New York City guide dogs are a special breed.
Service dogs working in the Big Apple, like hero pooch Orlando, have to undergo rigorous training to help their masters maneuver tricky urban obstacles.
The hardworking pups are trained at subway stations — sometimes among rush-hour crowds while their trainers are blindfolded — to avoid the edges of train platforms and on how to cope with big crowds, experts said.
“We always bring each dog into the city to be trained. If a dog can work in New York City, he can work pretty much anywhere,” said trainer Jim Kessler of The Seeing Eye, the oldest guide-dog school in the country.
Kessler spent time Wednesday training Crystal, a 2-year-old golden retriever, at the 49th Street station in Manhattan using a reward system.
“If I tell the dog to go to the edge of the platform or I try to walk on the track, that’s where we teach them to use ‘intelligent disobedience,’ ” he said.
“If I pull her straight [onto the tracks], she should pull me right or left.
“We don’t want the dog to be fearful of the edge, but we want them to respect it,” he added.
Jumping on subway tracks to save a master — as brave Labrador Orlando did — is not part of the training.
“We never expect the person to be [down in the tracks], but any one of our guide dogs would most likely jump in after his master. They are very attached,” said Dave Johnson of The Seeing Eye.