somerville dog: a weblog

Just in time for the Memorial Day Parade:

Expert Tips on Photographing Your Pets

Thanks to Bill (Suki's owner), who shared this on Facebook.

Posted by Michèle at 9:32 AM
Categories: Gear
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Rusty is a Cambridge dog; Strummer knows him from Norton's Woods at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (map).

Posted by Michèle at 11:57 AM
Categories: DogNet, Gear, Strummer
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The All Dog Rescue Online Store is now open for business!

All Dog Rescue is an all volunteer non-profit organization dedicated to the rescue of regional dogs in need and matching each with appropriate and responsible owners. One of the things that makes All Dog Rescue unique among rescue organizations is that they are committed to helping the region's Animal Control Officers who, for lack of funding, space, or other resources, must euthanize adoptable dogs. All Dog Rescue volunteers are willing to travel reasonable distances to evaluate dogs. The organization will accept adoptable dogs from any animal welfare organization or surrendering owner within the region, including states adjacent to Massachusetts.

The som|dog online store opened in March 2005.

Posted by Michèle at 12:15 PM
Categories: Gear, Somerville Rescues
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Last year between Thanksgiving and Christmas, pet-columnist, Gina Spadafori, blogged a new reason every day not to give a puppy as a gift.

Here on the somerville dog weblog, I gave holiday shoppers this little thought experiment: "Imagine a puppy with a bow around its neck on Christmas morning. Now, imagine it's President's Day: Where is the puppy? Where is the person who got the puppy as a gift? How about on the fourth of July? Where is the dog next Christmas?"

If you're thinking of giving someone a puppy as a present, please use your imagination and think of something else.

That being said, if you're thinking about bringing a member of the species canis familiaris into the family, December in Boston is a great time to start doing research. This year, the annual Bay Colony Cluster Dog Show—a series of shows presented by five Boston area AKC dog clubs: Eastern Dog Club, Ladies' Dog Club, Middlesex County Kennel Club, Concord Dog Training Club and the Yankee Golden Retriever Club—runs from Thursday, December 8, through, Sunday, December 11, at the Bayside Expo.

Check out the family-oriented dog demonstrations Saturday and Sunday from 11:30a-1:30p: Northeast Search and Rescue and the Department of Homeland Security Beagle Brigade will demonstrate their "dogs on the job" skills.

Local breed rescue organizations will celebrate dogs with a new "leash on life" in the "rescue parade."

Agility trials hosted by the Yankee Golden Retriever Club run all four days (until 2 p.m. only on Saturday and Sunday).

And if you're shopping for the dogs and dog lovers on your list, check out 100 concession booths displaying every type of "doggy bling-bling" imaginable: hand-knitted sweaters, specialty t-shirts and hats, grooming supplies, exercise equipment, digital photography, gourmet treats, handmade toys, safety products, bedding, custom clay pottery, fine jewelry and dog antiques.

Download the Press Release (.doc file).

Posted by Michèle at 8:44 AM
Categories: Canine Good Citizenship, Events, Gear, Massachusetts
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Happy Equinox!

Can we take it as a sign of Spring that Fi-Dough is down to their final pair of dog boots?

Note to the editor: dogs are quadrupeds and, ordinarily, dog boots are sold in sets that include one boot for each foot. -Canis Major

Strummer has been ready for Spring since February. I am convinced that she was suffering from seasonal affective disorder. She was never thrilled about having to wear her Muttluks, despite their beautiful Bruins colors, but being the little stoic that she is, she grinned and beared it.

Until one day she'd had enough of wearing her boots. And who can blame her? Haven't we all had enough of our boots this winter? She was meeting a new dog at Norton's Woods one evening and and she curled her lips—the little grumple-puss—which is very rare for her. I took off her boots, and she cheered up a bit.

So the next snow-fall, we walked to Fi-Dough (the Somerville store, on Beacon Street) and I got some Musher's Secret™.

Musher's Secret also protects dog's pads against ice balls and salt-burn. It is non-toxic and "will not stain carpeting" (though there are a few suspicious paw-prints on the carpet in front of the door to my office).

Strummer doesn't try to lick the Musher's Secret off her paws, and she's her usual bouncy self when she's wearing it, though the boots are a lot better at controling the ice balls that form around her ankles.

