While the causes of genetically determined deafness in dogs are not completely understood, experts seem to agree that in many cases there is a relationship to a dog’s coat and eye coloring. Many deaf dogs are born that way – called congenital deafness – and there is often a genetic component. Why are Some Dogs Deaf?ĭogs are deaf for many of the same reasons that some people are deaf. “She is just a really sweet dog!” says Mark. We tried to think about all of the advantages – like she wouldn’t bark at the doorbell!” In the end, though, it was Cleo’s personality, not the fact that she could or could not hear, that won them over. They decided it just might be something they could do. Though they did look further for a small dog, they also did research to find out more about living with a deaf dog and living with a Dalmatian. The couple left the shelter with Cleo on their minds and in their hearts. They were also concerned that a Dalmatian might simply have too much energy for them.
“We just weren’t sure about having a dog with a perceived handicap,” says Mark. Suzan and Gary also went away that day without Cleo. When he got no response to the sound, they realized that she was probably completely deaf. Gary experimented by clapping his hands over Cleo’s head. It was then that one of the volunteers at the shelter mentioned that she might be hard of hearing. Not knowing Cleo was deaf, they went into an exercise yard to meet with her. “It was as if she was saying, ‘OK, I’m ready to go home,’ ” says Mark. Anything but a small dog (she is a Dalmatian), Cleo nonetheless caught their attention when in the midst of kennels full of barking, jumping dogs, she came to the kennel door and sat looking at them. They were visiting a local shelter, searching for a small dog, when they first met Cleo. Suzan Mark and Gary Lomax of Santa Cruz also found their deaf dog, Cleo, somewhat through chance. The Sells now share their home and lives with three deaf dogs – Echo, Nefe, and Cooper – as well as their hearing dog, Hawi. Sell what some might consider a “calling” into the world of living with and loving deaf dogs. As fate would have it, she was there!” Echo soon came to live with the couple. “We decided that if she was at the pet fair the following Friday night, we could consider adopting her. Deb and Stacey went home that evening without her, but couldn’t stop thinking about her all week.
Sell and her husband Stacey got to the pet fair that night, they saw one cute little white dog quietly watching everyone and became intrigued by her calm nature. “We already had a 1½- year-old Aussie mix, Hawi (pronounced Ha-Vee it’s Hawaiian), and really hadn’t planned on getting a second dog.”īut when Dr. “We got our first deaf dog when going to a pet fair ‘just to look’ at the cute dogs,” says Deb Sell, an animal chiropractor in Prunedale, California, and the proud guardian of four dogs. But the people who really know deaf dogs – those who live with and love them – tell a very different story. Well-meaning but misinformed breeders and other “experts” commonly perpetuate myths about deaf dogs – that they are difficult to live with, hard to train, aggressive, and that they are only suitable dogs for a few “special” people. Unfortunately, given the number of hearing-impaired canines, there is a lot of misinformation promulgated about deaf dogs, even among dog lovers. – Owners of elderly dogs should consider teaching their dogs hand signals hearing loss is common in very old dogs.Įach year, as many as tens of thousands of dogs are born or become deaf.