Often times a pet owner will presume that a bite or growl has come out of ‘nowhere’ or that their dog is absolutely ‘fine’ in a situation; but this is often not the case, as is illustrated in this piece: A Second Look
A good place to start developing a better understanding of such situations is with canine body language and signaling; this is an excellent resource to get started with: Introduction to Dog Body Language from Silent Conversations.
fMRI is giving us some exciting insights into how dogs’ brains work plus all the dogs in Berns’ studies have been trained to willing participants in the MRI work – check some of their training and work in this clip:
We don’t have all the answers but these might be the reasons behind these 5 odd dog behaviours!
Now, it’s no excuse but we may have found a contributory reason for such a high proportion of these dogs to have a tendency to put on weight so easily: Why is my dog fat? (with link to full article)
A great clip clearly explaining the use of counterconditioning to help your pet to cope better with new, exciting or scary situations:
Such a busy week that the blog was left a little behind but we have big plans for the next couple of weeks so stay tuned!
Awesome Pets & their People
We had lots of amazing dogs with us this week for behaviour work, training and rescue evaluations.
Monday started off with this happy chappie, Dante:
Dante came for a follow-up to our initial consultation to help him get ready for a big move with his family to Switzerland!
Sweet, soft Rebel also came for some behaviour work – he was just happy to discover that pate goes into Kongs and it’s delicious!
Bacchus came for a behaviour appointment too before he set off for Crufts 2016.
He did really well, placing 5th in a puppy class with very stiff competition. Wohoo Bacchus!
Daytraining:
Molly came back for her second session and we worked on lots and lots.
Part of our plan was to introduce flirtpole play so that we can have some good exercise that will take some emphasis off lead walks, which can be a bit of a problem, and so that we can raise her arousal a little so as to narrow her focus – Molly is big on getting distracted.
We didn’t anticipate that she would be super scared of it though…
Introducing both predictability and controlability to a situation allows the dog’s confidence increase greatly so soon we were teaching her the rules of this high-energy game:
We added more and more challenge to our loose leash walking work – still not ready to go right out into the big bad world with that one but improvements in all areas:
We work with A Dog’s Life and help out with training & behaviour support for their dogs and volunteers, advising on policies in relation to fostering and adopting dogs and developing programs to help their dogs become the most adoptable dogs they can be!
We see the issue from all sides – rescue dogs going out into the community and the training and behaviour support some rescue dogs might need when out in the community. It is our priority to emphasise the placement of safe, suitable companion dogs that won’t mean a life long project for their new owners, who will be excellent representatives of what rescue dogs are and who will be loved and treasured family members. No pressure then!
We had visits from two of these dogs this week and got to spend a couple of hours with each one to get to know them a little better, evaluate their behavioural tendencies and outline the best next steps for them.
First up was this gorgeous gal, Jessie:
We are eagerly looking for a suitable foster placement and forever home for this girl so if you think you can help, please contact A Dog’s Life directly.
Both of these are cracking dogs who will make excellent family companions and wonderful additions to their new people. We look forward to seeing them again soon, once they have settled into their new homes, for their post-adoption follow-up!
People Training
This weekend we welcomed a full group of dog professionals, walkers, trainers & groomers, for another Canine First Responder course. It was a great day and all happily achieved certification for another two years, before they need to renew again.
Would you know what to do in a canine emergency? Register your interest for our next course by sending an email to info@anied.ie if you would like to learn more 🙂
BIG Summer Event
We are very excited to have Helen Zulch back after a very successful and booked out weekend workshop last year.
Helen is a veterinary surgeon, clinical animal behaviourist and a highly skilled clicker trainer.
She is best known for her work with Lincoln University and the Life Skills for Puppies program. Helen is a senior lecturer in Lincoln University on the Clinical Animal Behaviour under and post grad degrees. She is also a consultant at the University of Lincoln Animal Behaviour Referral Clinic.
The Canine Training/Behaviour Skills workshop will take place at our centre in Glasnevin in Dublin. We have a great weekend planned:
Day 1: Saturday, 4th June 2016
This day will concentrate on building clicker skills, covering more advanced skills in precision clicker training. Participants for this session will be those who have some experience in training their own or others’ dogs and have shaped behaviours with clicker training.
Spectators of any background will really benefit from this session and it will be especially helpful if you are new to clicker training or preparing for clicker training assessments such as the CAP program,
Day 2: Sunday, 5th June 2016
This day will be seminar style (no dogs!) and will look at a topic that is rarely discussed in our field, but one that is highly relevant. Helen will examine, with the help of case studies and interactive discussion, the relationship between canine health and behaviour. She will cover ways to integrate these concerns into our dog training, developing meaningful relationships with veterinary and healthcare professionals.
This will be a valuable topic for anyone working or interested in training/behaviour fields and those working in veterinary too.
Pricing:
Participant Saturday – €150 (with a dog who is suitable and comfortable working in a managed workshop environment)
Spectator/seminar one day- €90
Spectator/seminar both days – €160
Participant one day and spectator one day – €220
If you would like to book a spot we encourage you to register and pay ASAP so as to secure your spot (there are limited places). To book please copy and paste the following, along with your responses into an email to info@anied.ie :
Name:
Contact Number:
Email Address:
Day/s of attendance (please specify as many as are relevant: Spectator Day 1, Participant Day 1, Spectator Day 2):
(Where relevant) Dog’s name:
Type/Breed:
Age:
Chosen method of payment:
Better get your skates on as places are limited and booking up fast!
AniEd Dogs
Boomer and Decker reluctantly share – Boomer’s queen bee and Decker is just trying to steal a corer of his bed!
And Zack had something yummy…but then everything is yummy to Zack!
AniEd Ireland 