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Commencing the March Life Skills class with more Dogs than usual was always going to be a challenge, especially as we had several Dogs that were likely to be noisy. Our class rule of Dogs not meeting each other (a meter between noses) worked, though the underlying message is 'be more interesting to your Dog than its distraction' is the more important component.
Then along came the first blow, no more access to the Social Hall and grounds surrounding it. So, we convened in adjacent Abberly Park and completed, surprisingly successfully Week Three. Then, as we all know, came mandatory lockdown. Week four was lost to the ether, though ZOOM was considered. Now with the loss of daylight saving the role of the warm social hall will be missed all the more. But! we are working on "what next?"
Living and working adjacent to the 'red zone' and the Avon River we can see our City Dogs are really enjoying the 'home and walk' time. We see every day how many people out walking are really appreciating the time with their companions.
(and long may that continue).
So when this is all over, as much as we can predict, there will be Dogs at risk of some degree of separation angst.
So, here is a tip: Do some 'life as it was' exercises with your Dog, by doing the stuff of normality. Put on your work clothes, about the same time, pick up your keys, go out and start the car, drive a 100m out of earshot, go for a walk for half an hour and then ritually complete the coming home... Remember to not fuss when you leave, ignore for 5min when you come home. Repeat.
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Pssst... it's Natalie's birthday on the 11th. There's a huge online ukulele festival on her birthday. Isn't she lucky :)
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Bestselling Material during Covid-19
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Aesop wrote his fables a very long time ago. In 1877 Black Beauty galloped onto the stage, and mid-twentieth century, John Steinbeck wrote about his poodle-accompanied road trip in Travels with Charlie. Stories about animals have always been around, but precious few transcend the fluffy-edged sphere of children’s literature. Not so anymore. Ten or twelve years ago booksellers noticed a trend: Books about dogs began to show consistently solid sales, almost regardless of subject. Training bible or glossy coffee table photography, it mattered little.
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Today, what was a trend has become a wave. Once the sole province of ardent fanciers, dog-themed books now poke their noses onto bestseller lists every few months, even penetrating the fiction list, as in the case of Garth Stein’s The Art of Racing in the Rain, Bruce Cameron’s A Dog’s Purpose and A Dog's Purpose (major TV movies) .
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But the biggest winners are non-fiction that ranges from memoir to true stories to cognitive science and cynology. Who hasn’t read, or heard of, John Grogan’s mega-hit Marley & Me, about his family’s adorable, dysfunctional Labrador? Temple Grandin’s Animals in Translation earned bestseller status, as did Jon Katz’ memoir (Dog Days) and Alexandra Horowitz’ Inside of a Dog.
Why this groundswell of enthusiasm for doggie literature? The obvious answer is that dogs and other companion animals are more popular than ever before in history (a 2013 study by the Animal Health Alliance estimates there are 4.2 million dogs in Australia and a little less in New Zealand), so the pool of interested readers has grown.
But surely the demand for dog-related books—along with demand for designer collars, raw food, dog walkers, poop scooping services, and more—also indicates the unique position dogs have come to occupy in the family. Long our hard-working ally, dogs have moved into our homes and hearts in a way previously reserved for human children. According to another study, more than half of dog owners consider their pet ‘an integral part of the family.’
The truth may boil down to this: Dogs, with all their lovable foibles, make for vastly more interesting reading than, say, goldfish or Guinea pigs.
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A bit of a chuckle (from Facebook)
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Watch Max sing his heart's content... I think that Natalie is having just as much fun !
Link here
Dogged science
Your Dog May Not Be a Genius, After All
"I'm a Mess About My Dogs and Coronavirus—How Will They Do? If a pandemic someday depletes humans, how will dogs fare without us?
Canine MRIs Sniff Out How Human Preferences Shaped Dogs. A new study explores the brain structure of various dog breeds and how it relates to their behaviour
Dogs May Understand Even More Than We Thought Brain scans show our faithful canine pals match words with intonation to process meaning
What Does Your Dog Really Want? Dogs whose brains were more active to praise tended to repeatedly go to their owners whereas food-loving dogs’ brains stuck with the chow. But most interesting were the dogs whose brains like both food and praise. These dogs tended to sample back and forth between food and owner in the maze.
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Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.
I shall smile when wreaths of snow
Blossom where the rose should grow;
I shall sing when night's decay
Ushers in a drearier day.
-- Emily Brontë
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