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Halloween In June: Modeling Redux

Rachel Friedman | Sat, 06/28/2008 - 13:56

Another day of modeling...not as appealing as the day at the lake but you gotta make a living. This one was for a Halloween circular for Joann Fabrics to be printed in September. I had to drive my poor Trip 2 1/2 hours each way to Columbus, OH to pose in a Halloween Pumpkin Outfit.

So You Think You Know About Bloat?

Nicole Wilde | Thu, 06/26/2008 - 08:53

I thought I did. It’s the second leading cause of death among dogs, after all. I knew that a potentially fatal thing can happen when a dog’s stomach fills with gas and fluid, and that it’s often accompanied by gastric torsion—a twisting of the stomach. If the dog isn’t given emergency veterinary treatment in time, he will die. Bloat happens most often to deep-chested breeds, although the cause is still largely unknown. The warning signs include a stomach that’s bloated and hard, and dry heaving without the ability to vomit.

Goodbye Ollie

Jeff Silverman | Tue, 06/24/2008 - 11:00

Certainly the hardest thing about life with dogs, is the short time we get with them. Last year I wrote a series of posts about a Great Dane named Ollie. Ollie came to a shelter I work with, the Animal Adoption Foundation in Ross Ohio, under tragic circumstances and became dangerously aggressive within weeks of being adopted out. Ollie’s adopters returned him to AAF, where – with a little guidance from me – the shelter’s amazing staff and volunteers taught him to trust and to safely be amongst people again.

The Secret Life of Fleas

Dr. Jon Klingborg | Mon, 06/23/2008 - 08:09

Adult fleas aren’t very clever and they aren’t particularly sneaky. (In this way, they are often thought of as being similar to people—the teenagers are always much brighter than their parents.)

If you can pass an eye test at the DMV, you should be able to see adult fleas on your pet. Adult fleas want to spend all of their time on your tasty pet, so they aren’t hard to find. Both male and female fleas love to drink blood, and after a good blood meal the females will lay about 40 eggs per day. Once the feasting has ended, most fleas leave little black specks on your pet—these specks are called “flea dirt,” which is a nice term for flea poop!

The Longest Day of the Year

Rachel Friedman | Fri, 06/20/2008 - 18:31

It’s the longest day of the year as the summer solstice kicks in in the Northern Hemisphere; the opposite down south in places like Australia but even the shortest night of the year feels long if your biorhythm is disturbed by a not yet housetrained puppy or a dog with digestive upset or ...you get the picture.

Establishing Dominance

Jerry Hope | Thu, 06/19/2008 - 09:00

I received a call from a lady with a dog training problem a few weeks ago. Her voice was cracking and I detected a sense of urgency. She started her story by telling me her dogs were dominant over her, and if she didn’t get them under control, they would soon take over her house. She knew they were dominant, because the two trainers that had previously assisted her told her so.
As the story continued, she told me that both trainers abandoned her when she failed to comply with their prescribed treatment plan.

Help for Today’s Breeder

Jerry Hope | Tue, 06/17/2008 - 19:39

In the mid-70s, when I first became a professional dog trainer, it was not unusual for breeders to observe the whelping of puppies and then “stay out of mother’s way” while she raised her pups. Then, sometime after 6 weeks, the pups were placed into their new homes. Not much has changed in 30 years. The average age for pups to leave the litter is 7 weeks; and many breeders still haven’t bought in to the early socialization bit. This needs to change.

Confessions of a Doggy-Mama

Kelly Gorman Dunbar | Mon, 06/16/2008 - 13:55

For the first time ever, I’ve got a small dog. This means that sometimes he sits on my lap while I work at my desk. He is good at it, as a breed from the AKC’s non-sporting group it’s one of the many things he’s been bred to do, just hang out.

The other day while I was sitting at my desk looking at my calendar (with Hugo on my lap) I realized that it was Hugo’s one-year anniversary for the day he came to live with us. So I decided to take a commemorative picture using the Photo Booth program on my Mac.

Life's A Beach

Rachel Friedman | Fri, 06/13/2008 - 12:14

One of the coolest things about carving out a career as a professional dog trainer is the potential for diversity and the sheer fun of it all. The longer I do this work -- going on 10 years as a paid professional -- the more experience, contacts, knowledge and opportunities crop up. Certainly running one's business has to include a sense of recklessness and fearlessness, especially when coupled with the costs associated with raising 3 children as a single parent. But the payoffs can be oh so cool.

Dog 2.0: The Next Revolution

Kelly Gorman Dunbar | Wed, 06/11/2008 - 13:38

Most people know that Dr. Ian Dunbar & I have a dog training business called SIRIUS® Puppy & Dog Training. Some people even know that twenty-six years ago SIRIUS was the first puppy training school. They simply didn’t exist before 1982, if you wanted to take your dog to a class to teach her to mind her manners or to nip puppy nipping in the bud before she was six-months old, well, you were out of luck back then.

SIRIUS was the beginning of a revolution in dog training. Puppy training begot pet or companion dog training. You know, dog training for regular folks that had no plans to prance around in a ring or perform wild athletic skills, people who counted their dog as their buddy and just wanted him to come when called, maybe not jump up on people.