The little Labradors sleep peacefully under the Christmas tree.

Tired from the big game, Zina’s 8-week-old puppies snuggled up next to each other to rest. We invited Nóra Varga, who received her guide dog from our foundation and takes our mission to heart.

We wrote about Zina’s 10 puppies here earlier.

The puppies were born in our foundation’s breeding programme, and we are training them to be the guide dogs of the future.

How many guide dogs do we need?

More guide dogs are needed in Hungary. Many are waiting for a faithful companion at our foundation. On average, we have 40-50 people on our waiting list. On average, we have 12- 15 dogs in training, and we plan to have 30 puppies born every year in our breeding programme, who will become guide dogs in the next year.

How much does a guide dog cost?

The total lifetime cost of a guide dog is over 5 million HUF.

This is a period of about 10 years, the total cost of which is: breeding dogs, breeding, raising puppies, screenings, medical costs, boarding, equipment, training (this costs 1.5 million HUF), training the owner; handover, testing, follow-up and care for 10 years, replacement of equipment, extra medical costs for an aging dog, costs around retirement, overheads, vehicle use, etc.

This brings the total cost of the ten years to over 5 million forints.

How do we raise the money?

The training of the guide dogs will be raised from donations and tax donations of 1%.