Thanks for the great comments on what's needed in a booklet for people bringing home adult dogs from shelters or rescues. Keep 'em coming, either on this post or the previous one. A lot of you will be gratified to know that the points at the top of my own list are similar to many of yours: 1) patience patience patience, 2) do not expect the dog you bring home to be the dog you end up with in 3 days, 3 weeks or 3 months and 3) don't try to make up for past neglect or abuse (or the perception of it, which common but often not accurate) by coddling a dog such that she becomes emotionally overloaded by you and finally, for now, 4) no, love is not enough... love doesn't mean much if you are totally confused about what is expected of you. You simply have to teach your dog what you want, Read More
Booklet For Dogs from Shelters or Rescues
Karen London and I are planning on writing a booklet for people who adopt dogs from shelters or rescue groups. We're both aware that often it can be intimidating to sit in your living room with a new family member, whose background you may not even know. Over the many years that we've worked with people who have adopted dogs, and with our own dogs that we have taken in from difficult circumstances (5 between us), we know that these dogs can present challenges, and generate questions that are not often answered by standard training books. We have our own ideas about what to include in the booklet, we've already written an outline, but we'd love to hear from you too. If you have a dog that you obtained from a shelter or rescue group, or adopted an adult dog who might have had a difficult Read More
Cats and Shelters
I did a fund raiser for my local shelter last night, the Dane County Humane Society. They are about to open a state of the art facility for cats, designed to treat cats with ring worm (a fungus, not a worm) so that they don't have to be put down (as they often are at shelters, even some 'no-kill' ones.) They have developed a nationally recognized treatment program, and a new facility just for cats is part of the program. They call it the FIT Center (Feline Infectious Treatment? I'm making that up.) and it will be opening up next week. Yeah DCHS! I am bushed today, but am so gratified to be able to help. Over 200 people attended, we raised lots of money thanks to a generous community and I auctioned off Willie's slightly used Polly the Pig stuffed toy and discovered it's really really Read More
Could Breeders and Shelters Work Together?
Thank you so much for all your insightful comments about overpopulated shelters and whether responsible breeders could help reduce the number of dogs who enter shelters in the first place. Here are a few, admittedly somewhat random, thoughts about the issue. One: Boy would I like to see more collaborative efforts between good breeders, shelters and rescue groups. I know that already occurs in some areas, and Here Here! to that, but I wish somehow we could more often use the energy and commitment of these groups to 1) publicize a universally understood definition of "responsible breeder" so that the public understands what that really means 2) create more, affordable support systems to help people when they need help with training and behavioral problems. (FYI, I too have heard a common Read More
“Responsible Breeding” an Oxymoron?
I'm working on a column for Bark magazine, in which I'm going to talk about one way to decrease the number of dogs needing adoption from shelters and rescues. Right now the two primary efforts to decrease the number of dogs killed in shelters are 1) encourage spay/neuter & discourage breeding and 2) encourage adoptions of dogs from shelters and rescue groups. I say Here! Here! in general to both of those, and it is heartening how successful both of those efforts have been. However, there is one important aspect of this issue that is missing, and that is encouraging responsible breeding. Ah, some would say, responsible breeding?! Isn't that an oxymoron? Breeding is a dirty word in some circles. After all, aren't there too many dogs out there already? How could anyone justify breeding Read More
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