Fun with Dogs

mrwilson41: This is “It’s The Doorbell” song, which comes from...

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 20:57:00 -0500

This is “It’s The Doorbell” song, which comes from the tv show Raising Hope sung by Kate Micucci.

Found this on another tumblog and I love the song and the show (Raising Hope) Enjoy!

http://comfortablecreatures.com/puppy.html

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 11:47:49 -0400

http://comfortablecreatures.com/puppy.html:

My recap of last night’s Puppy Party at Sheabel Pet Care Center. Look how many of my tweeps helped me with information to include in the Puppy Packets!

Tintin can SWIM!

Fri, 13 Aug 2010 13:26:00 -0400

Today I took Tintin and Butter over to Izzy’s mom’s house so Butter could swim which as a Labrador Retriever is her most favorite thing to do in the whole world! I know this because she has told me ;-)

The rescue Tintin came from specifically said that he was afraid of water. I’ve had him in a couple of creeks, he jumps in my baby pool and I’ve given him a bath but I did not intend for him to do any more than get on the steps of the pool to keep cool. I was throwing biscuits in the pool for Butter to dive in and get and boom, next thing I know, Tintin is in the pool and swimming like, well, like a Labrador Retriever!!!!

Rescue said he is afraid of h2o lol! on 12seconds.tv

I just barely had enough time to grab my cell phone and click the camera on to catch his (as far as I know) very first swim! We had only one second of frantic pawing at the side before I managed to get on the steps and encourage him to keep swimming to me :-)

Fun with Food Puzzles!

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 18:26:00 -0400

I love food puzzle toys. I love them almost as much as my dogs love them. Here is a video of Jellybean (Australian Cattle Dog), Britney (Jack Russell Terrier) and Blue (ACD/JRT mix) having breakfast on my freshly mopped kitchen floor this morning. Brit has my original favorite kibble dispensing food puzzle: The Atomic Treatball. Blue is knocking around a pink Treatstik which was briefly my favorite until Kong unveiled the Wobbler which is what Jellybean starts out using.

I love the Wobbler and Treatstik because they can very easily be taken apart for cleaning and can be filled with specific amounts of kibble. The Treatstik and the Atomic Treatball come out ahead of the Wobbler for smaller dogs though since they both come in small sizes while the Wobbler is huge. Hopefully Kong will release a smaller version of the Wobbler soon.

Poor Brit has never gotten to play with small dog toys because I always also have a larger dog and fear the larger dog could choke on a Brit-sized toy but I have clients with small dogs who would LOVE a size-appropriate Wobbler!

Another advantage of the Wobbler and Treatstik which may not be apparent in this particular video is that the dog does not need to move them around a great deal in order to get the kibble to fall out of them.

Jellybean and Blue sometimes quarrel a bit about the food puzzles. If I were not recording the experience I would have separated the two of them and I would not have had to stay on hand to make sure everyone was playing with her own toy.

"PLEASE TELL US! Several people wrote in with sad stories of clear problems that trainers or vets..."

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 09:49:39 -0500

“

PLEASE TELL US! Several people wrote in with sad stories of clear problems that trainers or vets never mentioned when the dog was younger. Many people wished that someone had said something to them sooner. The trick is how and when you say it (read on!) KINDNESS Oh please please please remember how fragile and vulnerable we are about our dogs. Expressing empathy and concern goes a long way toward having any comment you might make about someone’s dog be heard. OFFER SOLUTIONS I cringed reading comments about trainers who said things like “You need to get your dog under control!” and kept walking. Isn’t that, uh, what we trainers are for? Don’t people come to us to learn how to do that?

