Wag Out Loud show

Wag Out Loud

Summary: The Wag Out Loud pawdcast started as a passion project that would help all of us to be the BEST advocates for our dogs’ health and wellness. After many amazing guests, intriguing topics and incredible feedback, the WOL pawdcast is hitting a nerve with dog lovers all over the world. Why is it that over 50% of our dogs are getting cancer? I believe it is because of the extreme toxic load that are dogs are taking on from not only their poor diets, but from their environment as well. We can do so much better for our dogs, but first we need to be educated on how to make the right choices for our dogs, to help them lead longer and healthier lives. Our short and succinct episodes (about 30 mins each) feature experts in the fields of canine health, nutrition, and wellness as well as recommendations about products and services that I've used, know, like and trust and have found to enhance the lives of dogs. My name is Krista and I am the host of the WOL pawdcast. After receiving my certification in canine nutrition and noticing that most dogs are getting sicker and living shorter lives, I have become obsessed with bringing experts and dog enthusiasts together in committed community. Together we can learn about the most updated science, treatments, protocols and products that will benefit both the mental and physical health of our pups. I continue to learn something every single day. This show mostly features topics and opinions from those in the holistic and integrative veterinary health industry. We address things like dental health, over vaccination, nutrition, benefits of feeding raw, gut health and the immune system, common canine diseases, aging issues, behavioral issues, cognition and so much more. You love your dog, right? And you want to provide them with the best life possible. Let’s learn together. No matter where you live, your financial status, how many dogs you have, if they are a pure breed or mixed, we have something for every dog parent on the planet. Dogs are such amazing creatures and are a part of our families. As research continues, we are learning more and more about how they enhance our lives. It’s time to give back all of the unconditional love that our dogs show us. They are here to teach us so many things…we just need to know how to listen. Nothing and I mean nothing, in the dog industry is regulated. That includes food, treats, supplements or the manufacturing of dog products. It really is like the wild, wild west and we have to do our own research on products, ingredients and materials. We can’t be fooled by false marketing claims. This is the only podcast that focuses on practical, actionable tips and strategies to help your dog to thrive. Tune in for the latest research, science-based information, natural alternatives and inspiration for ensuring you are making well-informed decisions, when it comes to your dog’s health and happiness. Just think of Wag Out Loud as the ultimate resource for the dog lover who is on a quest to provide the best care for his/her canine companion(s). I am the guide that helps you to navigate the landscape of conflicting and confusing information in the ever-growing pet health space. Listen in to all of the Wag Out Loud pawdcast episodes and be sure to tell your dog-loving friends about the Show. Your dog will thank you!

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 Manifesting the Ultimate Connection with Our Dogs | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:31:45

Hi there. This is Krista with Episode #159 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. I just wanted to remind you that you should probably check out all of the amazing trusted brands that I highly recommend. Because these are products that I have tried on my dog, Winston, and that I know like and trust, I've done all the research for you. And these products will also help your dog to thrive. So just go to https://www.wagoutloud.com/ and check out the trusted brands section. And I've negotiated discounts for most of the products, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life. Here's an interesting fact. A dog's sense of smell is reduced by up to 40% when they are overheated and panting, and that's because they're using the air to cool themselves rather than for smelling. And another interesting fact is that puppies have heat sensors in their noses to help find their mother during the time when their eyes and ears are closed right after they're born. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. James Jacobson is the Founder of Dog Podcast Network, which is entirely devoted to dogs and the people who love them. DPN brings together James’ two passions: dogs and the world of podcasting. He waited a long time for his own dog. He waited even longer for the podcasting world to be ready for his vision. James knows the bond we share for our dogs connects us in a very special way. He firmly believes we need this connection, now, more than ever. Hello dog lovers! I am so glad that you're here and willing to learn more about your dog's wellness. Today I'm honored to be joined by James Jacobson. He is the founder of the Dog Podcast Network and James and I have been chatting for the last couple years, I think, so I'm so excited to have him finally on this show. James, thanks for being here. My pleasure. I am delighted to finally join you on on your Show. I know this has been planned for a while. So this is gonna be a lot of fun everybody and a great learning experience. So stay with us. James, would you mind introducing yourself and tell us why are you so passionate about all things dog? Well, that I am I guess I am a dyed in the wool dog lover, I have ended up building basically a whole bunch of businesses that focus on dog lovers vs dog owners, the people who really love their dog. And I kind of happened into it. Because when I was a kid, I was promised a dog when I turned 10. And I never got one Krista. And finally, when I got on my own in my 20s I got a dog and I was hooked. And I did everything I could. And I learned as much as I could about keeping dogs healthy. And then I did weird projects like I did a video. Many, many when I was in my 20s I was an animal communicator talking about you know, animal communication and introducing people to that concept and, and then, and then I didn't do stuff for a while. And then a bunch of other businesses I had and then I ended up moving to Hawaii. And then when I moved to Hawaii, and sold my companies, I didn't know what to do. And I said I'm going to write a book about something that I have done my whole life, since I got a dog which was meditating with my dog. And that's how this whole journey started with a very silly book that turned out to be a best seller. And I flew on Oprah’s jet and did all sorts of things. But it all started with a silly book, How to Meditate With Your Dog. And here we are, well, we're going to talk about meditating with our dogs. I said, this is going to be fun. And I mean it everybody. This is going to be amazing. We're going to cover a few different topics today, which is really cool. And James is going to be talking about manifesting the ultimate connection with our dogs. So James, I know that you've been quoted that you believe that we need this connection with our dogs. Now more than ever. Can you expand on that? Our Connection To Dogs Absolutely. Well, I think you know, we are living in some pretty interesting times. And dog lovers, people that you talk to on your podcast, people that we talk to on our podcasts are truly special people. They have an open heart, they're loving, they want to do what's right for their dog. They have just this big heart. And in these crazy times that we're living in, I think there's an opportunity for us to connect with other dog lovers all over the world, because that love and that commonality that we have, doesn't matter what political agenda we have or what beliefs we have. Our common love for dogs is so important. And that's why I like to do everything I can to help bring dog lovers together. I love that. Well, let's do a deep dive, we're gonna go back to the very beginning. And again, you wrote the book on meditating with your dog. I can't believe it's 2005. You did this? That's been a while? Meditating With Your Dog I did. Yeah. Well, I was I was a meditator my whole life as a