Be a Resource Full Puppy Owner

We though wed best follow up our joint-post about Books for Before & After you get a Puppy or Dog with some further resources. 

Because lets face it - you can never have enough resources to consult with a new puppy in the family! 

Here are some of our primary go-to places and wed love to hear your suggestions in the comments section below - lets turn this into a great resource-full page for everyone!

Mia & Julie

The Other End of The Leash ~ Patricia McConnell
In 2012, McConnell gave her website a major overhaul. Readers can now follow along her weekly blog, as well as search by interest area and easily link to relevant blog posts and videos.

McConnell’s Reading Room has drop down menus where you can access Training Your Dog, Behavior & Health, Solving Behavior Problemsand Finding Resources. Have a question about aggression? Go to Solving Behavior Problems. What do you think the "Guilty Look" is all about? Check out the Emotions section in Behavior & Health. 


The Art & Science of Animal Behavior ~ Sophia Yin
An incredibly user-friendly website jam packed with all sorts of information. Yin’s blog and resources are searchable so just type in a term (e.g. toilet training) and take a look! 

Julies favorite video shows counter conditioning of a dog displaying aggression.

Dog Star Daily ~ Ian Dunbar and co.
Dog Star Daily is a resource-laden website populated by Dunbar and a lot of other trainers. 

Take some time to look through their many many videos.

New resources to watch

AVSAB
The American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior (AVSAB) new website includes a free newsletter (you can sign up using your email address or access the archives online) and blog. Considering that AVSAB tackles such topics as Cat Body Language as well as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Military dogs, it’s definitely a great resource for everyone!

Pet Pages
Pet Pages features content from lots of different sources. Animal behaviourist Kate Mornement writes regular posts on different topics that can be searched.

Commercial sites

Dr Joanne Righetti has helped Purina populate their Puppy Club website with helpful information.

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Dogs in Review May 2013

Canine Science! Everywhere! AHHH! (source)

Hey Mia!

Didn’t May come and go in a flash? Is it possible to ask for an extension? The world of canine science was bopping last month, so here’s a review of things I would have liked to cover in more detail, if I were granted a two-week extension:

--> Dogs in Research

Dogs rocked peer-reviewed journals last month! As you mentioned, the Horowitz Dog Cognition Lab published an article in a recent issue of Learning and Motivation. We looked at the olfactory experience of companion dogs, and Im sure Ill talk more about our paper later. The issue will include a number of dog-centric, peer-reviewed articles covering a variety of canine cognition topics such as olfaction, memory, physical cognition, and the influence of humans on dog behavior. Here’s a brief overview of a few of the studies:

MAGIC BONES

Pattison et al. The case of the magic bones: Dogs’ memory of the physical properties of objects.

How can I not mention a paper talking about magic bones? “Using a procedure popular with preverbal infant researchers, [the researchers] allowed dogs to initially observe a bone and then to subsequently view the bone changed in either size or color. Dogs gazed longer at a bone changed in either way, compared to a control presentation of an unchanged bone. Dogs apparently encoded and remembered both the size and color of the bone.” *

OLFACTION

Hall et al. Training domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) on a novel discrete trials odor-detection task.

“[Domestic] dogs can be trained to detect a distinct odor (anise) buried in pine shavings. However, it took dogs about 60 trials to reach an average performance level of 80% correct choices, and dogs learned much better when a human experimenter delivered food reward than when the reward was buried with the odor cue.” *

SOCIAL INFLUENCE

Pongrácz et al. “We will work for you” – Social influence may suppress individual food preferences in a communicative situation in dogs.

“[Dogs] would repeatedly choose a bowl containing a carrot over a bowl containing preferred sausage if a human pointed to the carrot bowl. In a delayed response test, dogs regularly search at the location where they last saw food disappear.” *

DOGS AND WORDS

Pilley. Border collie comprehends sentences containing a prepositional object, verb, and direct object.

Chaser knows words (source)

A border collie named Chaser initially captured headlines in 2011 as “the smartest dog in the world” when research published in Behavioral Processes reported that she knew the names of over 1,000 different objects.

Pilley’s current article investigated Chaser’s attention to the syntactical relationships between words, like differentiating “to ball take Frisbee” from “to Frisbee take ball.”

What’s going on with “wordy dogs” like Chaser? How did they get this way? And how can we test whether the dogs in our homes understand our words as we intend them?

