Dog Musings

Dogs on Drugs | Musings

At the Sound of the Tone, the Time Will Be

Part of fixing Lilly’s nighttime anxiety behaviors at home required restructuring our evenings to prevent any conflict over coming inside and to encourage her to remain in the social areas of the house instead of hiding. Rather than confronting the issues head-on, we’re basically creating new routines aimed at helping her relax (with the help of the meds, of course). In the month or so since the consult, we can practically tell time based on Lilly’s location and body posture. …

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Musings

Yawn Talking

Knock on wood, so far we’ve seen no real side-effects from Lilly’s new medicines (clomipramine & alprazolam). One thing we have noticed, however, is that she’s rather talkative. She’s always been a somewhat noisy girl, but these days, she uses all manner of noises to express herself. Mostly she’s being silly. We call it Yawn Talking. Maybe your dog does it too. …

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Musings

Lonely, Lonely Summer

Gosh, could I be any more isolated this summer? Between gas prices limiting my driving, other economic woes affecting my budget, Tom spending long hours several days a week painting his mom’s house, and NOT being able to take Lilly all the places we usually go, it’s been a long, lonely summer so far. I’m trying hard to change my thinking about it, but I do feel like a hermit. …

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Dog Training Update | Dogs on Drugs | Musings

Split, Don’t Lump

As the parsing of stimuli continues, I find myself also splitting out individual behaviors from their many partners for sanity’s sake. Take the hubbub at the door before going outside.
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Musings

Tribute to Onchu

I’m sad to report the passing of my friends’ (Jess and Linda) lovely sheltie, Onchu (pronounced Awn-shoo, which is Gaelic and translates roughly as “mighty dog”). He was only 7 years old and was diagnosed with squamous cell cancer just 3 weeks ago. Here’s an excerpt of a tribute Jess wrote: …

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Blog Swap | Guest Blogger | Musings

Guest Blogger – Dara Chadwick (When the Dog Becomes the Trainer)

Today, I’m teaming up with fellow freelance writer Dara Chackwick from Fit in Real Life for a blog swap. So, her entry appears here, and mine is posted on her blog. Keep an eye on Dara, she’s HOT STUFF, her book about how mothers shape their daughter’s body image is set to publish in 2009. One of the reasons I find Dara’s blog so compelling is that we have essentially the same body and similar issues with food and exercise. BUT, for today, she’s musing about …

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Info-Share | Musings

How I Define Hiding

I pretend I’m Dian Fossey as I track Lilly’s various fear behaviors so that we can gauge their severity, speculate about their cause, measure any changes. Was that a happy kiss or an anxious one? Is not actively wanting to come in a door refusal or does it only count when she throws a true shutdown behavior at me, playing the writhing dustmop or the boat anchor? And, what constitutes hiding? …

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Info-Share | Musings

Classical Conditioning: What it doesn’t mean

One of the headlines from our animal behavior consult is that I’ve done far too much operant conditioning and not enough classical conditioning. Generally I assume that experienced “dog people” know what this means. A recent conversation proved otherwise. At least one person thought I meant punishment-based training when I said classic. So, just to be clear, classical conditioning is a way of learning, not the out-of-date punishment/dominance obsessed style of dog training.
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Musings

To Spray or Not to Spray

I’ve ranted before about encounters with loose dogs (some friendly, some not) that Lilly and I have on our walks in our rural neighborhood. When we talked about these events during our behavior consult, the recommendation for carrying a spray with stopping power came up. Earlier this year, I bought the citronella kind to carry. But, I’ve yet to use it. Maybe I’m just being too nice. …

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Musings

Where’s Willy Wonka When You Need Him?

I’ve always given Lilly about 300 x more treats than anyone else I know. I can easily go through a quart-size ziplock of of training food in an hour. It’s one reason she often eats small meals. So, now that we’re working entirely under the behavior modification model that says “food changes how a dog feels emotionally about a situation,” I’m going through even more food. Which makes me wish for a Willy Wonka creation — something like the bottomless bait bag. …

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