kid. But it wasn't until I had a dog that I realized that dogs are natural meditation partners. I would show people who were reluctant to meditate like, Oh, this is some, you know, weird Eastern thing I can never meditate. And then I’d say, Hey, if you love your dog, you can you can leverage that love into a meditation practice, because dogs live in the moment, they are totally present. If you kind of ever looked at a dog, that is what I call in “hound lounge” where their eyes are half open. They're very much…they're perfect meditators. And so I have shown through the book and through classes I used to teach that it's incredibly easy to do, you just have to give it a shot and kind of put one hand on the dog's chest and another hand on the dog butt. So depending upon the size of the dog, you can either you know, have them sit on a chair with you in a comfortable place, or get down on the floor with them if they're really big dog, and do that and focus on the breath, which is a normal part of the pasna meditation, which is a focus on the craft. And after doing this for a really short period of time, sometimes as little as a few days or a week or two, your dog will totally love it and get into it and appreciate the bonding time. And you will begin this beautiful, sweet practice that once you start, you will realize why haven't I been doing this my whole life with my dog. And it's a beautiful thing. That in a very quick distillation of what how to meditate with your dog is all about. Well, I love that you bring this up, because I don't know about you. But we all have stress and anxiety. And of course our dogs can feel that. So they appreciate when we actually take a moment to be at peace. So they are the perfect meditators. I totally agree with you. And I meditate with Winston on the Calm app. I love that app. And you're right, you do need to touch them. And as soon as he knows that, I'm going to our meditation space, he jumps up on the couch, and he's right next to me, let's do this. He's excited. So I encourage everybody, if you're not doing this with your dog, it is going to bring a total peace at least the time that you're doing the meditation it's going to bring bring so much peace to your life. And it is a great bonding experience. And James, don't you agree that even taking our dogs on walks can be a kind of meditation practice? Yes, I talk about that, which is like sort of an Oh, so there's a thing in meditation philosophy, called an open eyed meditation. So in How to Meditate With Your Dog, I talked about walking meditations with your dog, dog walks where you kind of do it at the dog's pace, which is you sniff the hydrant and you sniff the flowers and you go around, and you become incredibly conscious and look at the world and see the world and pour into all the dog’s senses, the way they see the world and that is in and of itself a meditation practice. You don't need a soundtrack, you don't need anything. You just need to be present with your dog on those walks. And that can turn it into a meditation. But you have to be very conscious and deliberate about it. But the dogs will totally dig it. More recently I've been calling it a sniffari. Letting the nose drive the dog. And that is an open eyed meditation. It's different for sure than a closed eyed meditation, we are in one place. But it is another way of savoring the moment and just being there. And all of this helps dogs. I mean, the benefits are like there's so many it helps in terms of things like separation anxiety and anxiety in general. It helps human beings obviously because of all the stressful times we live in. And it just helps the the dynamics in the family. As you pointed out you said you know Winston picks up on any stresses and stuff that are happening. They do that. And so the more common, the more regularly you do this, hopefully daily just for him 20 minutes, it can make an amazing difference. I agree. And I really encourage people when you are out on these meditation type walks with your dogs, don't bring your phone, don't bring your music and your earbuds. Make it a true present time in nature for the two of you. I think I do my best thinking during our dog walks, because my mind is so open. I couldn't agree more, I am lucky enough to live on the beach. And almost every morning, my dog and I walk on the beach right now she's getting a little old and arthritic. So the sand is a little tough. So we go in the grass above it. But being out there in nature is just extraordinary. And being barefoot, if you can, if the weather permits, that there's a whole bunch of people talking about the importance of grounding, which sounds all very deep again. But it's just really connecting with the earth and so doing that, and mimicking and modeling what our dogs have to teach us. So extraordinary. Yes, I agree. And back to the closed eye meditation with your dog. It's funny how you both your breathing is in sync. And it just falls into sync, so naturally. It is. When I first came out with the book in 2005… I feel very old. People thought oh, this some sort of gimmick. But I mean, I was on Jay Leno and CNN and did all this stuff. And a lot of the TV producers thought they would be pretty clever. They would bring me this like dogs who I’d never met and then have to meditate with the dog live on television. And sometimes they brought me some nasty dogs, but you know what, it worked out every time. Because the dogs just they get it, they get the intentionality. And they really do follow your breath if you had sort of a dog trainer mindset, but they get it in a very cool way. Well, I encourage everybody to try it. If you've never done it is a super cool experience that once you start doing it, it becomes a habit and something both you and your dog look forward to. So thank you, James, that was awesome. We're now going from a happy calming subject to a not so happy subject of dog cancer. But James, you have been in this field for 13 years now. And you say dog cancer diagnoses does not have to be a death sentence. So do you want to unpack that a little bit? Coping with Canine Cancer Well, as you know, cancer is the number one killer of dogs, one in three dogs get cancer. And if you have a dog who's 10 years or older, the odds are 1 in 2, 50% of dogs over 10 get cancer and some breeds like Golden Retrievers. The odds are even worse 75% of Golden Retrievers die, die of cancer, and it’s horrible. And I only discovered this when, because of the success of how to meditate with your dog. People started writing me and telling me about their dogs. And I learned about the prevalence of cancer. And that's when I connected with my then veterinarian and then later on my business partner, Dr. Demian Dressler, who is one of the world's most respected dog cancer veterinarians on creating a book called The Dog Cancer Survival Guide. Him and Dr. Susan Ettinger wrote the book and it's sort of the Bible of dog cancer. 500 pages and it talks about everything you need to know to you know, help your dog with cancer and as you say it is about viewing cancer from a different lens not as a death sentence, but instead of as a thing that you can live with and thrive with because at the end of it all, we all want quality of life for our dog. And so I have basically spent since I got onto this journey with dog cancer, most of my time has been focused on helping to improve the quality of life for dogs and the people who love them and so many of those dogs have cancer and we've figured out all sorts of ways to help them live better lives. Oh, that's fantastic. Well James, we're gonna get a little deeper into this because you are super close to this topic. We are going to take a quick sponsor break and we will be right back. Thanks so much to the team at System Saver for being this month’s feature sponsor. Dr. Baker’s Canine System Saver is an outstanding all-natural supplement that promotes healthy aging.  Originally created by a veterinarian to help restore health and soundness to dogs suffering from chronic inflammatory and degenerative conditions, this is one product that does so much! Perfect for: arthritis, hip dysplasia & joint support, chronic dermatitis, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, and geriatric support for successful aging and quality of life extension. At 13 yrs old,my dog Winston has a better quality of life and has found so much more energy being on this amazing product!” Now with the start of allergy season, System Saver works wonders on canine allergies as well. Learn more by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ to relieve your dog’s discomfort naturally.