• Do Dogs Understand Our Words? The Dogs Weigh In. Scientific American

• Do Dogs Understand Our Words? The Bark Magazine 

PUPPY PROBLEMS?

In other canine science news, I was happy to see that the blog Companion Animal Psychology (twitter: @CompAnimalPsych) covered a recent publication by Frank McMillan et al investigating behavioral problems in puppies from pet stores vs puppies from non-commercial breeders. According to the study: What were the behavioral differences between pet store and breeder-obtained dogs? Read on!

YAWNING IN DOGS MEANS...

Over at Not bad science on Scientific American Blogs, @Felicity__M discusses a study of yawning behavior in dogs. Check out her coverage of the recent paper, Buttner et al. Contagious yawning, social cognition, and arousal: an investigation of the processes underlying shelter dogs’ responses to human yawns.

--> Dog Bite Prevention Week 2013
Apparently, the third full week of May is dog bite prevention week, but in my mind, every day is (or should be) dog bite prevention day. I don’t want to be bitten by a dog, and also I don’t want to give a dog the experience of biting me. So how do we prevent dog bites?

• My primary strategy to avoid being bitten is to not be a child. Yes, that is cheeky, but children are more likely than others to be bitten by dogs, which we’ve discussed in earlier posts, Dogs and babies: Not always cute and The Science Surrounding Children & Dogs: Part 3 (The Ugly).

• I also avoid bites by not interacting with dogs like this: 

Watch Sophia Yin Dog Bite Prevention Video

• Instead, I ask dogs whether they want to interact, as recommended in a great post by Khris Erickson, the Humane Educator at HAWS, Humane Animal Welfare Society in Wisconsin. 
  
  
• If dogs indicate that they are not into interacting, then we dont interact. Its that simple. What I sometimes find is that owners of "so friendly" dogs want to push an interaction even if the dog is giving "not right now" indications. A dog can still be "uber-friendly" without wanting to interact all the time with everyone. Ive been thinking about this a lot recently as NYC enters summer and dogs are looking hotter and hotter, and potentially experiencing some physical discomfort.
  
  
• I also think about context, practicing interventions and what a leash can (and can’t) prevent. Patricia McConnell, CAAB, offers in-depth insights into this topic over at her blog, The Other End of the Leash, in the post Dog Bite Prevention 2013.
  
  
• When it comes to preventing dog bites, I frequently check out The Blue Dog, a website aimed at educating children about dogs. I first learned about The Blue Dog at the 2nd Canine Science Forum. The website houses resources and research on children and dog bites, in addition to providing general dog information:
• Research on dog bites

• Research on dog bite prevention

--> Up next: Some of the leading canine science researchers will be presenting at a Canine Science Conference, SPARCS, June 28-30, 2013. The best part is, anyone in the world can join, either in a conference hall in Redmond, WA, or streaming live to your living room. 

(source)

I recently covered the SPARCS conference on #SciAmBlogs, who will be there & what to expect, at You’re invited to a canine science conference. Take a look!

I know your life is currently heavily focused on The Big W, and I’m not talking about the best movie ever, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Hoping for an update on working dog welfare!

Cheers!

Julie

* summary by Macpherson K. & Roberts W.A. (2013). Exploring the canine mind: Studies of dog cognition, Learning and Motivation, DOI: 10.1016/j.lmot.2013.04.006

© 2013 Julie Hecht

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New Zealand farm working dogs 11 The Law and your Dog

 By Dr Clive Dalton

The law

Ownership of a working dog carries with it some clearly-defined legal responsibilities under current legislation.  Your main responsibilities are to:

·      Make sure a dog is registered and that the certificate is in a secure place and readily available.

·      Have collars, discs, or tags for all dogs and make sure they wear them at all times.

·      Notify any change of address, either permanent or temporary if you move, or if you sell the dog.

·      Ensure discs or labels are not tampered with.

·      Present all dogs for treatment for hydatids as required.

·      Keep dogs under control at all times.

·      Make certain dogs are well housed.

·      Ensure dogs are well fed.

The dog is also covered under legislation that states that an animal must be provided with adequate food, water, and shelter, and given adequate exercise.  Ill-treating your dog or cruelly ill-treating it is an offence under the law.

Registration

All dogs must be registered annually with a "territorial authority" such as a borough council, county council, district council or city council, or a hydatids and dog control authority acting on behalf of these.  All farm dogs over 3 months of age must be registered. 

