Peer reviewed
Although thinking about animal rights and related questions of welfare can be complicated, uncomfortable, messy, and at times upsetting, critically reflecting on where we stand on questions of animal rights—and why—can help us be more intentional in living the kinds of relationships we want to create with the animals in our lives....
Peer reviewed
So much is yet unknown about how mammals’ bodies react to stress, and so many answers start with that ever frustrating phrase of “it depends”; however, there have been a number of studies that suggest we should, at the very least, question the cortisol vacation as a hard and fast rule....
Peer reviewed
Shelter personnel and consultants are always looking for new tools that to introduce dogs into a new home, help resolve inter-dog aggressive behavior within a household, or form shelter playgroups. I have successfully used a single evidence-based protocol to do all three....
Peer reviewed
While shelters across the country continue to increase their live-release rates, it becomes even more necessary to find new, innovative ways to save the most vulnerable populations. One population commonly overlooked as a focus of a behavior and training program is cats who are non-social or very fearful towards humans. f those cats are not viable candidates for TNR programs to live as community cats, and cannot be safely handled by shelter personnel, it can take a long time to get them adopted. This creates issues that many shelters do not have the resources nor staff training to handle and, as we have seen in frequent calls for assistance from local municipal shelters, often leads to the cat being marked for euthanasia....
Peer reviewed
In the fall of 2018, a keeper told me that zoo animals are trained to voluntarily participate in as much of their husbandry as possible. This astounded me. Cooperative patients are not necessarily expected in equine medicine, and we’re dealing with highly trained domestic animals....
Peer reviewed
We often hear people discussing distance to trigger, but it is less common to hear them talk about the importance of how to approach that trigger or alternately have the trigger approach the dog. Heading toward another dog straight on is a much different situation than walking at a slight angle away from the other dog. Adjusting the angle of approach is a great way to break things into small, achievable steps for a dog or to prevent a dog from going over threshold....
Although birds are a relatively common pet around the world, compared to dog and cat lovers I think it’s fair to say that “crazy bird people” are few and far between. That’s why opportunities to meet up with parrot lovers and behavior geeks in person, like at the yearly IAABC Conference, are a vital point of connection for so many people in our industry....
As a puppy trainer, zookeeper, and zoo animal trainer working in an industry where we do a lot of presentations, the question I get asked the most is how can one keep up good presentation skills and get the message across whilst presenting with animals, in front of an audience....
A smart business owner will use education, training, and good practices to reduce the risk of accidents, but you also need to protect yourself and your business in case something unforeseen happens and someone does get hurt....