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! We're back and we are speaking with James Jacobson from the Dog Podcast Network. And we are speaking about cancer. And James before we left for the break, I know that you have had two dogs I believe that have been diagnosed with cancer. Can you share your journey? Yeah. So Kanga and Roo are Maltese that I have. Roo passed earlier actually late last year from from cancer. And Kanga our other dog has had it for about three years, and has been thriving, but she's getting up there now she's approaching 14. And that's the other thing is like, you know, when that was first diagnosed, they're like, she's just totally beating the odds by doing the things that are talked about in the book like the dog cancer diet, and we use a nutraceutical that I helped found a company called Functional Nutriments, that makes a nutraceutical called Apocaps that we've been giving and used by veterinarians all over the world, and feeding the right diet and doing exercises even like meditation and things that improve the quality of life. And so Kanga has been has been doing really well, up until this point, you know, she's, she's still doing well, but she's, you know, unfortunately, we all get older and things happen. But she just had a beautiful walk this morning, and she's enjoying her food and, and a lot more cheat days as well. Things that are that make life worth living for a dog. That's great. Well, you have a Show. You're the host of Dog Cancer Answers on the Dog Podcast Network. So you are speaking to scientists and veterinarians that are on the front lines. What do you see as the future of cancer treatment? The Future of Canine Cancer Treatments Wow, that is a good one. Yeah, that Show has been on the air since 2009. So it is a really old podcast. It's a very niche podcast. Most shows like yours are like general interest. But this is a very nice one of the shows on DPN, which is extremely niche, which is like, hey, it's just all about cancer. And I tell people, you know, it's one of the things I'm sorry, you have to listen to this show, because you're probably listening to it because you have a dog with cancer, but it's super helpful. So the scientists, the veterinarians, we talk to are from all spaces on the veterinary community from super holistic, people who are using, you know, Chinese herbs and acupuncture to cutting edge on the other side that may be a little pushy. And like, we just did a show recently with a veterinarian who uses an approach that basically does full body irradiation of a dog. And they give the dog so much radiation that they have to do a bunch of things, basically, because it'll kill the certain blood cells, that they have to do a whole bunch of things. But it does actually show an objective response relative to other treatment options to preserve every last possible day that a dog could live on this planet. So we look at all those different approaches. And we answer questions from our audience about specific questions that they have for their own dog's journey. But in terms of like where I see the future of dog cancer, the thing that I think is most exciting is genomics. Looking at the dogs. It's the same thing with human medicine, looking at cancer through the genome and seeing how one might approach a cancer diagnosis and a treatment plan based specifically on your dog's DNA and genes. That's, that's the future. That's fascinating. Well, and I also like hearing, I think it was back in 2017, that the National Cancer Institute gave out $11.5 million in grants to six veterinary schools to study immunotherapy treatments. And I love that approach, because it's, you know, you're just mentioning the vet the talked about whole body treatment radiation. And this is more targeted to the unhealthy cells, which I kind of think would be a little bit better. So I think that's really cool, that we're thinking outside the box. And there are other modalities that are being used. Because we have to remember you guys that dogs get cancer at about the same rate that humans do. So any studies in Veterinary Cancer Research benefits both of us, animals and our dogs. That is so critical. I think that that's one of the things that this is kind of a fad subject in general. But what gives me so much solace, Krista is that what is being done in dog camps, because dogs and humans not only get it at the same frequency, but they get the same types of cancer, and they respond pretty much the same way to different treatment. So a lot of things are tested in dogs that later can be applicable to people. And then also things are being done in people that are now being used in dogs. It's this concept of one medicine. I don't know if you've, if you've touched on that in and of your shows. But one medicine is really helpful one health because it's called One Health, One Medicine, where basically, veterinarians and human physicians and researchers are all looking at the same health issues, and looking for commonalities, but we have so much to learn about treating human cancer by looking at dog cancer and vice versa. That is a great point. And I don't think a lot of people realize I never realized before I got into this industry, that dogs share approximately 85% of the same DNA as humans. So it does make sense. I didn't know the number, but yeah, we’re so similar. Yeah, it's crazy. So we do need to work together with human Doc's, and veterinarians to figure this all out and make everybody better. So I'm on the same page as you. That is exciting. So we took a pretty sad subject, and put an up spin on it. So thank you, James. That's awesome. You're welcome. It's worth you know, people. If you have a dog with cancer, it's a really good resource, Dog Cancer Answers. Check it out, everybody. All right. Well, we are going to use our last segment here. This sounds really fun. James is going to talk to us about the difference of dog lovers versus dog owners. So you say most of us aren't crazy. So tell us more, James. Are You a Dog Lover or a Dog Owner? Well, I love this. I love this topic. So when I started Dog Podcast Network, we needed a way to kind of figure out who is our audience because we have podcasts for dog lovers. But who would who is our true audience? Is it just people who own dogs or the people who love dogs. And then people would ask you, well, what's the difference? And I said, ah, there are three things. There's a litmus test. So the first question is, where does your dog sleep? So, dog lovers will say, Oh, they sleep in my bed or they sleep in my bedroom. If that's the answer, we'll put a check in the column for dog lover. And if they say outdoors and they sleep, and I don't know, they sleep, you know, in the kitchen, that's the dog owner. The second question is, what do you feed your dog? And if they say I go to Walmart, and I buy the cheapest kibble. Probably dog owner, or somebody says, I cook for my dog and I do this measurement or I feed raw. I know you I know you like raw. And I do. So there are so many different if anyone is basically thinking a lot about their dog's food, whether they cook for him or they provide raw or they shop at the shi shi store. So whatever you're doing, then you're we'll put that in the dog lover column. And then the third question I ask is, How would you handle this scenario? You wake up one morning, and you're feeling sick. And your dog’s also feeling sick. Who is more likely to go to the doctor or veterinarian? You or your dog? And if you say, well, it would be I take my dog to the vet. First. No doubt about it, my dog always goes to the vet, then you're definitely a dog lover. So those are the three tests that I use to quickly find out if someone's a dog lover or a dog owner. Well, I guess we've set it straight here, everybody, I am a dog lover through and through, which I think most of us are. I think you are and pretty much anyone who's listening to the shows like this definitely fits in the dog lover category. And we're special. We're a breed apart as I like to joke. Well, if there's so many dog lovers, James, why does legislation takes so long to figure