Posted by Michèle at 11:03 AM
Categories: Gear, Strummer
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Winter presents its own seasonal dangers to dogs: In the snow, ice can form between a dog's pads, and, if surfaces have been treated, salt and chemicals can cause a dog's pads to crack and bleed. Also, salt and chemicals can be ingested when a dog licks his paws.

Some dogs seem not to be bothered by ice and salt. Some dogs seem not to be bothered by salt and chemicals: they'll trot along with you through the slush for miles, only for you to find cracked and bloody paws when you get home.

Remember the first snowfall of the season on November 13? The som|dog Conway Park Clean-up had to be postponed.

Strummer and I took the Canine Good Citizen Test that morning (see Citizen Strummer). Strummer had been out playing in the snow, and when we got to Canine University for the test, she still had little balls of ice in the fur around her ankles, and she would not sit because she was uncomfortable. Fortunately, by the time we took the test, the ice had melted and the floor had warmed up a little.

Strummer's Muttluks arrived in the mail later that week. Strummer hides in her crate when she sees me coming with her boots. Then, when I put them on, she acts like none of her paws work and tries to hold all four off the ground at the same time. As you can see from this picture, though, she's stoic. (You can also see that she needs to be brushed!) She can't use her nails for extra purchase when she's wearing the boots, but, despite the handicap, she seems to do okay playing chase and play-wrestling with other dogs.

Via Boston Pooch*. See "Dog Boot Recommendations" and "Pooch paw protection," which discusses the boot alternative, Musher's Secret.

*UPDATE 22 February 2006: The BostonPooch site is, alas, defunct.

Posted by Michèle at 2:37 PM
Categories: Gear
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Somerville has several options for the discerning dog owner in the market for rooty-toot-toots and rummy-tum-tums:

• Big Fish Little Fish
  55 Elm Street
• The Dog House
  169 Washington Street
• Fi-dough: Pet Bakery, Boutique and Grooming Salon
  70E Beacon Street
• Pet Spa
  669 Somerville Avenue
• Stinky's Kittens & Doggies Too
  110 Bristol Road

A fun holiday treat for dog lovers (and a great source for gift ideas) is the annual Bay Colony Dog Show, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday, December 2 through Sunday, December 5, at the Bayside Exposition Center (Local News).

Every day offers a unique mix of competitions, demonstrations, and special events, and each day is presented by a different prestigious AKC dog club resulting in one "Best in Show" trophy each day.

The weekend offers family-oriented dog demonstrations by the Boston Police K-9 Unit, Northeast Search and Rescue as well as the annual "rescue parade" spotlighting pooches who found a new leash on life through breed rescue clubs. (Press Release)

Posted by Michèle at 9:16 AM
Categories: Events, Gear, Massachusetts
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Fortunately, I don't have my own cautionary tale about the risk to dogs riding unrestrained in cars, but my friend, Dave Trowbridge, does. Dave's story has a happy ending: his German Shepherd Dog, Oka, was properly restrained in a VariKennel and survived the accident unscathed.

But Dave's admonition is one that responsible dog owners should take seriously:

If you have a serious accident with your dog unrestrained in your car, your dog will die. If you have any sort of accident with your dog tethered in the back of your pickup truck, your dog will die. (And if you carry a dog in your pickup truck without restraint, you should be publicly flogged.)

Worse, it's all too likely your dog will suffer horribly for quite some time before it dies: you may not leave the scene of an accident, even if you can, and there are no provisions for severely-wounded animals, save the doubtful mercy of a peace-officer's gun. Very few people know how to quickly and painlessly kill an animal with a firearm (draw a line from each ear to the opposite eye, and fire into the point of intersection), and it generally can't be done with a frightened, thrashing dog, anyway. How will you feel, when it's all over, knowing that a $100 crate could have prevented a horrible, prolonged death for your beloved pet?

In my compact four-door sedan, however there just isn't enough room for a crate that can accommodate a standard poodle. I asked a member of the Poodle Club of Massachusetts how to travel safely by car with my dog, and she said: the best vehicle restraint harness for dogs is Ruff Rider. With a tensile strength of 9300 lbs., it surpasses SAE standards for human seat belts, and its design is orthopedically sound, ergonomically correct, and warranteed for the life of your animal.

