“Six-Week-Old Girl Dies After Mauled By Family Dog,” the headlines blared. The LA County Sheriff’s Department reported the familiar scenario. A family member had left the baby unattended on a bed for a few minutes and returned to find her head encased in the dog’s mouth. Sounds shocking, but this isn’t the first time an infant has fallen prey to the family pet. According to the Center for Disease Control (1997), of the 279 dog bite-related fatalities in the US that occurred between 1979 and 1994, most involved children younger than ten years of age, with infants making up a

Last week when lecturing at a seminar with Sarah Kalnajs, I watched an interesting video that Sarah showed. When her friend who had a history of cluster headaches was visiting her, Sarah’s dogs performed an unusual behavior. Typically they would hang back instead of interacting with the visitor but in this case they climbed onto his lap and kept licking his face, especially in the area of his right eye. At the time her friend did not have a headache but 10 minutes later he felt one coming on. As it was starting to occur, he warned that the dogs might

What’s up with the dog that eyes people who approach his food bowl or stiffens and even growls, snaps or bites if others interrupt his meal? Don’t they understand that you’re the provider of the things they want and not a threat to them? Like many dogs that are otherwise easygoing, this type of Fido has a food fetish, and he feels it’s his duty to guard each bowl as if it holds his last meal. While this behavior may seem odd for owners who provide plentiful amounts of food for their pooches, anyone who’s watched free-roaming and stray dogs

On October 3, 2009, Diamond Pet Foods announced that they had voluntarily withdrawn from distribution two brands of cat food Premium Edge Finicky Adult Cat and Premium Edge Hairball cat. The recalled bags are those with the following date codes. RAF0501A22X 18lb    RAF0501A2X 6 lb.,   RAH0501A22X 18 lb.    RAH0501A2X 6lb.    SO far, based on calls from pet owners and veterinarians, the problem appears to be centered in the Rochester, NY, area. The company has contacted all retailers and outlets to which these lots were shipped and asked them to pull the product from the store shelves. The retailers

Day 4 of my trip to Indonesia (Sept 2009) Dolphin Encounter Today we went dolphin watching at Lovina beach in Bali; I give the trip mixed reviews. First, we had to ride out further than expected to get to deeper waters in hopes of seeing dolphins. This was actually okay because we enjoyed the ride and the scenery. But instead of seeing the horizon or having a postcard view of the coast we saw a brown haze. It was smog! From the cars, maybe from Java, and definitely from the boats, which are traditionally outriggers with ancient motors. Throughout the

Day 4 of my Indonesia Trip (Sept 2009) One fact that’s wonderful about dogs is that whether they’re a pampered pet from America, a trained competition dog in Germany, or a street dog in Bali, the language is the same. So no matter where I go, I know I’ll be able to communicate with them. On the morning of our first full day in Bali, while my friend Asri and her family and I are waiting at Lovina beach for our dolphin-watching boat to get fixed, a little village dog follows a visitor to the beach looking for food. The