out that dogs are sentient beings, that they're not a piece of furniture legally? Why are we lagging behind? I just I don't get it, you know, States are finding… And it's actually countries that are realizing it. But here, not so much. You know, you get a divorce. The dog is property. Property and also like for malpractice, veterinarian malpractice, the value of a dog. Yes. Yeah. Is we in the United States are behind the rest of the world in a number of things that are that are news headlines these days. And that that is just one of them. Yeah, it is. It's sad and unfortunate. And I'm sure all of your listeners will appreciate the fact that dogs are should definitely be accorded a certain number of rights that that we consider our inalienable rights. Maybe not as much food as they want as many walks as they would demand. We should at least try and we shouldn't think of them as property. Right. I agree. Well, as we wrap up, James, the Dog Podcast Network, tell us when that came about, and what shows we can enjoy on there. The Dog Podcast Network Well, so that started as a vision in 2019. And I planned it and I said we are going to launch in 2020. And then this little weird thing happened, like a global pandemic. So we did launch the company started hiring people in 2020, we launched our shows in 2021, of course, Dog Cancer Answers which I had been doing in the network. And so we have a bunch of shows that are really high production value. And people say they're like NPR sounding, BBC sounding shows that are focused on dog lovers. Our flagship show, which I'm most proud of, is a show called Dog Edition. And that one I co host. I have a we have a wonderful, wonderful co host who just joined me. And it is designed it we call it the world's first podcast designed to listen to while you walk your dog. It is a magazine style formatted show that right now comes out weekly, we hope someday maybe to come out five times a week, because you should walk your dog, at least that many times, like 20 minutes long. As 20 minutes long is we tell great stories that we consider dog adjacent things that you won't hear on most any other show. And we do we have a team of correspondents and reporters all over the world. So we have really good journalists who tell the stories and we have good sound and good production value. And we work really hard to make this sound like you know, like all things considered for dog lovers. And we’ve won some awards, and we're really excited and be competitive dog edition.com. And then we have other shows and we're always looking for more people and we're constantly hiring. My ambition is that by the end of this year, to have 20 different shows on DPN. Wow, that would be fantastic. You can never talk enough about dogs. You can go on and on. And people love them. So I think that is great. So again, James, where can everybody find out more information about you and the Dog Podcast Network? Dogpodcastnetwork.com. And there is a tab somewhere on there. To find out more about me. You can find me on all the socials. I'm James Jacobson, on Twitter and Facebook and all those places. And I'd love to talk to other dog lovers and now we know what dog lovers are. Social Media Tags        Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dogpodcastnetwork/?hl=en          Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DogPodcastNetwork/          LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/dogpodcastnetwork/ Yes, thanks to you. It's official. Well, I will have all of James's contact information on social media and the website all in the show notes. So James, I I hope that you get to the 20 shows by the end of the year. Because again, we can't talk enough about our dogs for sure. Thank you so much for being here today. Thank you. It was so much fun. I really enjoyed it. Thanks again to our friends at System Saver for sponsoring this month’s episodes .  Check out this fantastic all-natural formula by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode? Don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE and please leave a review: Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify I Stitcher I iHeartRADIO The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. The host as well as guests who speak on this podcast express their own opinions, experience and conclusions, and Wag Out Loud LLC neither endorses or opposes any particular views discussed here.

 The Law of Pet Action: Human vs Dog Mindset | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:32:42

Hello everyone this is Krista with Episode #158 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Well, it has been confirmed… dogs do have a sense of time, and they do miss us when we leave. You might have already heard about the circadian rhythm, which is our internal biological clock, if you will, that helps us to know when to wake up, when to go to sleep and when to eat. Well, it exists in our dogs as well. And our dogs have a general perception of time as daylight turns to dark, but maybe you knew that already knew that. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Lesley Nase, is the Creator and CEO of ‘Intuitive Animal Healing’. The host of ‘Books, Yarns & Tails’ on Win Win Women TV, Apple TV, Amazon Fire and Roku. From a very young age, she knew she was destined to work with animals. For more than 30 years, pet people have hired her when conventional healing methods failed to answer their questions. Welcome dog lovers to another fascinating episode of the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. And after first meeting Lesley Nase, I knew that she had to be on the Show. So welcome, Lesley! Could you please introduce yourself and share why are you so passionate about healing energies, especially when it comes to our dogs? Oh, you were so kind of to say that we hit it off because I felt that as well. I love listening to your podcast. So I appreciate that. So I'm Lesley Nase, Creator and CEO of Intuitive Animal Healing. And I'm the host of Books, Yarns & Tails’ on Win Win Women TV. It is also on Apple TV, Amazon Fire and Roku. But my career always started in nature. I grew up on a family campground in the state of Vermont. So I was always surrounded by animals at a very young age. And I think I'm one of those kids who just bugged my, you know, Mom and Dad about a dog, a dog. And I already had a cat. We already had bunnies. We had other animals that surrounded us, but I really wanted the dog. And it did finally come, the dog came a couple of times, but dogs teach us so much about our lives. And they reflect bak to who we are. And as you said, I do healing work as the intuitive animal healing and my gift and my passion has allowed me to help hundreds of dogs as well as cats and horses but dogs in particular. And to help those people who share their lives with their dogs discover their own innate healing ability and to help them deepen their relationship to their dogs. And I just so enjoy helping to restore imbalances and giving them optimum health naturally and holistically as I guide them through insight and wisdom as an intuitive healer. That is great. Well, Lesley, I know that we can all agree that we are living in an insane, crazy, challenging world right now. And I think we're in a time where nothing makes sense. And it's great to know that more and more of us are seeking out more natural and holistic healthy ways to bring our lives into balance, like you mentioned, and of course more balance and awareness with our dogs. So I'm so excited that you're going to be chatting with us about the law of pet action, human versus dog mindset. So let's start unpacking this. Can you tell us what exactly does the law of pet action mean? You know, over the especially the over the last four or five years here and into the pandemic when we saw so many people adopting the you know, a dog to share their lives and to help them. What I was seeing about the relationship between people and their pets was that their pets were really reflecting back to them. What was going on in their life. And that went right down to the point of anxiety. If your pet if your dog especially is anxious, look to yourself. Find out what's happening, because they're in Quantum Physics, there's something called mirror imaging. And there are these little neurons in our brains and our dog's brain. And we all know