Restraining a dog in a vehicle insures the safety not only of the dog but of the human occupants of the vehicle as well. The owner of Ruff Rider, Carl Goldberg, says "If you brake hard at 30 mph, a 60-pound dog will fly forward with a force of 1,200 pounds per square inch." That's a dangerous projectile--at only 30 mph: even on short, local drives, say to Sheepfold in the Middlesex Fells or to Canine University in Malden, I exceed 30 mph.

In my car (as in all things), I try to do right by my dog. Strummer travels in the Roadie LX, and she loves to go for rides!

Posted by Michèle at 9:35 AM
Categories: Canine Good Citizenship, DogNet, Gear, Strummer, Your Dog's Health
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Before I adopted my dog, I wondered how I would react if my dog were ever in a dog fight. I've had my dog for just over a month, and now I know (read the harrowing story): I pulled my dog by the leash; I screamed for help; I screamed at the offending dog; I kicked the offending dog; I got as much of my body around my dog's body as I could. I can only honestly recommend screaming, which served to get someone else to get the offending dog off my dog. Twenty-four hours later, I torment myself by thinking: If I had been able to prevent the other dog from attacking my dog, I would not have had to react to the dog fight. If I had heard the other dog running up behind us and seen it making a beeline for my dog, I could have debilitated it with a swift kick before it jumped on my dog.

On second thought, getting in front of a charging aggressive dog is probably not a good plan. It proved to be possible to incapacitate the particular dog that attacked my dog with a kick, but it wasn't, in fact, my kick that ended the fight, it was the well-placed kick of a neighborhood businessman. As much as I wish I could prevent my dog from ever being attacked, I know that I may very well have to react again to an aggressive dog attacking my dog.

While waiting for the opportunity to adopt a dog, I read a few dog books. A couple of the books that I read touched on the subject of aggression. But these books were all about adopting and training a dog. The aggression with which they were concerned, whether human-oriented or canine-oriented, occured in the context of responsible humans. Bruce Fogle identifies eight types of aggression and suggests methods for both treating and preventing each of them in The Dog's Mind (New York: Macmillan [Howell Book House], 1990). Reviewing his categories--Dominance Aggression, Possessive Aggression, Fear Aggression, Protective Aggression, Inter-Male Aggression, Predatory Aggression, Ideopathic Aggression, and Learned Aggression--I find that none of his suggestions for treatment or prevention could have prepared me for my dog's being attacked from behind by an unleashed dog on a city sidewalk.

Like Fogel, Jean Donaldson is interested in what makes dogs dogs, but the goal of her Culture Clash (Berkeley: James and Shattuck, 1996), is to help human owners understand their canine companions. Her chapter on "Socialization, Conflict Resolution, Fear & Aggression" addresses important issues including the responsibility of dog owners to socialize their dogs, ways to promote a "soft bite," and ways to reduce resource guarding behavior. Again, no help for me when my dog was attacked by an unleashed dog whose owner failed to take responsibility for its behavior.

In Successful Dog Adoption (Indiana: Wiley [Howell Book House], 2003), one of the first books I read as a prospective adopter, Sue Sternberg devotes a chapter to "Adding Another Dog." Her advice for stopping and preventing dog fights is directed to families who introduce another dog to the family dog(s). She focuses, not surprisingly on the ways that humans inadvertently fuel dog fights by interrupting and interfering with the outcome of early stages of the contest: in a family conflicts either run their course, or someone leaves (or is kicked out) of the family.

Under "How to Break Up a Dog Fight, Sternberg discounts the common recommendation of spraying the dogs with water from a hose. As Sternberg predicts, my dog was attacked no where near a hose. She also makes the important point that "the most common way for a human to get bitten by a dog is while breaking up a dog fight" (220). If you have to separate two fighting dogs, she recommends shoving a solid object between the dogs faces or "throwing a blanket over one dog and trying to work it down between them" (221). Needless to say, I didn't have access to a solid object or blanket on the streets of Somerville, which are suddenly looking a lot meaner.

Sternberg also advocates the use of citronella oil for breaking up a dogfight:

The best tool for breaking up a dog fight is a spray can of citronella oil. The product is called Direct Stop, and is sold in portable and convenient small canisters that shoot a long, direct stream of harmless but intrusive citronella oil (221).

Posted by Michèle at 11:32 PM
Categories: Gear
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