Dogs with jobs: Ally the rottweiler’s new life as a therapy dog

Summer Stewart-Heather has always been keen on pet therapy, but she didn’t expect to find her perfect partner at the pound.

Ally, a small rottweiler, looked absolutely dejected when Summer first saw her in January this year.

The animal control team had found the dog roaming in South Taranaki, and she turned out to be dangerously ill, with a retained placenta from what was her fourth litter of puppies.

As a trained vet nurse, Summer recognised what was wrong, and the dog was rushed for emergency surgery.

“She would have died if she hadn’t been picked up by the pound, and they hadn’t rung me,” she said.

“I was fostering dogs for the We Love Dogs Trust, and I’d got to know the pound guys, I’d helped to rehome other dogs.”

She took Ally, now nearly 2, home to recuperate after the surgery, then adopted her.

Summer, who currently works as a cleaner after being made redundant when Hāwera Intermediate School closed, has a lot of experience working with people and animals.

“I worked with non-verbal, autistic primary school children and in a past life, I was a paramedic, and later a vet nurse – all my jobs have led into each other.”

She had studied pet therapy during her vet nurse training, and recognised Ally had the personality to be a therapy dog.

“As she started to get better, there was just something about her, that I picked up on.”

But first she had to help the dog overcome the trauma from her past.

“She didn’t know how to play, didn’t know what a ball was.”

And Ally was so terrified of garden hoses and vacuum cleaners, and getting in a bath, she would cower and wet herself.

With patience and time, and the help of a canine behaviourist, Ally overcame her fears, learnt to play and all the other skills she needs in her new role.

“She just amazes me pretty much every time we do something. It’s her, I couldn’t do it if she didn’t have that nouse, that personality,” Stewart-Heather said.

“I’m all about breaking the stereotypes, even myself, a solo teenage mum, now look at me.”

In May, Ally and Summer started regular volunteer therapy dog sessions at Idea Services’ activity hub in Hāwera, and they also visit a residential house, where she has her own bowl and brush.

“She’ll come in, and we say hello to everyone, get the guys to interact with her, throw her ball, blow bubbles, sometimes they’ll walk her around the house on leash,” Stewart-Heather said.

As Ally moves around the house, her tail never stops wagging.

“It’s that whole non-judgemental thing, no facial expressions, she doesn’t see if their socks don’t match, she’s just, ‘I’m here for you’.

“One of the guys a few weeks ago, gave her a big hug and said, really clearly, ‘I love you’, and he’s someone who doesn’t talk well,” she said.

And Stewart-Heather enjoys the visits as much as the dog.

“I love interacting with the clients, getting them out of routine, doing something fun and getting a smile out of them.”

The pair also make regular visits to the special needs unit at Te Paepae o Aotea.

“At the school, the kids try to read to her, one or two kids will read a page, then we’ll play. It gets the kids moving, talking and laughing, mentally and physically.”

Ally has the knack of finding the right balance of friendliness, she said.

“She seems to instinctively know, especially at the high school, which kids want her to be up close and personal, and which ones need to just watch.”

Ally recently made it to the top 10 of more than 500 dogs entered a national competition for dogs with jobs, and although she wasn’t placed, the dog is a definite winner in her own community.

Idea Services service manager Lilly Tautuku said everyone loved Ally’s visits.

“They just love having her here, they look forward to her coming,” she said. “There were a few who were a bit timid, she’s not a little lapdog, but they were soon throwing the ball for her.”