—————————————————————————————————————-
Hmmm last weekend I was trimming the hedges in front of my house. I had Jellybean in a Gentle Leader and leash on a sit stay a few feet behind me in my front yard. She got several compliments from people walking, with or without dogs, down the street on how nicely she stayed and how calm she was.
Then the yellow lab towing the very small girl approached. I have worked with either in boarding, training, pet sitting or dog walking probably 200 labs. I have met ONE genuinely aggressive lab. It could be that this dog’s body language was thrown off by towing 70 lbs of child but he came at us with a very hard stare and what both Jellybean and I perceived as aggressive body language.
I wish that I had reiterated Jellybean’s stay cue, stepped in front of her and let the lab jump into me. Doing that might have prevented the dog from terrorizing Jellybean and I probably could have gotten control of him and given him back to the child. What happened instead was that I let Jellybean run from him into my neighbor’s yard knowing that she is very smart in a feral way and a LOT faster than any fat, out of shape lab. The child got pulled down, lost the leash, the dog bolted after Jellybean who lost him then ran around the house to come back to me. I put Jellybean in the house and went to make sure the child and lab were okay. She proceeded to walk around my front yard with that dog until he took a ginormous poop which she of course did not clean up.
I honestly wanted to follow the two of them home and give the parents a piece of my mind about allowing this child to attempt to walk this dog. She seemed to be somewhere between 8 and 11 but very small and slight. There is NO way she could physically control a 75 pound dog and since the dog obviously had not been taught to walk nicely it was going to take someone who could physically demand that from him to get him from point A to point B.
The potential horrible outcomes are almost too numerous to name: dog starts a fight with another dog and child is injured trying to break up the fight; dog drags child into street where one or both are hit by a car. Not to mention that the child could very easily just sprain/break a leg, ankle, wrist or arm being dragged to the point where she falls.
When I was done trimming my hedges a half an hour later and went inside I could hear her little voice pleading with the dog to stop on the street behind my house. I know that there are a number of not very friendly dogs AND people living on that street.

”

- Trouble Brewing, II » TheOtherEndOfTheLeash

When I am an old lady...

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 19:14:00 -0400

I am not going to wear red hats with purple. I am going to clicker train beautiful, soothing Koi that don’t bark or need fetch sessions or to be walked :-)

The Bubble Blog » Halfway Hoop

Charles Barsotti : “It’s O.K. I’m not really in the mood,...

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 08:14:37 -0400

Charles Barsotti : “It’s O.K. I’m not really in the mood, either.” - Thenewyorkerstore.com

Alex Gregory : “I had my own blog for a while, but I...

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 08:24:38 -0400

Alex Gregory : “I had my own blog for a while, but I decided to go back to just pointless, incessant barking.” - Thenewyorkerstore.com

How To Find A Dog Walker

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 11:10:41 -0400

How To Find A Dog Walker:

This to me makes infinitely more sense than the other suggestions about hiring pet sitting/walking professionals which are solely based on insurance and contracts. Insurance is a good thing. I’m going to go ahead and say that I think contracts are silly. Does your child’s nanny have a contract? If so, did s/he write it up and bring it to you or did you write it up for him/her? The second is what is recommended on parenting websites by the way.

I was extremely disheartened to learn this weekend that Myra and Sally’s Mom has been unable to find a dog walker in Indianapolis who will allow the dogs to interact with other dogs.

Safety tip: A whistle could save your dog’s life

Sat, 18 Jul 2009 21:18:07 -0400

Safety tip: A whistle could save your dog’s life:

Cool! I’ve been using a whistle lately with Britney since her recall has fallen a ways a way from 100% lately which is why she isn’t getting to go on as many of our daily activities since then I would actually have to…gasp…put a leash on her! I’ve been using an ACME Survival Whistle from cleanrun.com but these Bosun’s Whistles are LOT more attractive :-)

This is convoluted by I was trying to do an example screen shot...

Sat, 18 Jul 2009 20:32:24 -0400

This is convoluted by I was trying to do an example screen shot for @dogstardaily (aka Ian and Kelly Dunbar) of a twitter-sation that took place [while I was yet again reinstalling windows on my stupid effing machine…not that I am bitter about Dell or anything like that ;-)] regarding the best way to respond to people about Cesar Milan and concepts of dominance in training, etc. I was just showing how Troy’s Twitter Script works.

Tonight my friends L and N and I took Fancy to Graeter’s...

