Sound Therapy and Other Stress Busters for Anxious Pets

Do you have a dog that is fearful of thunderstorms? Fourth of July fireworks? Or a dog with separation anxiety? It has now been shown that calm music, such as classical music can have a calming effect on dogs.

I had a first hand experience yesterday with our foster dog, Lucky. He was exhibiting some separation anxiety behaviors when left alone in his crate when I left the house. Yesterday before I left, I set him up with Pandora playing through my computer, and a peanut butter kong. He rested his head on his paws as the music played (it was actually easy listening country), and lifted his head quickly when the music stopped. I was able to leave Lucky alone for nearly 3 hours in his crate, and he was calm when I returned home, the music still playing! Not only was I proud of him, but I sensed he was happy and proud of himself!

You can learn more about sound therapy in the book Through a Dog's Ear, and read how more animals are being adopted in shelters as a result of this wonderful discovery here: http://throughadogsear.com/

The following video segment with Dr. Marty Becker from Good Morning America discusses the powerful calming effect of music on dogs, as well as other products such as anxiety wraps and fermone sprays.

Lucky and Maddie

To learn more about Lucky or to adopt him visit Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue and fill out an application. He is 6 1/2 years old, house-trained, responds to many commands, and is affectionate and sweet. He will lie at your feet, cuddle and be thrilled to finally have his forever home where he is loved and wanted for life.

Posted By Dawn Kairns, Author of MAGGIE: the dog who changed my life

Don't Leave Me! (Steps to Deal With Separation Anxiety in Dogs)

Posted By Dawn Kairns, Author of MAGGIE: the dog who changed my life

Have you ever had a dog with separation anxiety? It can be one of the most challenging behavioral problems to deal with in your dog. After Maggie died, we were far from ready for another dog, so we got involved with the Humane Society of Boulder Valley and Front Range Labrador Rescue (today we have Safe Harbor Lab Rescue and Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue) and we fostered dogs. We fostered a handsome white lab named Bob. But oh my, we did not know what we were in for! I'd never even heard of separation anxiety in dogs before. But Bob took my husband and I on such a journey that I wrote about our adventures with Bob and some handy tips for dealing with separation anxiety in your dog in an article published in Real Travel Adventures online magazine. Here's the link if you'd like to read it:

Don't Leave Me! (in Real Travel Adventures online magazine)

Good luck!

EBay Now Allows Puppy Mills to Sell Dogs in its Classified Section.

Tell eBay to shut down its sales of cruelly treated puppies and all live animals.

I received this information today from Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue, sent to them by change.org...  Please read and pass this on after signing the petition to let eBay know you want them to stop the sale of live animals in their classified sections.
 
"Puppy mills" are large-scale commercial operations where dozens of dogs are kept in small cages for their entire lives, forced to give birth to litter after litter until they're no longer fertile, at which point they're usually killed. Puppy mills are unsafe, inhumane, and produce thousands of puppies with serious health problems every year.

Now, puppy mills have found a national vendor: eBay.

A few years ago, eBay had plans to sell animals via online auction. Responsible breeders would never sell dogs via online auction, so this would have resulted in the site becoming a haven for puppy mills. eBay users and anti-cruelty activists spearheaded -- and won -- the fight to prevent eBay from selling live animals.

But now all that's changed.

Despite eBay's claims that it "do[es] not condone unethical treatment of animals," eBay now allows puppy mills to sell dogs in its classified section.

This practice enables flagrant cruelty to dogs, and it has to stop. Tell eBay to shut down its sales of cruelly treated puppies and all live animals.

Puppy mill dogs spend their entire lives in small wire cages, without companionship, and often without vet care, exercise or shelter from the elements. As far as puppy mill owners are concerned, the dogs have one purpose: to supply the pet trade.

The USDA recently admitted that they’ve failed to effectively monitor commercial breeders and puppy mills. When it comes to sites like eBay Classifieds, it’s even worse: Breeders who sell directly to customers online aren’t subject to any USDA regulations.

The best chance we have to shut down puppy mills is to hold vendors accountable.

Click here to tell eBay to shut down all live animal sales immediately:

http://www.change.org/petitions/ebay-classifieds-stop-selling-live-animals?alert_id=JhDDcGIQNR_WxllxQesNV&me=aa

Posted By:

Dawn Kairns 

Author of MAGGIE the dog who changed my life A Story of Love

Website: www.dawnkairns.com

Blog:      Dawn Kairns and Maggie the Dog 
Twitter:  www.twitter.com/themaggiebook

The Texas/Mexico Border Rescue Dog: Remember Marky?

Marky and me in Brownsville PetSmart

It's been almost a year now. I know many of you remember my stories/posts about Marky, the dog Tom and I rescued near the Mexican border while we were in South Texas. I hadn't planned on writing another update until he was adopted. I never dreamed Marky would still be in his foster home a year later, so I think an update is in order. 

I am now a volunteer for the Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue (RMLR). Awhile back I asked one of our board members if we could find a way to transport Marky from Brownsville, TX to Colorado. The adoption rate for animals between the two areas of the country are like night and day. RMLR agreed, even though the logistics may not be easy, and I was thrilled! I thought the Brownsville SPCA would be, too. Tom and I would have fostered Marky as a RMLR dog until he found a home. RMLR dogs are typically adopted out after being in foster 2-4 weeks. Compare that to a year!

So what happened and why isn't Marky sitting next to me as I write this? The Brownsville SPCA wouldn't agree to send him unless he went straight into a forever home here rather than a foster home. BSPCA didn't want to take Marky out of his stable situation to go into another foster home, and then have to move to yet another home. I do understand and appreciate their thinking and concerns for Marky on this. But I'm also sad to think of him staying perhaps yet another year in foster in Brownsville, TX when finding a forever home in CO may have already even happened if he was here ...