The fees vary with each territorial authority and some charge lower fees for working dogs and neutered dogs.  You are not allowed to shop round for the cheapest authority - you register your dog where you live! 

Proof of ownership, other than the owners certificate is the label or disc that the dog should wear at all times.  This shows:

·      The territorial authority where the dog is registered.

·      Year of registration, also shown by the colour of the tag.

·      The dogs ownership number.

New collars can be purchased from the authority.  Old ones can be used provided the current label or tag is firmly attached.  If a collar or disc is lost, you can apply to the authority for a replacement and youll have to pay for it. 

Remember that if a dog is found without a collar, it will be "deemed as unregistered" until you can prove the contrary.

Selling a dog

When selling a dog, if its under 3 months of age, there is no obligation to register it before sale.  If you sell the dog when over 3 months of age you must notify the territorial authority in writing within 14 days that the dog has been sold.  Theres no fee charged for change of ownership. 

When selling a dog you must:

·      Give the new owner a current treatment certificate showing that the dog has been treated for hydatids in the last 42 days.

·      Provide the authority with the name and address of the new owner and the address where the dog in normally kept.

Buying a dog

If you buy a dog under 3 months of age, the vendor doesnt have to produce a hydatids treatment certificate.  As a new owner you must:

·      Register the dog before its 3 months old

·      If over 3 months old, get the original owner to provide a certificate to show the dog has been treated for hydatids in the last 42 days.

·      Notify the territorial authority in writing within 14 days of purchase the name of the authority the dog came from.

Moving with your dog

If you move within the same territorial authority, then notify the territorial authority of your address change, in writing, within 14 days .

If you move to a new authority, notify them in writing within 6 weeks of moving where the dog came from.   Then inform the authority you have just left that youve moved, and give them the new address where the dog is kept.  It would pay to do this in writing too.

These two situations are important for stockpersons doing casual work and for those having dogs on trial before purchase.  Its also important for people traveling outside their district to always carry their dogs hydatids treatment certificate. It should show that treatment has been carried out within the last 42 days.

Control of dogs

This part of the act is important for farm dogs.  It covers the fact that dogs must be kept under control at all times.  If a dog is considered to be out of control, then a number of things can happen.  Important examples are:

·      A Dog Control Officer can impound it.

·      The occupier of the land on which the dog is found can impound it.

·      If the dog is in a public place from which dogs are prohibited, anyone can seize the dog, or arrange for it to be seized and impounded.

·      Anyone can impound a dog (or dogs) if they consider it to be causing distress, annoyance, and damage to property other than the owners.

The occupier of land where a dog causes a nuisance can either return the dog to its owner or hand it over to a Dog Control Officer or Dog Ranger.

Barking dogs

If a barking dog has been reported to a Dog Control Officer or Dog Ranger, and there are reasonable grounds to believe that its barking constitutes a nuisance, an officer or ranger can:

·      Enter the land or premises (other than a dwelling house) at any reasonable time to inspect the conditions under which the dog is kept.

·      Give the owner a written notice requiring him/her to abate the nuisance or remove the dog.  The owner may object within 7 days.

Disqualification from ownership

A territorial authority may apply to a court to disqualify a person from owning a dog if convicted of a range of listed offences in the legislation.

Dogs attacking people or livestock or rushing at vehicles

Anyone who sees a dog attack stock or poultry, or who is themselves attacked, can either seize the dog or destroy it immediately.  Note that police dogs are exempt!  Once you have seized the dog, you must hand it over to its owner or to a Dog Control Officer or Ranger.

If you cannot catch the dog, you may call a police officer who can shoot it.  It need not be caught in the act for this to happen, but the office must have reasonable ground for believing the attacks took place.

The police officer is empowered to destroy the dog only if he/she is unable to seize it.

Dangerous dogs at large

It is an offence for owners of a dangerous dog to have it at large without a suitable muzzle.  A "dangerous dog" is one that has attacked people, stock, poultry or property of any kind.  If you keep it in a vehicle or cage, then this is acceptable.

Destroying dangerous dogs

A court can order the owner of a dangerous dog either to keep it under proper restraint or make an order for it to be destroyed.

