With its rugged, ancient landscape dotted with colourful plains, rocky mountain peaks and scenic gorges, Moolooloo Station in South Australia’s Flinders Ranges draws tourists from across the country.<\/p>\n
The property, which is nearly the size of Singapore, is both an eco-tourism hub and a working sheep station, owned by farmers Reece and Tarina Warren.<\/p>\n
But the workforce at this station has one unique addition, seeing eye dog Mika, a glossy black labrador who plays a special role in running the property.<\/p>\n
Mika has become Ms Warren’s way of getting around.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Tarina Warren says bringing Mika to Moolooloo Station has helped boost her confidence and maintain her independence. (Supplied: Tarina Warren)<\/p>\n
The station owner has been legally blind since she was 16, after losing her sight at seven.<\/p>\n
Her vision loss was caused by Stargardt Macular Dystrophy, which is a degenerative disease with no cure.<\/p>\n
“I’ve never driven. I did all my study with minimal vision,” she said.<\/p>\n
But this year saw a major decline in what was left of Ms Warren’s vision, leaving her grappling with a loss of independence.<\/p>\n
“In the past 12 months I’ve had a rapid decline that meant I couldn’t get around without help anymore,” she said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mika was chosen for her adaptability, and is described as a playful and affectionate pup who loves her toys and doing zoomies. (Supplied: Tarina Warren)<\/p>\n
Adapting to change<\/p>\n
The change left Ms Warren questioning her role in the day-to-day operations of Moolooloo Station, as she was unsure how she would do things the way she previously had.<\/p>\n
The biggest challenge was finding her way to locations she used to navigate to with ease, such as the shearers’ quarters.<\/p>\n
“Because it’s been very dry, it all looks brown to me, so I was finding myself wandering off the tracks,” she said.<\/p>\n
After struggling to find a solution, Ms Warren put herself on the waiting list for a seeing eye dog.<\/p>\n
It was not just to keep her functioning on the station; she also needed support in her role as a physiotherapist on the Yorke Peninsula.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Tarina Warren needed a dog that could navigate a sheep station but also wait calmly while she worked with physiotherapy patients. (Supplied: Tarina Warren)<\/p>\n
The perfect pair<\/p>\n
The matching process to find a dog that was able to cope with both the remoteness of a sheep station and busy visits to town was surprisingly fast.<\/p>\n
Seeing Eye Dogs senior instructor Brooke Anderson said there had already been several success stories of partnering dogs with farmers.<\/p>\n
“We have got other clients that work on regional properties with farm-type situations,” she said.<\/p>\n
But this was the first time Ms Anderson needed to find a dog that could cope with the challenges of station life.<\/p>\n
Labrador Mika was selected for her “adaptability”, being able to switch between leading Ms Warren around the station to calmly waiting while she saw clients at the clinic.<\/p>\n
Ms Anderson said she had witnessed firsthand how dogs helped to create a sense of independence for a person.<\/p>\n
“[Getting] dog guide mobility can give that sense of movement back to a client, which is pretty important,” she said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Seeing Eye Dogs senior instructor Brooke Anderson said there have been several successful partnerships between dogs and farmers, but Mika will be the first “station” dog. (ABC News: Matthew Holmes)<\/p>\n
Thinking outside the box<\/p>\n
Josie Clarke is the founder of Ability Agriculture, a not-for-profit organisation aiming to create awareness and opportunities in agriculture for people with a disability.<\/p>\n
“Vision impairment within agriculture and how you navigate that is something that hasn’t been highlighted much,” Ms Clarke said.<\/p>\n
She said there was no “one size fits all” approach when it came to navigating a career on the land.<\/p>\n
“A lot of people with disability and impairments have had to figure out how to innovate and do it their own way,” she said.<\/p>\n
“It’s [about] thinking outside of the box at what kind of adjustments could help that person still be actively involved in what they want to do.”<\/p>\n
Josie Clarke founded Ability Agriculture as she wanted to help others like her father get back on the land. (Supplied: Josie Clarke)<\/p>\n
Ms Warren said the partnership had given her more confidence in every part of her life, and she had been able to try new things.<\/p>\n
“Apparently it [takes] six to 12 months [to] feel like the bond is really good and [the dog] almost starts reading your mind,” she said.<\/p>\n
The station owner said when Mika wasn’t working, she was a playful and affectionate pup who loved her toys and doing “zoomies” outside.<\/p>\n
“When she hasn’t got that harness on, she’s just a dog,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With its rugged, ancient landscape dotted with colourful plains, rocky mountain peaks and scenic gorges, Moolooloo Station in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":200734,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[6391,2594,64264,3393,26875,146,113087,85,46,113090,113088,113089,5387],"class_list":["post-200733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-accessibility","tag-animals","tag-canine","tag-disability","tag-dog","tag-entertainment","tag-flinders-ranges","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-moolooloo-station","tag-seeing-eye","tag-seeing-eye-dog","tag-station"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}