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A SENIOR MOMENT

A recent article in The Telegraph suggested that dog owners who noticed peculiar behaviours in the older dogs might be shocked to learn that their dogs could be suffering from Pet Dementia. Odd behaviours include; Dogs becoming forgetful or confused, Forgetting what they have just done; for example greeting their owner, then losing them and finding them again and greeting them again. Standing on the hinge side of the door instead of the side that opens, Drifting away from an activity, Walking in circles, Forgetting to eat, or forgetting they have just eaten, Struggling to find their way around. Vets have put this condition down to poor lifestyles and poor diets. Dogs that are no longer taken for long walks or given poor diets are more likely to suffer from this. Prof. Peter Volk of the Royal Veterinary College  says in an article: “I don’t think people realise how serious this problem is”. He goes onto to say that lack of activity, with owners less willing to t
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The Future of the Wolf

The 'Wolf' by L.David Mech. "The Wolf is a strong, sensitive, intelligent animal with a complex social behaviour and lasting family ties. It has a tendency to travel long distances and to seek out vulnerable big game animals that it can kill and eat with enough safety and efficiency to maintain its species. All the while the wolf is subject to any number of stresses from its environment, and must constantly contend with forces tending to suppress its numbers. With minor variations in this mode of living, the wolf has survived and evolved for millions of years in a variety of habitats throughout most of the northern hemisphere. But a new force has now suddenly arisen on the earth, a force that could quickly snuff out the unique flame of life that is the wolf's. This is the expansive force of the human population, with its aggressive tendency to occupy all of the planet in high densities and to overcome and destroy anything that might stand in its way. At present
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LOOKING FOR A HARNESS

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An interesting article on Harnesses I came across. Considering the Kennel Club have changed the rules about letting dogs wear harnesses during assessments these might be of interest. Walking is a vital role of dog ownership. Depending on its breed, it might be important to walk your dog several miles regularly in order to give him or her appropriate exercise and stimulation to avoid boredom and undesired activities. Again, it is essential for their health . Some individuals needs dog particularly as a motivation to walk more. You may also want to have a car ride with your dog.  However, let’s face it. Some dogs are really challenging to walk. Some pups, for instance, are quite strong and aggressive they may pull so hard and may drag through town. Others will wander all over, neither here nor there, while some may completely refuse to cooperate altogether. If walking your faithful friend is a challenge, doing it becomes discouraging.  In such a case, then, you need a quality dog
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"NO" IS NOT AN OPTION!

This article was written by Lonnie Olson for Dogs Naturally magazine in its July issue. Lonnie has been teaching people to train their dogs for 30 years in her successful Dogs Choice Training Centres.Lonnie founded Dog Scouts of America, a non-pro t educational and charitable organization that promotes responsible dog ownership and educates people about the human/animal bond. I was at my Freestyle class last night with my dog. I was attempting to do a remote figure eight, which is send ing my dog away to do a figure eight around two objects which are about  20 feet apart, making theatrical arm movements that don’t look like signals to the dog,  the instructor happened to notice my improvement and said, “Nice, Lonnie!” About that time, Kozi was rounding her third orbit around the bar stools and ran to the other bar stool, only to decide to climb up the rungs of the stool rather than run around it. All I could do is laugh. I was embarrassed because that’s right when the whole cla
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DOES YOUR DOG LOVE YOU?

At the start of each of my training courses I frequently tell my clients that their dogs dont love them and that all they are doing is satisfying their basic needs. The need for companionship, food, water, exercise and play. I tell them that if someone else was to come along and offer their dogs these things then their dogs wold go with them. I then usually make an example of this by calling one of their dogs over to me with the promise of a nice piece of cocktail sausage. It always works, what dog can refuse a nice piece of cocktail sausage. So I was intrigued to come across an article which suggested that dogs can indeed declare their love for their humans by displaying certain actions. This is a summary of the article and the points highlighted. So I thought I would share an article I read recently that was extracted from an interview by “60 minutes” Anderson Cooper and Brian Hare supposedly a well know Dog expert. In the interview they were discussing how dogs express love.
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RISK TAKERS

According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's, or even maybe the early 70's probably shouldn't have survived. Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. (Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.) As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat. We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.  Horrors! We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing.  We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this. We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the
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DOMESTICATION OF THE WOLF

By the stoneage some 14'000 years ago, man had developed close social interactions with dogs. Some of the benefits that dogs provided were recognised and exploited by those early hunter gatherers. In order to get these dogs to assist in guarding, hunting and killing prey, some form of training involving  an 'agreement' or 'pact' between man and dog would have to have been made. This pact would take the form that says if you do this you will be rewarded by that. To think this is probably when positive reinforcement training first started out. Dogs as a species have been by mans side side for more than 14'000 years. It is not beyond reasoning to think that it was the dog who helped man conquer earth and make it into the world we have today. No other species has evolved quite in this way. Although the earliest archaeological records indicated the earliest remains of dogs at 14'000 years. Molecular genetical analyses has been carried out in the United States of
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