Seizure or destruction of a dog found at large among livestock

If a dog is found running at large among livestock or poultry, the owner may either seize a dog or destroy it.  Owners can also request their "agent", a constable, a Dog Control Officer or Ranger to do this on their behalf.

If seized the dog must be returned to its owner or delivered into the custody of a Dog Control Officer or Ranger.

Dogs seen worrying livestock

If a dog has been seen worrying livestock of poultry, the owner may make a complaint to the District Court.  The court as a result may make an order of restraint or an order to destroy the dog.

Liability of the owner for damage

The owner of a dog is liable for all damage done by the animal.

Dog control bylaws

A territorial authority can make bylaws for a range of purposes.  Those of interest to farm dog owners are:

·      Prescribing minimum standards for accommodation of dogs.

·      Limiting the number of dogs kept on land or premises.

·      Requiring dogs to be tied up during the hours of darkness.

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When dogs die the science of sad

Diposting oleh fajar di 21.48

Farewell to Elke

Ah, Julie...

I’m not even really sure where to start. 

"On Sunday I sat outside in the sun, stroking Elkes so-soft ears, while my husband patted her long, sleek back, and we farewelled our first girl. We learned on Friday that her liver and spleen were full of cancer. We are so grateful to have shared 12.5yrs with her and will miss her dearly." is what my Facebook status update said.
But lets start at the beginning...

Little Elke-Moo and her
cow hips, at RSPCA

I met Elke (pronounced Ell-kee) when I was in my third week of employment in the RSPCA shelter. What a sucker I was! She was seized as part of a cruelty case from a property where an elderly man with dementia had over forty dogs. Because of the dementia, the dogs weren’t receiving proper care and he sometimes fed them chicken pellets. Of her litter, Elke was the only survivor. She looked like a 5 week old puppy but she was actually 12 weeks old. 

She was always small. Our ‘bonsai pointer’, we called her. We joked that she was little, but could lay a good egg.  My boyfriend at the time and I had been speaking about getting a dog, and pointers had come up as a breed we were interested in – he wanted a dog to run with him. After three weeks of rehabilitation at RSPCA, she came home with me. I was 23 years old. Since then, she has been a fixture in the landscape of our lives - through house moves, our engagement and marriage, the death of my father, the arrival of our daughter, the comings and goings of oh-so-many other dogs (occupational hazard!).

Elke and my daughter - a fantastic introduction to dogs

Elke was energetic, excitable and hilarious. She wasnt perfect, but neither were we. We were a perfect match. She realised, as a young dog, that she could redirect attention to herself if visitors were over, by trawling our dirty clothes basket for recent underwear and then parading it through the lounge room for everyone to see. 

Post-beach snooze with our other dog, Caleb

She didn’t like thunderstorms or fireworks. She loved running off lead at the park, the beach or through the bush and she adored retrieving. She would regularly throw herself into water without stopping to check for a way out. One time I had to walk along a river back for about 500m while she swam and we looked for a place where she could scramble up the riverbank to get out again!

We took Elke to obedience training and she taught us so much. Elke was also more than our pet. She helped as a friendly adult dog at puppy preschool classes, she posed as a jaunty model as Australia legislated for the end of tail docking, she tried to distract trainee guide dogs and she visited nursing homes as a certified visiting therapy dog. They were all things we did together, my spotty dog and I.

Elke loved playing swim-retrieve in the water

 She and our other dog Caleb were very close. They had a silly play ritual they indulged in every day. Twice a day. A close-quarters mouthing and growling game that ended in howling calamity. It was sometimes annoying (working from home, it wasn’t always compatible with work-related phone calls!), but always made me smile. But now our house is very quiet.

We all loved time at the beach

We didn’t know Elke was sick until a week before she was euthanased. We took her to the vet, her temperature was up, a blood sample was taken, antibiotics were commenced. We didn’t know just how sick she was until two days before. What we did know, was that she was getting older, slowing down, not hearing the thunderstorms any more – and we knew she wouldn’t live forever. But that day always seems - in the future.

Instant couch-rights

When the vet rang me on Friday (the 13^th) to advise that the ultrasound showed Elke’s liver and spleen were full of cancer, I was interstate at a conference aiming to eliminate the euthanasia of healthy and treatable pets in Australia. I was told that there were no options. Elke was comfortable, but at risk of bleeding internally and needed to be kept quiet with minimal activity. Euthanasia was not required immediately, but certainly the recommended course of action to avoid a slow and painful death by haemorrhage. I made the appointment for the day after I was due home and cried in my hotel room until there were no tissues left.