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 20:58:40 -0400

Tonight my friends L and N and I took Fancy to Graeter’s to celebrate her tenth birthday. Every year Fancy gets a pint of ice cream for her birthday.

I was sitting on the floor next to Fancy’s mother the night she was born. I was the first human being she ever saw.

For the first two years of Fancy’s life I was really the only person who could lay a hand on her. Yet tonight, while we were sitting outside eating our ice cream not only did both my friends pet on Fancy, several strangers and children were all over her. Despite whatever is making her so uncoordinated (a brain tumor or the phenobarbital or a stroke?), Fancy attempted to do several tricks - hey there was ice cream at stake!

Fancy is the best dog I have ever had. I hate to NOT say she is the best dog I will ever have since that seems disloyal to her but I also hate to say that she IS the best dog I will ever have.

Bottom line, I just don’t want to lose her and I don’t know that I will ever be okay with it.

Just One Of The Guys

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 17:15:51 -0400

Just One Of The Guys

"Let’s say you like traveling long distances with your Doberman and have plenty of extra cash...."

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 10:28:42 -0400

“Let’s say you like traveling long distances with your Doberman and have plenty of extra cash. Since he doesn’t fit under a standard airplane seat and you don’t want him in the cargo hold, you’ve been out of luck. All that is about to change. On July 14, your pooch will be able to fly on Pet Airways, the only airline that caters to exclusively to pets. In fact it’s so exclusive that you’re not welcome on board. You’ll have to find your own flight.
——————————————————————————————————————
I’m sorry, I’m sure this is a wonderful thing for a lot of people but I have to say that the idea of one of my dogs in a crate in a plane with a bunch of other dogs in the cabin does not make me feel a whole lot better than my dog in a crate in the hold of a plane where I am in the cabin.”

- Wag Reflex: Pet Airways Takes Off

"Finally, this advice does not address sound triggers. Squealing, screaming, yelling, or shouting..."

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 21:51:10 -0400

“Finally, this advice does not address sound triggers. Squealing, screaming, yelling, or shouting also adds stimulation, which is counter-productive.
————————————————————————————————————————
Really nice piece about dogs and kids and how children *should* behave around dogs.
I got a big reminder of how children should NOT behave around dogs a couple of weeks ago. One of the labs I walk daily is the most placid, relaxed, well behaved dog anyone could possibly ask for. A truly lovely animal who I very honestly tell the owners I am ALWAYS happy to keep when they are gone…I admit to sometimes fibbing about this to other clients ;-)
We often run into neighborhood children on our walks and this lab is the only one of the dogs I walk that I will actually turn over to a child to walk with us. The other labs aren’t bad just not THAT placid or THAT good. This dog honestly verges on perfect.
Well, about two weeks ago I was bringing her home from a playdate with the other labs. The neighbor pulled into their driveway right at the moment I pulled into the client’s driveway. I knew Butter was good with the neighbors and didn’t see anything that would alarm Jellybean so I let them out of the car right at the moment that the neighbor let her granddaughter out of her car! I hadn’t seen the child in the SUV :-( If I had realized there was a child involved I would obviously have waited until they were in the house before I let Butter and Jellybean out of my truck.
That little girl screamed like she was being murdered! Butter had taken 3 friendly bounces towards her. Jellybean fortunately froze at the sound but man that could have gone many different ways!
The girl continued screaming for several minutes while I hurriedly got Butter back into her house and made sure Jellybean was right next to me.
If I hadn’t had Jellybean with me I would have asked Butter to sit and brought the girl over to see what a kind, gentle animal Butter is. With wildcard Jellybean I just did not feel comfortable doing that unfortunately.
However, Jellybean did not run or bark or do anything other than sit right next to me so this shows some progress :-)”

- Impenetrable Fingers or How Not to Meet a Dog

"# The least stressed dogs have an opportunity to run free daily and meet other dogs. Just running..."

