Happy New Year!
What an incredible holiday season and new year here at DogCentric! There are many wonderful changes planned for 2014. First off, I just got engaged! Second the monkeys, my fiancé, and I will all be moving to Oakland, NJ–only 40 minutes outside of New York City. Although I love the bright lights of the big city, we are choosing to live in an environment more conducive towards playing agility and with a slightly slower pace. The suburbs are more our speed. We will be moving in one month! 🙂
What this means for me personally:
- I get to play agility in my backyard;
- the dogs get to hike regularly and go swimming in the lake behind the house when the weather is warmer;
- we have more living space;
- we have a car to travel.
What this means for DogCentric:
- I will be commuting to New York City to see clients on specific days of the week;
- I will be driving to Westchester to see clients on specific days of the week;
- I will continue contributing to the New Rochelle Humane Society as their trainer on staff;
- I will be consulting more often for the ASPCA;
- I will be adding agility instruction back to my list of services (specifically teaching seminars & workshops)!
My experience living in Manhattan has really helped me to empathize with the needs of urban dog owners. Now, I reallyunderstand the need for training and behavior work for urban dogs and their humans. There are so many more variables and situations to contend with that don’t exist outside of the city:
More stressors for dogs; More people and dogs in closer proximity; Less space in homes and on sidewalks; Limited opportunities to exercise dogs. In most apartments, there usually isn’t that ‘spare room’ to put a dog when guests come to visit. It is difficult to avoid close encounters with other dogs on urban walks. Burning off your dog’s energy is more challenging when you don’t have a backyard.
All of this CAN be done and PLENTY of people live happy and comfortably with the canine companions in the city. But many struggle, which is why I will continue to keep seeing clients in the city.
The issues I faced with my dogs was Charlotte reacting towards other dogs, her fear of people in close proximity, the dogs barking from time to time in the apartment and disturbing neighbors, and Charlotte and Tricky not getting along in our small apartment. I’ve already written about how I supported Charlotte and the way she lunged and barked at dogs.
As you might guess, I will be addressing the other behavioral issues I faced in future blogs. Stay tuned!
Clarity & Harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
Almost 15 years ago, I adopted a Pit bull. Her name was Claire. She came into my life like a cannon shot and left this world the same way. BOOM! Claire made such a significant impact on me that I created a whole career out of my experiences with her. In processing her death, I started writing in a journal. The journal turned into stories about Claire’s life and the different ways she made me laugh, cry, and even scream. I was recalling the kind of antics that made my cheeks hurt because I was laughing so hard. During the writing process, I saw that Claire’s death left a huge hole in my heart. In that same year, another dog of mine passed away of cancer and my marriage ended. 2010 was rough, to say the least.
After a few years, I revisited the stories I had written about Claire and was inspired to share her story. I had been working with various shelters and rescue agencies over the years, including the ASPCA. I saw the huge misrepresentation of the breed, Pit bull so I wanted to turn Claire’s story into a book. After sharing this idea with lots of people, a new idea was born. The book I am now working is comprised of stories about Pit bulls who have made a difference in peoples’ lives. The goal is to change the conversation people have about the breed by raising awareness and portraying another side of the breed’s abilities and contributions. Through these conversations over time, we will be able to lower the number of Pit bulls in shelters, lower than number of euthanasias on a national level, and lower the number of bite cases. My Pit bull, Claire, and experiences with her is the inspiration for this book. I will not only be talking about different Pit bulls, I will also talk about the breed in general and why I chose to train the way I do, as a reward-based trainer.
Claire is a perfect example of why I believe in humane, science-based methods of training. I adopted Claire at the age of 7 mos. At around a year and half, Claire started becoming reactive towards other dogs when I walked her around the block. I didn’t know much about training dogs at that time, so I acted out of frustration and embarrassment–I yelled at her, popped her leash, dragged her in the other direction, hid behind cars, and a variety of other exhausting, but ineffective things. Claire’s behavior only got worse. And on top of that, every time I corrected her, she became more and more worried around me. I listened to the advice of a “dog expert” in NYC and started to growl at her as if I was a dog and intimidate her with my body. Again, her behavior worsened. Finally, I attended a seminar by a positive reinforcement trainer and was reminded of my old high school lessons of Pavlov’s dogs. I started giving Claire hot dogs on our walks every time she saw a dog. Over the next few months, I saw Claire’s behavior improve. In the realm of behavioral science, Claire was making an association that dogs are good because when they appear she gets hot dogs. What might have worsened her behavior towards dogs before was my reaction towards her. Every time dogs appeared and Claire became reactive, I got upset—all this created a snowball affect. What started as barrier frustration, turned into leash-induced aggression.
A year later, Claire was able to walk past dogs without reacting at all, even if the other dog was reacting towards her—I often didn’t need treats. Since then, Claire assisted in many behavior consultations as the helper dog, acted as the demo dog in group classes, and had an impressive resume as a canine actor, working with P. Diddy and appearing in a national commercial for the Dodge Caliber. She happily lived with 7 other dogs in the home.
Stay tuned for more information about my book!
Clarity & Harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
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