Guide dogs are service or assistance dogs trained specifically to help people with a visual impairment navigatearound. Apart from helping people navigate, they are a companion and provide a sense of freedom to the visuallyimpaired. We all might have seen a guide dog with a person, but do we know how they help the visually impaired personor handler? Do we know the intensity of training and what it takes to be a guide dog? Here are a couple of things youprobably didn’t know about guide dogs.First, not every dog is cut out to be a guide dog. They are carefully chosen for breeding with the sole purpose totrain them to be a guide dog. Most of the guide dogs originate from a carefully planned breeding program. Enormousfocus is given to the physical health and characteristics like intelligence, good temperament, stability and willingness towork. It is a known fact that when puppies are screened, only about 70% make the cut.In addition, the training period for a guide dog from the time of its birth is anywhere between 15-18 months. Theygo through two different stages in their training. The first stage is when the puppies spend about a year in a specificvolunteer’s household. They learn to abide by some guidelines and are exposed to different people, sounds, situations,places like railway stations, shops, traffic areas as a part of their training. They’re exposed to a fun and unique training.On the second stage, the dogs receive a formal training at a training center by professionals. This training lasts for about5-6 months. The dogs are assessed at regular intervals and continuously monitored for progress.