how empathetic dogs are. They just give us those great big looks that melt our heart. And they also look at us to help heal us. And so they try to take on what's happening within your body, for their body. So if you're anxious yourself, if you are having a hard time with anxiety, your pet is probably reflecting that. If you have some disease within your body, your pet can often I'm finding, they have a very similar disease in their bodies, as well. And everybody seems to be out of balance. And the easiest way sometimes to get a real handle on this is that we go unconscious in our lives, you know, we get up in the morning, and we do our morning routine, we get out of bed, we brush our teeth, we may get dressed with the same leg into you know, the pants or whatever, and go downstairs, and our dogs are right there. They know exactly what we're going to do when we're going to do it. And so do we, but we don't think about it. And that happens in the habit that happens to us. So we might be doing, trying to I knew I had one example of a client that I had recently who kept saying that, you know, I'm, every time I try and go out the door, my dog starts acting up. And I asked, where are you going out the door? Well, I'm going to work. And so this is different. Yes, she would say, because I have been working from home during the COVID outbreak. And now I have to go into work where I'm going to see all these people. And I don't know what's happening. And her anxiety level kept going up and up and up, just about going out the door. What we don't realize is that our anxiety, our thoughts get repeated over and over again, and they start before you go out the door. And once she understood that unconsciously what she was doing and projecting outward to her dog made a difference. She was able to then slowly back off, that behavior. And then we could work on regaining balance and holistically thinking of how she would venture and try this again. So that is the law of pet action. The actions of our pets really reflect back. And they know more about us than we want to let on. You just have to listen. Yeah, definitely. Well, Lesley, what exactly is intuitive animal healing? And how does it work? Well, we all have a sense of intuition. We were all born with that natural ability. But many of us through the years kind of go, oh, well, you know, I have to believe what is happening outside of me. So and it's not a bad thing. It's just that it's how we grow up and in this society. And so as a child, we start believing what our parents are saying, because they're trying to keep us safe. And they're our parents. And then as you grow older and older, you get your teachers and then where do you get your news? And where do you get your information from your friends and your peers. And you stop believing that spark that’s within you that has that intuitive knowing. That time when the goosebumps kind of rise up. Or many people feel the shiver down their their back when they hear something and they know it or they know an answer before the question’s even asked. There is that sense of intuition in the work that I do, because I pay attention. And I really am aware of my surroundings, especially when I'm working with someone. I'm aware of the person I'm talking to, but I'm aware of their dog. And when I'm working with a dog, all I need is their photograph and their name. And I often ask if they’re spayed or neutered only because it's an it you know, easier than using a pronoun. From there, I get impressions from the animal. It's like watching a little movie in my mind as I see things and I feel it within my body. And sometimes I even hear it or smell it. So that’s the intuitive, knowing part. And there are sometimes owners just absolutely know when they look at their dog and look at the dog's face, they're like, I knew something was wrong, I just couldn't pinpoint it. I took them to the vet, and the vet couldn't pinpoint it, they couldn't tell me exactly what to do, they would say, well, there's nothing we can do, or we'll try this. And it was usually medication, an owner will go, it didn’t feel right. It's that gut feeling that something else was out there for them. And so we all have that ability to develop our own intuition, and our own ability to help heal our dog, our environment, and our other loved ones. Wow, that's cool. Lesley, what is the difference between an animal communicator and a pet psychic? Are they the same thing? Yeah, there, there isn't a whole lot of difference. You know, words are so funny because we learn the meaning of a word. And yet, it has different meanings in different ways throughout the world. So basically, when you're learning to communicate to an animal, you are using your psychic abilities in which to do that. And they can be very latent. You know, I teach about the Clairs as I like to call them. Sometimes people have Clairaudience. Clairsentience, Clairvision, the clair senses and all of these are part of the psychic tools that you can use in your abilities. So we all have different ways of accessing. And the hardest thing for most people is they're so visual in this world, that they'll be like, I don't see anything. Well, okay. But what do you mean by you don't see anything? Is it there or not? Is it black? Do you feel anything? Then you start digger deeper. Have you smelled anything? Stop a moment. Can you hear anything? And people start to discover that, oh, there is something in there. And that’s just your own skill ability. Well, I think this is a perfect time to take a quick sponsor break. And then we are going to get into this and I know that you said we all have our own innate abilities in this healing work. So I really want to find out more about that. So Lesley, hold tight, we will be right back. A special thanks to the team at Tickless USA for being our monthly sponsor. I am so thrilled to share this great company and their products with all of you who want to prevent ticks and fleas without the use of toxic chemicals. That's right, no more harmful chemicals need to be applied to your dog. Tickless devices are ultrasonic, flea and tick repellers that emit a series of ultrasonic pulses that humans, pets and wildlife cannot hear. These outstanding patented products are the number one selling chemical free repellents in Europe that are proven safe in multiple studies. They offer various versions to be worn on the collar, and they also have units for the home. They're not only for pets, but they have tick repellents for people as well. You can't go wrong with these environmentally friendly chemical and fragrance free ultrasonic devices, making them perfectly safe to use for your entire family. Order your Tickless device today by going to TicklessUSA.com and use the discount code WAGOUTLOUD That's all one word with no spaces to receive 15% off of your order. We're back with Lesley and she is talking about intuition and the law of pet action with our dogs. This is just fascinating. So Lesley, I have had other animal communicators on the Show before. So what makes your practice different? That's a great question. I think when I was talking before about what I've seen over the years, is that I what I've realized is that when most people started to come to me more than 30 years ago to do a session either a communication or a healing session with them or because I am a shamanic practitioner using those shamanic techniques as well, they were looking for me to give them all the answers. And yet, when you realize that the relationship and the bond that you have with your dog is so close, and that if I teach people how they can, you know, discern their own relationship and come up with more of their own ideas and feel empowered by that, that's more long lasting than me just telling you, well, this is what your dog said, and you can understand this they do, they certainly understand, you know, this is why they're not eating that food or something else. But when you give somebody the tools to really do it themselves, and whether you, you know, you have to do it on a daily basis, you have to practice you have to, it's got to be part of your life, that’s just the deal with that, then you're not always looking outside of yourself for the answers, you can start with yourself. And we're going to do an exercise here shortly. So I'm excited to do that. You mentioned shamanic healing