now, we wonder whether he might have
been losing his sight gradually, which is why he hasn't been running
through the house lately. Getting and keeping weight off him is going
to be tricky now.

Mustang Sally

In article ,
sighthounds & siberians wrote:
Getting and keeping weight off him is going
to be tricky now.

Well, maybe the upside to this is that you can walk him in
relatively small circles now and he won't get bored.
Kidding! Saber *loves* going for walks and is really good
about stopping and sitting when I tell him to, which is
pretty much a prerequisite out here in no-sidewalks-and-not-
much-traffic-but-what-traffic-there-is-really-hauls-land.
He does like to walk along the edges of drainage ditches,
though (he likes the smell), and fortunately they're shallow
enough that a misstep isn't going to hurt him. He's a big
fellow, though, and surface irregularities are going to be a
much bigger problem for a little guy. There's always this:
http://www.fattriathlete.com/images/Dog%20Walk.jpg

blinddogs.com is a good resource for figuring out what you
need to do around the house to make the dog's life easier,
but I don't recall that they deal with dog/dog issues very
much.

Good luck with it. It's amazed me how well blind dogs can
do, but I do find the interdog social issues to be more of a
challenge than the problems of how he learns to negotiate
his environment.
--
Melinda Shore - Software longa, hardware brevis -

Prouder than ever to be a member of the reality-based community.

On 8 Feb 2006 17:09:40 -0500, (Melinda Shore) wrote:

Well, maybe the upside to this is that you can walk him in
relatively small circles now and he won't get bored.
Kidding! Saber *loves* going for walks and is really good
about stopping and sitting when I tell him to, which is
pretty much a prerequisite out here in no-sidewalks-and-not-
much-traffic-but-what-traffic-there-is-really-hauls-land.
He does like to walk along the edges of drainage ditches,
though (he likes the smell), and fortunately they're shallow
enough that a misstep isn't going to hurt him. He's a big
fellow, though, and surface irregularities are going to be a
much bigger problem for a little guy. There's always this:
http://www.fattriathlete.com/images/Dog%20Walk.jpg

Eewww. We do have some interesting, safe places to walk him nearby,
and being a scenthound, I think he'll enjoy the different smells.

blinddogs.com is a good resource for figuring out what you
need to do around the house to make the dog's life easier,
but I don't recall that they deal with dog/dog issues very
much.

That's mostly what our issues are going to be.

Good luck with it. It's amazed me how well blind dogs can
do, but I do find the interdog social issues to be more of a
challenge than the problems of how he learns to negotiate
his environment.

Thanks. I think the interdog issues will be much more of a challenge
for us; he's already doing pretty well with his environment.

Mustang Sally