Marky and me, PetSmart Adoption Event

The good news is EVERYONE at BSPCA is in love with him. Marky is a "couch potato" they say -- very affectionate. He loves other dogs, cats, people, and is just a very sweet boy, they tell me. Well, didn't I know that the first time I looked into his hopeful brown eyes on the road, with a coyote headed his direction? As his flea-ridden , smelly, skinny body rode on my lap in the truck, I knew this one was a sweet, special dog -- a real keeper -- for someone. Could you be Marky's forever person??

Posted By:
Dawn Kairns 
Author of MAGGIE the dog who changed my life A Story of Love

Website: www.dawnkairns.com

Blog:      Dawn Kairns and Maggie the Dog 
Twitter:  www.twitter.com/themaggiebook

"They stay in our lives for a while, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never, ever the same." -- Author Unknown

 
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Saving Gracie: the Animal Rescue Railroad in Action

Marco--RMLR Featured Dog

I recently became a volunteer with Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue, a small group of volunteers who locate Labrador retrievers and Lab mixes who are about to be euthanized, often with the help of out-of-state shelter volunteers who alert them to dogs whose time is running out. On Wednesday evening, my husband and I had the great fortune to participate in saving Gracie, a lab mix who found her way to Colorado via the efforts of The Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue (RMLR) and  Colorado Animal Rescue Express (C.A.R.E.). C.A.R.E. is one group RMLR works with to transport their dogs from "high-kill" states. Gracie came from Missouri and was picked up in Hayes, Kansas by the Colorado Animal Rescue Express  van, along with about 20 other rescued dogs. C.A.R.E. makes these runs twice a week to rescue dogs and cats from high-kill shelters in Colorado and neighboring states. They work with over 110 rescue organizations like Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue.

When we arrived in the parking lot meeting place and found the C.A.R.E. van, our very frustrating bumper-to-bumper, stop-and-go rush "hour" drive to get there was immediately forgotten by both of us. Staring back at us from the open van were sets of uncertain, wondering dog and puppy eyes, represented by numerous breeds and mixes, still in kennels awaiting pick up from their rescue group. 

"What is going to happen to me now?" I could almost read in their precious faces. Other dogs had already been gathered from their crates and were being walked or led by a rescuer to their cars, on their way to foster homes. A woman by the van with a very kind, open face asked who we were. It was Linda, the person who started C.A.R.E. I could feel the love and sense of fulfillment radiating from her. I imagined she could feel the joy of having just given 20 dogs a second chance at life! If not for her efforts, they would all be dead soon. I'll never forget that scene. So inspirational! We introduced ourselves & told her we were with RMLR, looking for Gracie. She directed us to our RMLR transport coordinator, Jessica, just across from the CARE van.

I squatted down to a very frightened Gracie, looking warily about and pulling on her leash. I took off my glove and slowly held out the back of my hand. She sniffed my hand, then immediately gave my chin several licks.

"Wow," said Jessica. "That's the most we've seen from her all night! She is so scared." Jessica had already chipped Gracie, and we did a hurried exchange, with Tom placing Gracie in the kennel in back of my car. She tried to get away at first, her body frozen in fear as he picked her up. 

After warning me that Gracie was a "flight risk," off we drove to take her to her new foster home. Gracie whined periodically, and I talked to her, explaining to her that this drive was much shorter than the one she just endured, and that she would be well cared for in her new foster home. Every time I spoke to her, she stopped whining. Soon, Tom joined me. The time between her whining lessened. I explained to her about "forever homes," and assured her she was safe. The whining ceased completely.

When we arrived at the foster home, Karen's (foster mom) husband came out so he and Tom could carry Gracie's kennel into the house. Thump, thump, went her tail. A good sign. She was smiling a little now, and the fear was gone. We were met inside the front door by Karen, her anxiously anticipating 2 children, and their Golden Retriever.The men placed the kennel on the floor and opened the door. Off Gracie galloped, wasting not a moment as she leaped up and began playing with the Golden; she then ran to explore the house. That was my next moment of inspiration and reward for the evening, seeing the joy and the opening up of a little dog who less than an hour ago was terrified.

But inspiration didn't stop there. I considered the beauty of what was happening here; how wonderful it was for a family to engage in such a life-affirming activity together with their children. To invite an unknown dog into their family and space, if only for a little while; to be Gracie's springboard into her new life. What a beautiful value to teach and share with children, that of giving life and love to an abandoned animal! The energy all around us was high and joyful.

Please visit the Rocky Mountain Lab Rescue website to learn more about their mission, to volunteer, or to see their adoptable dogs. RMLR  has no shelter and relies ONLY on foster homes.

Please visit the Colorado Animal Rescue Express website to learn more about their wonderful mission. Since C.A.R.E.'s inception on 6/27/2007, 415 transports, 7,363 dogs and 483 cats have been saved through their transport.

So, who really rescues who? Ah, indeed anyone involved in rescuing animals knows that the act indeed does boomerang ... and the gift is to the giver. 

Posted By:
Dawn Kairns 
Author of MAGGIE the dog who changed my life A Story of Love

Website: www.dawnkairns.com

Blog:      Dawn Kairns and Maggie the Dog 
Twitter:  www.twitter.com/themaggiebook

"They stay in our lives for a while, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never, ever the same." -- Author Unknown

 
Become a fan on Facebook of MAGGIE: the dog who changed my life