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 18:59:34 -0400

“

# The least stressed dogs have an opportunity to run free daily and meet other dogs. Just running free doesn’t cut it. Dogs need contact with other dogs. # Dogs that were walked on leash and had no contact with other dogs were the most stressed.
——————————————————————————————————————
I always find something useful in Debbie’s posts (@boulderdog1) and this is no exception. For one, the quote I pulled is a strong argument for using a dog walker who allows the dogs frequent off-leash socialization times - hint hint, that would be MOI! And, I know that I am constantly scanning the horizon for things that might trigger fear responses in Jellybean (Debbie is, of course, one of the founding Team Jellybean captains!) and am often surprised by how little attention other people pay to the world at large and how their dog will react to that stimulus. I used to have a client with a very reactive dog and I was standing talking to her and saw another dog starting to walk in our direction, client was very lightly holding her own dog’s leash looped over her wrist (don’t DO THAT!), paying not the slightest attention to the environment and tottering around in heels. Yeah, dog took her down pretty much instantly.

Pay Attention People!

”

- Boulder Dog » Blog Archive » Stop the Stress Express!

"Dogs possess a two-year-old child’s capacity to understand human pointing gestures, with dogs..."

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 11:07:24 -0400

“Dogs possess a two-year-old child’s capacity to understand human pointing gestures, with dogs requiring next to zero learning time to figure out the visual communication, according to two recent studies.
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I think anyone who has done any work with a dog has seen this but it is lovely to have it scientifically validated! I know that mine all respond to a very slight head twitch and “come around” when we are playing frisbee and I use an after you-like gesture when I want the dog to go ahead of me to get him/her out of my way. I am always surprised by dogs who don’t understand that gesture.”

- Dogs Get Gestures as Well as Toddlers: Discovery News

New Cancer Treatment Approved for Dogs!

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 11:04:28 -0400

New Cancer Treatment Approved for Dogs!:

This is amazing news! Fancy had a benign mast cell tumor two years ago and as with the dog in the article the vet took wide margins and all has been good since - well except for this possible brain tumor but that is a whole nother issue.

Dog Videos

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 14:17:05 -0400

Dog Videos:

Even though I *know* she is cuing the pup somehow I must say I am extremely impressed!

Brit and Jellybean Update

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 09:32:22 -0400

We’ve managed to not have an incident for almost a month which is, of course, outstanding and probably largely due to my being more vigilant in management as well as my reading and utilizing some of the ideas from both Click To Calm and Feeling Outnumbered?

I also think that Brit is starting to learn that Jellybean’s aggression isn’t actually aggression on her part - it seems that way to Brit but Jellybean is just trying to play and she is a very rough and tumble girl which was fine with Brit when they were closer in size but now, not so much.

I’ve been keeping a 1/2 sized emptied out peanut butter jar of treats and a clicker by my bed because one of our issues is first thing in the morning when Jellybean is going bananas to get outside and start her day!!!! The rest of us are more the just a few more minutes of sleep types ;-) I’ve only been keeping the treats and clicker by my bed for a couple of days and this morning Jellybean very politely hopped off my bed and sat quietly until I was ready to get up. Great! That is exactly what I would like! We often have 20 minutes of my snuggling with Fancy while Jellybean barks her head off which isn’t pleasant for anyone….well maybe Jellybean, I don’t know. I proceeded to the back door to start letting dogs out and I got sits from everyone while I opened the door but Jellybean was getting very frustrated while I was very slowly opening the storm door (mistake on my part - listen to your dog!!) and jumped Brit :-(

The absolutely crazy thing is that even though Brit responded to this with her own aggression I hurled the open jar of treats at them - it was the only thing I had! - treats went everywhere and BOOM they stopped fighting to scarf down the treats!

Obviously I am very glad that that happened to work today and we didn’t have any blood drawn but now we are at day zero on incidents again which is frustrating. FTR, the empty plastic jar hit the floor, not a dog!

I am seeing quite a bit of Brit standing on her hind legs and putting her front paws around Jellybean’s neck. I keep trying to get a photo but they of course don’t do it when I have my camera. I don’t know exactly what that body language means. Thoughts?