GM News - March 2021

March is Pet Poison Prevention
Awareness Month

The most common ways dogs are poisoned:
1. Human Medications
2. Baits & Poisons
3. Human Foods
4. Toxic Plants
5. Fertilisers
6. Household Items e.g. Ooshies
7. Alcohol & Cigarettes
Please check out the Australian Dog Lover article outlining the range of issues and considerations critical to keeping your dog out of harm's way.

Stay Safe,
Amanda, David, Rodna & Ruth

Top Tip

Fear Free Happy Homes has videos and articles designed for humans with pets. You need to register to receive free access but it is worth doing so. For example, there is a terrific video on Nail Trims. Clipping nails is a task that some dogs and humans view with some trepidation (I feel it too! :-) At just under four minutes the Fear Free Nail Trim video has great simple tips and easy to follow strategies for preparing and then trimming nails using a variety of tools.

Free Program!

Dr Ian Dunbar, his wife Kelly and son Jamie form the Dunbar Academy and bring years of expertise in dog training to the public through specific paid courses and a membership program. They also offer free programs too, the newest being Six Simple Steps to Solve your Dog's Behaviour Problems. Great video-based content and downloadable materials are available with the short program. Brush up your skills and spark new ideas on strategies.

Dog Tricks - Guiness Book of World Records

Emily Larlham is a great US dog trainer with an excellent YouTube Channel: kikopup
Emily and her Border Collies, Wish and Halo, have achieved a Guinness World Record by performing the most tricks by two dogs in one minute: 28 tricks! Wish also broke the record for the fastest 5-meter crawl by a dog, achieving the feat in 2.175 seconds. Check out the video of the tricks being performed.

Inspired!? Let us know if you would like to participate in a Tricks Workshop in April (amanda@jenkins.net)

Boredom Busted

Australian Dog Lover has released their 2021 list of Boredom Buster Toys. Some of the items listed have discount codes. Remember LickiMat have given us a 20% discount code for your use until the end of July. The code is GENTLEMODERNSCHOOL.

What the . . . !

Russian scientists found an 18,000 year old canine puppy carcass buried in Siberian permafrost in 2019. The photos are incredible - you would swear the pup was just taking a snooze in the Lab! It's under debate whether the pup was a dog or a wolf.
The find popped up again in the media when the Centre for Palaeogenetics (joint venture between Stockholm University and the Swedish Museum of Natural History) tweeted on 23 Feb:
Twitter, we need your help!
Where should we focus our efforts next?
1) Sequence more DNA to find out if this 18,000 year old puppy is a wolf or dog?
2) Or try to break the record for “oldest DNA”? [Mammoth related]
What would we do without Twitter!?!?!

Present or Not?

Due to COVID-19 precautions, most Vets have not permitted a pet's humans to be in the examination room with them. You may be considering maintaining that practice even when you can go into the exam room with your dog.
Linda P. Case of The Science Dog has reviewed research studies conducted in 2017 and 2020. Both studies came to the same broad conclusion: being with your dog during Vet exams and procedures (when possible) reduces stress in dogs.

In case you were wondering . . .

We have adopted Pluto. Here he is wearing his bed. (And, yes, that is chipboard clamped to the bookshelf behind Pluto - setting up an environment where it's difficult (but not impossible!!) for Pluto to make choices that his humans don't favour :-)