blogger, podcaster and photographer; photography, family, hiking, travel, flying, dogs and life

005 | Ruff Around the Edges with Trillian Ross & Fenrir

Trillian shares her and Fenrir’s story, both the training techniques she tried as well as all the management involved. Fenrir is a stunning Czechoslovakian Vlcak (or Wolfdog) who’s no small boy, measuring 29 inches at the withers (if you’ve listened to the podcast you’ll know why that tidbit of information is in here).

He suffers from pretty bad anxiety of which Trillian gives some examples. The management involved in giving him his best life is quite extensive. From providing Fenrir with 40 minute chews to buy the humans an hour outside the house (but then waiting in front of the door during the buildup phase to hear what’s going on), to having one person stay upstairs while the other was downstairs because having two people in the same room was stressing Fenrir out too much.

Every day is tongue out Tuesday for Fenrir

We talk anxiety in combination with crate training, BAT training and howling (yes howling and not barking), and how medication seems to be helping Fenrir to find a little more calm, but also brings about an unexpected “disadvantage”.

Also, I learn what combisport is (and that it’s probably not for me).

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Fenrir singing a tune!

Links:

Fenrir is on Instagram and you can follow him there: @fenrir_and_friends

The Czechoslovakian Vlcak Club of America

BAT training: https://grishastewart.com/bat-overview/

The book on BAT training at Amazon.de: Behavior Adjustment Training 2.0: New Practical Techniques for Fear, Frustration, and Aggression in Dogs (affiliate link, if you use it you’ll help support the podcast 😉)

Karen Overall’s book on behavior modification: Manual of Clinical Behavioral Medicine for Dogs and Cats (affiliate link)

Julie Naismith Sub Threshold Training

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004 | Ruff Around the Edges with Vanessa O’Sullivan & Darwin

Vanessa & her and her boyfriend’s gorgeous Black Mouth Cur Darwin

After several years an MRI finally reveals brain abnormalities in Black Mouth Cur Darwin’s brain. Rather than give up and accept the status quo, Vanessa keeps trying out new training ideas and management strategies to improve quality of life for everyone in the multi-dog (and cat!) household.

The gang, left to right: Sputnik, Darwin and Sonic

Strap in for another long episode people. Follow along as Vanessa recounts how a perfectly behaved puppy changed to an anxious adult dog after puberty.

We discuss how assumptions can lead to blind spots. For the longest time, Vanessa and Ryan had assumed that the move from the US to The Netherlands and the plane ride over had been the triggering event for the decline in Darwin’s behavior.

Going through old photographs looking for clues in Darwin’s body posture, they realized that assumption was false as the signs had been there earlier. Vanessa tells us what it took for her to gain confidence in her own knowledge of dog behavior.

A short improvement in behavior after quitting Darwin’s anxiety medication gave them hope briefly, as did the possibility of maybe being able to participate in an RTMS trial at the Belgian University of Ghent, but none of it was meant to be.

Darwin’s anxiety is such that having to make simple decisions such as “Should I get on the couch?” are stress inducing for him.

Darwin all comfy in his Baskerville muzzle

Muzzle training turned out to be a blessing in disguise. As a bonus side effect to the muzzle training, it became a tool to help Darwin relax.

You can find Vanessa on Instagram: @overseas.with.pets

As soon as her dog training business website officially launches, you will be able to find it here too.

A link to the scientific article that got Vanessa to contact the university of Ghent is here:

TMS improves anxious aggressive behaviour in dogs: A case study

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003 | Ruff Around the Edges with Leana Mayzlina & Atlas

Sooooo…. this episode is a long one, but in my humble opinion it is worth a listen. Though we talk about Atlas’ story, for the bigger part of the episode the talk is about acceptance and personal growth.

Leana fell in love with the gorgeous black pup with the recently operated on, crushed, leg being fostered by her brother. That leg caused him to be on house rest for half (!) of the first two years of his life. During that time he slowly transformed from a mr. Wigglebutts to a fearful dog- and human reactive pup.

Three surgeries on Atlas’ leg allowed him to keep the leg, but forced him to be on house rest for half of his first two years of life.

Working with an arsenal of trainers, trying out a bunch of different types of anxiety medication, and finally at least a year and a half worth of work with a vet behaviorist brought no relief. And so a different type of journey started, one of acceptance and of “it is what it is”, and that is what this episode is really about.

We talk about the public perception that all dogs “should” somehow be lovely, cuddly, non-barking, non-biting living cuddly toys; about embracing the “and” and not the “or” in all aspects of life including life with our dogs, which can be amazing and hard at the same time.

Then there is what the feeling of being judged does to us. Also, you will hear a bit of my own story with Rusty as we ponder the question what life would have been like for our dogs had they grown up with someone else.

Finally, we sing the praises of another podcast: Paws and Reward

You can find Leana on Instagram: @Leanita

The Instagram handle of her brother, who regularly fosters rescue dogs in the Seattle area is: @dmitriysdogs

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002 | Ruff Around the Edges with Elissa Chasen & Bodhi

Meet Bodhi, who is aptly named as his name means “enlightenment”.

On this episode I talk to Elissa Chasen about life with her leash reactive dog Bodhi.

We talk about the concept of “socialisation” and how we’re still not clear on it but that we’ve found out the hard way that it does not mean “meet every dog”. We discuss the differences we see in our dogs when we move them out of the trigger-rich city environment.

Elissa mentions how she regrets not having filmed Bodhi’s reactions at first so she would have been able to better see his improvements. In that light, we consider how we are our own worst critics and how we are each trying to embrace the “We did the best we could at the time”-adage. Finally Elissa tells us how her life has changed since getting Bodhi.

Elissa and Bodhi braved the ridiculously low Wisconsin temperatures for a brief moment to snap this image of the two of them…

…though the weather lent itself more to doing this 😉

The rescue Bodhi came from is called Paddy’s Paws: https://paddyspaws.blogspot.com/

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001 | Ruff Around The Edges with Kate Oates & Vader

In the first episode of Ruff Around The Edges I talk to Kate Oates about her Australian Shepherd Vader.

It seems only right she be the first to be featured on the show as she inspired the name.

We talk about all the small things that in combination led to his reactivity, and about the the stress she felt when she got a warning from the municipality threatening her with a $2000 fine if Vader wouldn’t stop barking.

We discuss how we each deal with “my dog is friendly” people and what feelings these people invoke, how she got around to telling people “my dog bites” in order to keep them at bay, and what finally led her to not only try force free training but to become a force free trainer herself.

You can find Kate at:

http://coolcanines.com.au/

https://www.facebook.com/CoolCanines

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Ella BirtApril 5, 2021 - 07:08
This episode was so comforting. My husband and I have such anxiety walking our dogs. We go out of our way to make sure we only walk in spots where we won’t encounter other dogs or people – mostly because of those people who insist “my dog is friendly,” and then continue to tell us that we need to let our dog say hi to others, etc and so on with the “friendly” advice while ignoring our words, our boundaries, and our own knowledge of our dog. I’ve been scared to say “my dog might bite” because of the judgment from others. I think I will try next time! We haven’t had anyone over in years, and our entire lives revolve around keeping our doggies safe and unstressed (and us too). ReplyCancel