techniques that you use, but you also use the science of quantum energy. Can you tell us more about that? I love quantum energy. And it has really taken hold in the scientific realm, and the spiritual realm, to bring them both together. I believe in the seen and the unseen in this world, and quantum physics understands the energy that entangles us, which is a theory with our environments. And that means the inside of your house, to the outside of where you live, and everybody in between. And it also gives those biology factors within us, especially when I go deeper with someone about their unconscious and conscious habits, and how to change those. They get to understand the workings of their own self. And that's where your success comes in. That's when you get the change. And just a quick one on that. I had an agility trainer with her dog who did beautiful during practice, but during competition did terrible. And when I went to train to look at what the dog was doing. But I also train the person, you know, if you've ever been to a dog trainer, they tell you that whatever your feelings go right down that leash, and it's more of the person that you need to train than the dog itself. And when she understood what her behaviors were when I took her through a visualization, and she went, Oh my God, I didn't realize what how nervous I was. And what was happening on. I gave her the skills to work with her dog, real quick exercise, just before each trial that she did. And the difference was amazing. They were a team. And what do you say? I mean, some people listening might say, Oh, this is woowoo. They're skeptical. What do you say to the skeptics out there? You know, I love it. That term woowoo has been around for so long. That's why I so enjoy quantum physics, because it begins to open up your mind to say, well, maybe there's something to the spiritual side to that side, that's not there. I say use your imagination. Tap into that, you know, all of us have this logical mind that wants to play with us and say, Oh, my gosh, I just made this up. This can't be real. And yet, when you actually use some of what you imagine, or you understand, it changes, like a ripple effect in your life. It doesn't happen overnight. Except there are some times that there can be a big change that happens because you gain for understanding. But give it a try. You know and and if you give it a try and practice it and believe that you can do that. We are more powerful as human beings than we ever thought we were. True. And there's such a small percentage of our brain power that we even use. We don't even utilize our skills that we have. I know. Well, let's do this. I am excited. You have an exercise for us on how to develop our intuition between us and our dog. So I'm ready for you to take the leash and walk us through it. Okay, so this is called directive intuition. And this exercise has to do with relationships. Now, in this exercise, you want to think real quick, whatever comes to you, is really what it's going to be about. Don't judge don't think you know, and if nothing comes visually, then think of the sensation that you might be feeling. Because our thoughts and our feelings are connected. So those are the kind of ground rules for this. Take a couple of deep breaths. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to have you think of your dog, as you close your eyes, and you're thinking of your dog and your relationship. And then you're going to think of a blanket. And I'll lead you through that, as we start now. So to take a moment to close your eyes, and get yourself a little centered. And to do that, we're going to breathe in through our nose and out through our mouth. Slowly breathe in. And exhale. We're gonna take two more of these breaths, I want you to breathe in all the positive energy that's around you. And exhale, any of the negative energy that you may be holding on to coming into the here and now. And on this last breath, when you breathe in, slowly and deeply, and you feel your body relaxing, even more, and you slowly let out the exhale, you've just signaled to your body, that you're safe. That everything's fine, right where you're at. Now, in your mind's eye, I want you to think about your dog, one dog in front of you. Once you've got that, think of a blanket. The blanket is, is it around both of you? Or around one of you? Is it only covering around your shoulders? And part of your dog? Or is it covering all of you, and all of your dog? Does it have color? One color, two colors? Is it smooth and kind of no wrinkles? Or is it rough? And torn and old? Or is it brand new, and still needs to be kind of broken in? Open your eyes. Did you get any impressions from that? I did. Hopefully our listeners did. Because listeners are supposed to be doing this with us. I go real quick and real fast, because it truly is the impressions that you get. There are different meanings to different colors. Some people get one solid color, others get two colors. Now the blanket may look old, or it may look brand new, you know, does it mean that if it's brand new is a brand new relationship with your dog? If it's an old one, does it mean that you've had a long term relationship with the dog. All of these impressions are part of your imagination, and your intuition that gives you feedback. And there are others that we do that build upon that relationship leading to a meditation that's a real Heart to Heart Meditation. Where that's a deeper connection. But I start first with a quick thing and developing that intuition. So that when you get to the deeper part, you have opened up your awareness, your perception is broader. And you can bring in deeper understanding. And that helps you to understand that law of pet action. That is cool. And does this work just with dogs that are here presently, or maybe dogs that have passed on? So here's the thing. The caveat, I should say. If you're doing this on your own, that I probably should say yes to all of the above. But the caveat is we are tied up emotionally with those who share our lives. Our pets have our hearts and when they have our heart and it's whether I'm doing a reading… in the readings such that I do I I often will do a reading with tarot or oracle cards just because I can get kind of deeper meaning when a person isn't coming forth with everything they want to say yet because emotionally they want to, we want to please somebody just like a dog, we want to give the right answers. And sometimes we don't want to go deep. But we have emotional attachment. And some of the work that I do is end of life support as a death doula and a psychic medium to help people with those times. So our emotions are tied up with that. And if you do a directed intuition on your own, your emotion’s going to be like, I want them to come, I want them to come. Oh, please, please, please. That's a really hard one to do with ourselves. Yet, having said that, there are signs of those dogs who have passed on, who show up in our lives in many different ways. And they're always trying to give you that messages to say, I'm still here. I'm still part of your life. I didn't really leave you. And the more we try to work on our own intuition, you mentioned, you know, signs, the feel of the blanket the is it over just the dog? Or is it both of us? Is it new? What color is it? How do we unpack what we saw in our minds? How do we understand what all of those that we did see what it symbolizes? Well, let's, let's think about that. I don't know if you want to use what you saw as an example. Sure. Okay. So tell me what you experienced. I saw the blanket just around Winston. It was like a really soft velour, like a dusty blue. Okay. And where was Winston sitting? Right in front of you like on your lap, or was Winston a little separate? To the side of me on the carpet. Okay. So when we can ask deeper questions, then we go a little bit deeper. So Winston was next to you, where he probably always is on the same side. And that's loyalty. And the color blue is a lot about safety, as well. And, you know, the velour is rich. And you know, it's plush and luscious. And so that shows you that you've got this loyal companion who's right next to you, and covered in this blue color of blue. It's a like an aura is what I would say. Bubble, bubble of blue, next to you. And, and so that's a real rich relationship you and Winston