Sunday morning was a beautiful morning in Melbourne. The sun was out. I sat with Elke and my just-turned-3-year-old daughter in our garden. We talked about Elke being sick and that she was going to die. She asked hard questions. I did my best to answer them. We weren’t able to play retrieve, but passed Elke little sticks and she crunched them in her teeth. I took some last photos of the two of them – my girls – who have enjoyed a calm and positive relationship. Then Pete and I took Elke to the vet. She was given a mild sedative and we walked outside into the vet clinic’s garden (she never really liked veterinary consult’ rooms). We placed her bed on the grass in the sun, while she walked and sniffed. As the sedation took effect, I helped her settle onto her bed and she relaxed, dozing in the sun. Pete gently stroked her back. I had her relaxed head cushioned in my lap, savouring the sensation of her silky soft ears against my fingertips, one last time. She didn’t even notice the needle that entered the vein in her leg with the overdose of anaesthetic. It really was the perfect euthanasia.

Elke was doing selfies pre-Facebook - circa 2003

Now Elke is gone, and we’re adjusting to this changed landscape of our lives.

Despite all the dogs that have lived in our home, for days or for years, Elke is the first dog that we have owned from puppyhood through to old age. In some ways, this is helping me cope with her death.  With other dogs I think I’ve felt an element of anger that we had met too late for them to live their best life, or been robbed of time together through unexpected illness taking them too soon. But today, I’m trying to take comfort in the fact that Elke lived a fabulous and full life with us; her passing was as peaceful and stress free as any of us could hope for. I’m so grateful that our daughter had Elke to share her infancy with. 

It still hurts. In ways that bubble up unexpectedly. And I know that’s OK. Grief is messy. It’s individual and it takes as long as it takes. Time plays a critical role and will not be rushed.

Spooning in 2003.

Still besties in 2013.

Research over the past 25 years has shown us that grieving for a pet follows the same reactions and involves the same emotional responses as dealing with a human loss. People who have lost a pet commonly experience intense feelings such as sadness, anger, anxiety, disbelief, depression, panic, relief or even numbness. The act of consenting to euthanasia has been found to be particularly disturbing for some owners, who feel they have betrayed a trust by choosing death over life. Of course, grief responses to death of companion animals is linked to the strength of attachment we have with them, but we should not trivialise, nor brush aside our response to the death of our pets.

Animals are important to us and the grief we experience when they die is real.
We should be gentle to ourselves.

Acknowledging this and permitting ourselves to react (however we need to) is important. Letting our support networks (friends, family, colleagues) know how we feel and letting them help us in return is also important. If time isn’t helping, or you lack a support network, seek further help, from your doctor or a professional counsellor. The Australian Centre for Grief and Bereavement has helpful information about grief here. The number of friends who have sent me kind messages, called to see how were doing this week or even driven over just to give me a hug has shown me that a) Elke was a dog whose reach was long, and that b) I have amazing friends and family!

And so, my friend, I’m off to give Caleb a big hug. Because amongst all the other sad (for Elke, for my daughter, for me) I’m sad that he may never get to do this again:

Mia

Do You Believe in Dog? will place further helpful resources about dealing with the grief associated with pet loss online soon.

My submitted proof that the sun did shine out of...

Further reading: 
Weisman A.D. (1990). Bereavement and Companion Animals, OMEGA--Journal of Death and Dying, 22 (4) 241-248. DOI: 10.2190/C54Y-UGMH-QGR4-CWTL

Archer J. & Winchester G. (1994). Bereavement following death of a pet, British Journal of Psychology, 85 (2) 259-271. DOI: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1994.tb02522.x

Podrazik D., Shackford S., Becker L. & Heckert T. (2000). The Death of a Pet: Implications for Loss and Bereavement Across the Lifespan, Journal of Personal and Interpersonal Loss, 5 (4) 361-395. DOI: 10.1080/10811440008407852

Smith A. (2012). Pet Loss and Human Emotion: Whats New?, Death Studies, 36 (3) 292-297. DOI: 10.1080/07481187.2011.590443

Field N., Orsini L., Gavish R. & Packman W. (2009). Role of Attachment in Response to Pet Loss, Death Studies, 33 (4) 334-355. DOI: 10.1080/07481180802705783

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