Are Huskies Good Service Dogs? 5 Things You Need To Know

Siberian huskies, being one of the most beautiful dog breeds, are considered excellent pet dogs. They don’t just make a great pet to you but a family member too. But do they make good service dogs? Let us find out. 

Yes, Siberian huskies prove to be a great choice when it comes to services. Huskies are known explicitly as service sled dogs. There could be varied services you could ask of a husky and train them accordingly. However, the husky behavior you bring in will make a massive difference in the benefits it would provide. 

If you are thinking of bringing a husky home, there are a few things that you need to know about them and their temperament. If you are well aware of their mood and energy level, training them will get much easier. 

Read on to learn more about Siberian huskies and the qualities that make them good service dogs. 

Huskies are a very intelligent breed

If you require specific traits from dogs, the first essential that comes up is intelligence. If the breed you are training does not possess intelligence naturally, the entire process could get tiresome. In some cases, even intense training might not show any good results.

A Siberian husky service dog may have to perform specific tasks that would require my presence of mine and a good understanding of the trainer. Some of the functions that we could expect from a service dog are:

• Rescue
• Guard 
• Emotional support
• Sled

An intellectual bond between the trainer and the dog cannot be formed without the dog’s intelligence. As you cannot teach a dog to be intelligent, it comes naturally from its breed.

The bred is very friendly

The entire concept of having a service dog is to have a dog that can take care of people and help them when in need. You cannot expect a dog to provide good service if it is not comfortable around human beings. The dog will not serve the purpose if it happens to harm people when triggered or scared. 

The mannerism a service dog shows when providing comfort to a person makes a lot of difference. Even the person who requires help would not be comfortable with the dog if they notice slight discomfort. 

Moreover, as service dogs provide crucial emotional support for depressed people, they have to be friendly. If they are trained to be calm and soothing around patients with depression, they could give a lot of emotional support and make them feel good. 

Therefore, it becomes extremely important for the service dog to come out as quite friendly and confident among the people. Only then would it be able to provide the services.

Self-Confidence

You may not consider self-confidence as a trait necessary for dogs. 

However, if your service dog has the required amount of confidence in its skills, it will work great for you. Not every dog has confidence as an essential trait. Some require regular work on it, while some gain it eventually. 

Why Is Self-Confidence Important For Service Dogs?

Service dogs usually need to go about tasks that cannot be supervised by their trainers every second. In some emergencies, such as a fire, the trainer and the team could get busy in the rescue.

While the trainer is busy, the dog needs to alert any situation that may arise and require its assistance. If a dog possesses a sufficient amount of self-confidence, it is easier for it to trust its instincts and help people without the trainer. 

Due to this self-confidence, the dog would also be able to make decisions well. It will not have to wait for the situation to worsen and wait for the trainer to arrive. 

Calmness

Calmness is one of the essential traits that a service dog can possess. If you want the animal to assist you in emergencies, you need to choose one with calmness as a primary trait. Without this trait, things can go very unpredictable.

Importance Of Calmness For A Service Dog

It is crucial to note that a rescue or service dog comes across many threatening situations one day. It could get stuck in the fire or hurt itself during a fight. However, as the dog ultimately has to rescue the people, it has to keep things under control and finish the duty.

This can get very difficult if the dog you choose has no control over its behavior or emotions. For instance, if the dog has to recuse someone from a fire or earthquake, it needs to stay calm. Otherwise, the scared dog may get hype and end up hurting the people it was supposed to rescue.

As this could be very dangerous, training the dog to keep all its impulsiveness and emotions in check gets critical. In some cases, the dog might even run away from a scary situation and leave the rescue incomplete.  

Love For Work

This point only makes sense if your Siberian husky service dog is an active being. Although huskies are rarely lazy, growing lazy overtime is a trait that all dogs possess. Depending on the kind of schedule you keep for them throughout the day would decide their activeness.

To become a good service dog, the dog has to be active and love its work. If the dog somehow tries to avoid going to work every day, you probably cannot trust it with the duties. If your dog loves coming to work, it will perform well and keep people safe.

A common reason why huskies or any other service dogs, for that matter, stops liking coming to work is laziness. Dogs tend to grow lazy after a while due to various reasons. It could either be their diet, schedule, or environment in which they live.

Ways To Keep Your Husky Active

If you find your husky to be growing lazy after a while, you could do a few things that would kick it start again. 

Change The Diet

You could be giving your dog way too much cooked human food. This diet, if kept regular, can make them gain weight which will eventually make them very lazy. Instead, providing them with wet dog foods, which are rich in protein, works much better. 

In case you run out of dog food, you could give them boiled vegetables without any curry or spices added. Leafy vegetables that will give your dog as much nutrition as possible with make them active again. 

Change The Schedule

Siberian husky service dog stays active the entire day and saves energy for the next day too. This is achieved with not just a healthy diet but a busy schedule also. The husky should be made prepared to run miles to catch a thief, run around an entire building to check for hurt people, etc. 

Therefore, providing them training that involves a lot of running and walking around will keep them on their toes. A regular practice will also keep them on their toes most of the time. Once they get in the habit again, changing their schedule will become very easy. As a result, they would like to go to work too. 

Huskies As Sled Dogs

As has been mentioned above, huskies are naturally sledded dogs. They have been an active member of the transportation system of the cold regions across the world. Siberian huskies prove great in pulling carts and transferring heavy loads from one place to another. 

The best thing about these sled dogs is that they don’t have to wait for the snow to melt. They are well versed in running in deep snowy regions and can carry heavy loads through these regions without much struggle. 

As they are naturally strong, you don’t have to train them to become better sled dogs. If they are comfortable with the weight you give them, they will carry them without any complaints about long routes.

Therefore, all you have to do is tie the carts with them and ask them to run. However, make sure not to overload the carts as huskies cannot carry a piece of hefty baggage.

Siberian huskies may not perform well in tropical regions or regions with a warmer climate. They are comfortable with the cold environment and make great service dogs in these places.

To Sum It Up

Siberian huskies prove to be good service dogs. Possessing all the essential qualities of service dogs, they prefer all the options available today. Being brave, kind, and intelligent makes them reliable and a good partner in emergencies.

With its calm and friendly manner, a Siberian husky may also bring down an emergency’s stress. 

Therefore, Siberian huskies can be an excellent option for services such as rescue, emotional support, sled, etc.