In One Sense, He’s Special Dog Keeps Hearing-Impaired Single Mother In Touch With The Outside World

Cub’s ears never rest.

Even when he’s sleeping at Sandi Storseth’s feet, the oversized flaps stand erect, like furry radar dishes atop his intelligent head.

He bounds to Storseth’s side when there’s a knock at the door, the smoke alarm sounds or 15-year-old Heather Storseth calls her mother’s name.

The silky black dog paws his new master, then leads her to the source of the noise. As reward, Storseth lavishes him with praise.

“When I first saw his picture, I thought, ‘Oh, what big ears you have,”’ said Storseth, 45, doing her best impersonation of Red Riding Hood.

She switched to the Big, Bad Wolf for Cub’s imagined reply: “The better to hear you with, my dear.”

The two met Thursday, when a trainer from Dogs for the Deaf brought 4-year-old Cub to Storseth’s home.

Cub spent two years with a deaf couple in Pennsylvania until the husband died and the wife decided she didn’t need the dog’s help.

Dogs for the Deaf has placed about 400 dogs in homes across the nation, but Cub is the first in Spokane, said trainer Barb Velasquez.

Already, Storseth, a single mother, wonders how she got along without Cub.

Nearly deaf since birth, Storseth can hear her telephone as a faint ring - if she is wearing a hearing aid and sitting next to the phone.

Without her hearing aid, Storseth can’t hear a blaring smoke alarm unless she’s standing directly under it. She sets her alarm clock so loud it wakes neighbors in the summer, when the windows in her bedroom are open.

Now, Storseth can set her alarm on low and Cub, a 21-pound skipperkee-cross, will wake her when it sounds. She won’t miss trick-or-treaters on Halloween.

A hairstylist and Camp Fire volunteer, Storseth plans to take Cub to work and on campouts, so she’ll know when someone is calling her name.

“All my clients are anxious to meet him,” Storseth said. “It’s going to slow me down for a while with all the questions.”

While Seeing Eye Dogs have been used for more than a century, dogs have been trained for hearing only for about 20 years, said Velasquez.

They have saved owners from fires and speeding cars and alerted them to burglars. Some are trained to warn parents when their infants are crying.

Like guide dogs for the blind, hearing dogs legally can’t be kept out of restaurants and other businesses. They’re identified by orange vests and leashes.

About 30 dogs a year graduate from Dogs For the Deaf, making it the nation’s largest training and placement center, said Velasquez. It was founded in 1977 by the same man who trained animals for the movie “Dr. Doolittle.”

Based in Center Point, Ore., Dogs for the Deaf relies on donations. Recipients pay nothing toward the $4,500 cost of training a dog, but agree to annual visits from trainers.

Most hearing dogs come from animal shelters, where trainers look for small, energetic dogs between eight months and 2 years old. Most are mutts.

About half the dogs wash-out of the training program and are prized as pets, since they’re already housebroken and have learned basic obedience skills.

“Some dogs would just rather be little lap dogs, someone’s pet, than to be a working dog,” said Velasquez.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo