Family Dog Care

03/04/2025

03/04/2025

In the last couple of years, the nation’s shelters and rescues have seen a decline in the number of dog adoptions. Our Washtenaw County community is no different. 2024 was a 10-year low in dog adoptions at the Humane Society of Huron Valley. President Tanya Hilgendorf joined WEMU's David Fair to d...

03/04/2025

I STILL NEEDED MY MOM

THE CONSEQUENCES OF TAKING PUPS TOO YOUNG

The early life experiences of a puppy are so important and have a significant influence on how that pup develops - emotionally, mentally, socially and physically.

There are still many so-called “breeders” that allow pups to be taken away at 6 weeks.

Uninformed people just accept this without question and are often unprepared for the consequences.

Just because a puppy may no longer physically depend on mom for food doesn’t mean they are ready to cope emotionally, without the security of their family unit, in a strange new home.

A 6-week-old puppy is still very reliant on mom and their littermates to learn appropriate play behaviour, impulse control, frustration tolerance, bite inhibition, self-confidence and develop the social skills that will help them grow into well-adjusted adults.

Although 8 weeks is the bare minimum that a reputable breeder will allow their pups to leave, some will keep their puppies until 10 or 12 weeks of age, but also make sure that proper, age-appropriate socialisation and habituation is provided.

Habituation is getting a puppy used to different things in an environment in a positive way, at the right developmental time. This could look like introducing different objects, noises, sounds, smells, different textures, places etc, so the puppy learns that these things are not something to be afraid of.

However, we don’t live an in ideal world and having to care for or rescue pups much younger than 8 weeks is often unavoidable due to different circumstances.

In these cases, we need to do what we can and hope for the best.

This post is not about this kind of situation, it’s about spreading knowledge, creating awareness, understanding and encouraging people not to support unethical, irresponsible breeders that allow their pups to leave too early, with no regard for their wellbeing or development.

03/04/2025

“My dog is so great with the kids – he lets them climb on him, sit on him, pull his ears and tail, stick their fingers in his face, and he tolerates it all. He’d never do anything to a child.”

This is fairly common boast that we hear from parents who are fortunate to have child-friendly dogs. However, these statements are concerning for a number of reasons:

• Even though nothing has happened yet, even the most gentle dogs can lose patience with this type of treatment over time and may one day growl, snap and/or bite to defend themselves. This is increasingly true as dogs age, and may be dealing with underlying aches and pain.

• Rough treatment from a child could easily injure, even if they’re a large-breed dog.

• Pets provide a great opportunity to teach children compassion and empathy. Rather than allowing them to interact roughly with a tolerant dog, we should educate youth on how to interact gently and kindly, and to be respectful of other species.

For more tips on helping children and dogs live successfully together, check out these articles on our website ❤️

https://www.hshv.org/dog-meets-young-child/
https://www.hshv.org/dog-meets-baby-part-2/

02/08/2025

I NOSE HOW YOU FEEL
One of the most incredible things about dogs is their ability to recognize and respond to our emotions, but just how do they know how we’re feeling?

They may not understand the emotion we are feeling, but their brains are wired to understand whether that emotion makes them feel safe or not.

From an evolutionary perspective; for their survival, it was and still is, important for dogs to know which humans were safe to be around and which were not.

Dogs recognize the different chemical scents we produce through our skin or breath, our facial expressions or body language and our tone of voice.

Although we’re not aware of it, we emit different scents when experiencing positive emotions compared to when we experience negative emotions. Dogs have an amazing ability to recognize these different scents.

A dog's sense of smell is incredibly powerful and far superior to ours. Dogs have +/- 300 million olfactory receptors in their nose, sometimes more depending on the breed, compared to +/- 5 to 6 million in humans. In addition to this, the part of their brain that processes scent is around 40 times bigger than ours.

Dogs also recognize our facial expressions and body language. Just like we might stay well away from or not want to interact with someone who looks really angry and be more drawn and responsive to a happy, relaxed looking person.

Tone of voice – more info on this in my previous post.

Dogs can be such a comfort to us when we need emotional support or aren’t feeling well, but some of our emotions many have a negative effect on them.

Working with or interacting with a dog when we’re feeling angry, stressed, frustrated or having a bad day is not a good idea. It’s far better to wait until we feel more relaxed and calmer.

Dogs have rich emotional lives – just as we should try to be aware of their emotions, also be aware of how our emotions may affect them.

02/08/2025

"I still miss them all..."
sold

02/08/2025

In order for our dogs to get it right, we need to allow them to be confident enough to try, offer and progress. This all comes more naturally when we allow them to confidently make mistakes.

The same goes for us. You wouldn’t be able to look back and say ‘I wish I’d done it differently’, if you hadn’t made those mistakes in the first place. Mistakes are what progresses us, keeps us unstuck and helps us grow. Mistakes are never really mistakes at all.

02/06/2025