As a lifelong animal lover, I am happy to be able now to focus primarily on caring for pets. As a coal mine crew bus driver in the east Kootenays, I saw a disturbingly high incidence of fatal wildlife-vehicle collisions (WVCs). So, I undertook a self-directed observational study as well as liaised with numerous stakeholders in industry, government, non-profit, and ecological research to raise awar
eness about the high danger and death toll. I stay involved as much as I can from this new geographical area and was recently asked for input by a group starting to address the high incidence of WVCs in A2A (Algonquin park to the Adirondacks mountains in New York state). I was happy to share information with them. Upon moving to Prince Rupert in 2021, while driving city transit bus, I was struck by the high number of feral cats wandering the area and engaging in high-risk behaviours. So, I started volunteering for Pawz United Rescue Society (PURS) in many capacities as well as co-caring for a colony of feral cats near my home. A severe degenerative disc condition in my lumbar spine made it excruciating to drive bus, therefore, I was faced with reinventing my life and career once again. With a degree in human psychology, education and experience in Reiki and Acupressure, I have found it easy to transfer skills from work with people to work with animals. They respond so well to kindness and there is never any reason to treat them with anything other than caring. My self-study includes online courses by Dr. Ian Dunbar, Crucial Concepts in Dog Behaviour and Training; dog calming signals by Turid Rugaas, a humble Norwegian dog trainer who has amazing views on how to relate to dogs; a wealth of informative articles by the Calgary Humane Society about dog behaviours, and much more. Now, I embark on my education about cats, after fostering two lovely kitties for eight months before deciding with my partner to adopt them! I cannot explain the amount of love I feel for animals, and I'm sure there are many others who feel the same. Many of them are pet owners and it is exciting for me to be in this position of being able to help care for pets and ease the burden on their people.