have. So anything else that you would add to that? What came up for me… So I think if people want to unpack this, again, Lesley can teach you how to do this on your own. And I'm sure that's one of the best services that you offer to let us use our own intuitive healing. So Lesley, as we are wrapping up here, you have an offer. For our listeners, there's a free resource. Do you want to tell them more about this Heart to Heart Meditation? FREE OFFER Yeah, I had, you know, sometimes your mind goes. What offer did I put out there? I love the heart to heart meditation. And I really have developed that for people who are trying to develop more between themselves and their dogs. And I, I must say, again, that I found that some people go oh, meditation, I don't want to sit for that long and do that. But it's not very long. It's like 10-15 minutes. And it is a great way to jump in and get your feet wet and, and just explore it on your own through the meditation. But there's also times that people will say, Well, you know, I didn't quite understand this. So give it a try, you can always email me, I would love to tell you more and give you a couple of quick tips. And just so you can get your feet wet and see what it's all about. That's really what the Heart to Heart Meditation is about. And can we find that just on your website? It should be on my website these days. I don't trust websites so if you don't find it there you really want it. Please just email me and that will be on the website. And just, you know, reference that you heard me right here on on this podcast, Wag Out Loud and, you know, I'll gladly send it to anybody who who doesn't or couldn't download it or something. https://intuitiveanimalhealing.net/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/lesleynase/          Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Intuitive-Animal-Healing-Animal-Communication-Healing-for-Pets-People-103761697742457          LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lesley-nase-819b4454 Well, thank you Lesley. So you can find out more about Lesley and her practice, which is Intuitive Animal Healing. And that is at https://intuitiveanimalhealing.net/ And Lesley works nationally and internationally by phone or internet. So I would really encourage people to reach out to her. She has such a powerful message and understands the true bond between us and our dogs and what we can achieve. So Lesley, I just want to thank you so much for being here. Do you have any parting words for us? It was my honor and pleasure. And I just, you know, I do love dogs. I have three. I walked them before this, so they'd be quiet. They all they were great. They were great. Thank you so much for having me on. I so appreciate that. Thank you, Lesley. And thanks for everybody tuning in. Go practice this intuition and develop a closer emotional connection with your dog. Thanks, Lesley! Thank you! Thanks again to our friends at Tickless USA for sponsoring this month's episodes, and for making such incredible products. Order your Tickless device today by going to TicklessUSA.com And don't forget that code WAGOUTLOUD, no spaces gets you 15% off. Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode? Don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE and please leave a review: Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify I Stitcher I iHeartRADIO The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. The host as well as guests who speak on this podcast express their own opinions, experience and conclusions, and Wag Out Loud LLC neither endorses or opposes any particular views discussed here.

 Natural Flea and Tick Prevention | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:33:47

Well hello. This is Krista with Episode #157 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast and I just wanted to remind you that you should probably check out all of the amazing trusted brands that I do highly recommend. And these are products that I have tried on my dog Winston and I have tried a lot of them. But these are the ones that I know, like and trust. And these products will also help your dog to thrive. So go to wagoutloud.com and check out the Trusted Brands section. And you'll notice that most of them have discounts, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life? Speaking of your dog, your dog is pretty smart, right? Well, how smart is your dog compared to you? Well, according to research by animal psychologists, dogs can understand up to 250 words, they can also count to five, and they're able to do basic calculations. So we already knew that our dogs are smart. But did you know that they have the intelligence of a two year old? Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Ádám Bacsó is the COO of an internationally growing company ProtectOne America Inc., and he's been involved in the development of tick protection for more than 4 years. His alma mater is Budapest Business School in Hungary, and later he finished his Tropical Parasitology studies at Duke University in the US. Nowadays innovation and environmentally friendly solutions are on his radar. Hi there dog lovers. Thanks so much for tuning in and for wanting to do better for your dog. Today, I have the privilege of chatting with Ádám Bacsó about natural flea and tick prevention. And I promise you will definitely want to stick around for this one. Adam, I want to thank you so much for being with us today. I would love for you to introduce yourself and share why are you so passionate about natural flea and tick prevention. Thank you for being here. It's awesome to be your guest. I’ve been related to tick prevention for four years now. And we see that with the climate change, they're more ticks than ever before. And in just the last few years, well the last 20 years, the number of ticks have been multiplying. So this is becoming a bigger and bigger problem for for the community. So we must have a solution against them. I got into this industry a couple of years ago. I had no idea about it, like five years ago, but the more I dig into it, the bigger the problem seems. The good thing is that we can do some things against it. Well, Adam, I read your bio, I mean, you finished your tropical parasitology studies at Duke University. I never knew there was such a thing. What's involved with that type of degree or program? Oh my God, you don’t want to know that. Yeah, I learned so much about different kinds of diseases, which are related to ticks, fleas, flies, mosquitoes. It's it's been crazy. And honestly, I'm really glad that I finished it. I learned a lot of nasty things. We learned a lot. It mainly covered ticks and fleas, which were my side. And I learned that just in the USA, there are more than 800 different species of ticks. So it's crazy. And I never heard about it before. But but we should be alerted because well, these modern 800 species are becoming more and more each year. So so it's it's actually a really, really interesting topic to learn about. They're there even even if you don't know about them. Well, my skin is already starting to crawl just thinking about it. But let's dive into it. We know that fleas and ticks are obviously a nuisance and when it comes to our dogs, we have to know, you know you've told me before we're always worried about flea and tick prevention for our dogs but we have to be aware for ourselves as well because we can be hosts, just like our dogs can, you know, they're gross, they're annoying, but they really are potentially harmful to our health. Our health and our dog's health. So, when we think of conventional treatments, you know what comes to mind, I see the poison symbol in my head. You know, these are toxic chemicals, we're trying to kill off the fleas and ticks. And we really have to realize the toxicity of the chemicals used in the chews, the collars, the shampoos, the sprays. So let's get into that a little bit. What are we doing to our dogs when we're giving him these products with toxic chemicals? How Chemical Treatments Work First, I just want to start with a statement. I am not fully against any chemicals. The main thing is tick prevention. So to prevent the diseases in the best ways we can. And one of the most well known option is to kill the ticks and fleas, just as you mentioned. Generally, many people use chemicals, spot ons, collars for their dogs to actually kill the ticks. And just talking in general, these chemicals work in a way where the tick has to bite first, and then it dies. So basically, these solutions, the tick bites first, and there are some diseases that can be spread just by the tick bite itself. So it doesn't have to go through the whole blood system, just like Lyme disease, for example, the tick has to bite. I believe that the main thing, the best thing that that we can do is to prevent the tick and flea bite itself. Because then we can also prevent the disease itself as well. I agree. And we have to remember that a lot of these drugs work systematically, which means that they're absorbed into the entire blood system of our dog. So it's affecting their entire body. You know, we think maybe the collar or the spot on treatment is only in one area of their body. But But these chemicals go, yeah, the entire body. So for instance, like fleas will feast on your dog's blood as as will ticks. And they eat the chemicals, they become paralyzed they die. And why don't we start with why do fleas prefer dogs as hosts? The first thing that comes to mind is that dogs have great fur. So it's, it's an amazing thing to hide there. And it's just much easier for them to grow on dogs, and also in dog beds, because if I would just spot some fleas in my bed I would just get rid of it there as soon as possible. But thank God I don't so… Dogs are generally going through bushes. They like being outside. And so they can also get ticks and fleas easier than us because we are just not rolling, but we people we are not rolling in grass. But dogs do. They can be affected with flea or tick borne diseases much easier than us. Also, I’d just like to go back a little bit about the chews that can be good for dogs. And just as I mentioned, many people use it and this is one of the most general thing to do against ticks. And normally there's just enough poison to kill the tick or flea but not enough to kill the dog itself. So it's really important if somebody is using chemical treatment against ticks and fleas, it's really important to choose the chew for the right size of dogs because unfortunately we hear about that many dogs die because of these chemicals and sometimes pet parents buy the wrong product for their pet. So these chemicals are calculated to have the exact amount of of poison in themselves. And let's say we have a small dog but we buy the tick and flea prevention for a large sized dog. It can also kill the small pets and that would be really unfortunate. So if somebody's going for these chemical treatments, then it's it's really important to consult with the veterinarian, for example, and choose which was the right the right product, I just want to highlight it first, because it's really important. We want to have as many pets around as possible… as as many healthy pets as possible. Yeah, I'm so glad you pointed that out. Because you're right. I know that there's a lot of reports that keep growing that from these other treatments that have chemicals in them, that dogs have neurological reactions, tremors, seizures, it can change their behavior, liver damage, GI illness. So to your point, we really have to pay attention to the products that we are administering to our dogs. So I like that you pointed that out. So let's go back to fleas. Fleas, if you see one, most likely there are many more correct? Yes, absolutely correct. And what is the life cycle? The whole, you know, they hop on your dog, how long do they live for? How long do they feed on your dog's blood and actually breed or lay eggs? Life Cylce of a Flea It can actually take a couple of weeks to go from larvae to an actual flea. And, for example, if you have fleas on your dogs, and you, you just give them a bath and get rid of the fleas on your dog, then you should also wash your dog's bed and also clean the places where your dog has been because there can be many larvaes around your home and around your dog's place. So it's really important to not just to get rid of the the actual fleas that you can see at that time. But just as you mentioned, there are many more just around the house, and just around your your dog's bed. So if you find fleas, then it's important to clear the whole area where your dog has been recently, because most of the fleas are there. And you can only get rid of them if you clean the whole area. Because we hear many, many people saying that they got rid of the fleas on their dog, they gave them the bath, but the fleas came back. The actual thing is that the fleas didn't come back. They were there. They were already there. They were just born after that. Right. And is it true that fleas are the most common cause of skin disease in dogs because when I think about flea bites, I know that a lot of dogs have a bad reaction that they are actually allergic to is it the saliva in the flea that they're reacting to? Yes, they're just as I mentioned, there are many species of fleas, and they can spread some diseases, just by their saliva. And also, if your dog is just scratching itself, then that's also a problem because they can just get get rid of the fur really easily as well. So all in all flea prevention is a really important thing nowadays. And you should do, for example, the regular cleaning as well and also use some, if you can, then use some natural products against them. So just going back to the prevention part is just much better to do prevention, than curing an actual disease. Okay. All right, let's go on to ticks. So ticks are a totally different animal than fleas. How do ticks get on dogs? And on us? And what is the life cycle of a tick? Life Cycle of a Tick Just as we talked about it earlier, there are more and more ticks, ticks around. So a couple of years ago, we could have just said that they are mostly in forests. When we go for a hike with our dogs and with our family, but nowadays they can be found in city parks as well. So this whole climate change is actually helping them. They've been here before us and some scientists say that they will be here after us. So it's, it's a bit scary to think about. There are more than 800 species of ticks so as they can spread some different diseases, some of the most well known for dogs is Rocky Mountain Fever, Babesiosis and also Lyme can be dangerous for dogs. That's mostly for people. But dogs can be affected with Lyme as well. Generally, when we go, or when we think about tick prevention or tick borne diseases, then we normally think about dogs mostly. But the thing is, when, when our dog is outside, then many times we are around them, we like playing with each other. And many people only think about preventing tick bites for their dogs. But the thing is that if we use great tick prevention for dogs, then that can also go for us. And the thing is that Lyme is much worse for people and we can get affected by the ticks that don't, that don't affect our dogs. So we have to think about the prevention for ourselves as well. So for example, just thinking about Lyme in the US, there are almost half a million people diagnosed with Lyme each year. And that's a lot. So we we never want to be included in this study. Lyme is not as big as a problem for dogs, but still, and there are between 20 to 30,000 dogs affected by Lyme each year. And these are the officially diagnosed dogs. But the thing is that not all the time can these Lyme diseases be diagnosed for dogs. So the thing is that there are unfortunately, many misdiagnosed dogs who who are not diagnosed having Lyme disease or other tick borne diseases, because let's say that there's a tick biting your dog but then it falls off and when the actual symptoms come to our dogs, then the tick is not around anymore. So the symptoms can come three or six months after the bite itself. So it's really important to do tick prevention all the time. It used to be only from March to September the season for ticks and fleas. Now with the mild winters. The thing is that they can be a problem for the whole year. Also, I’ll share a really interesting study about ticks a bit later. Adam… Yeah, can I stop you there? We're just going to take a quick commercial break and Adam is going to share with us a wonderful resolution for fleas and ticks in a natural way. So stay tuned, everybody, we'll be right back. A special thanks to the team at Tickless USA for being our monthly sponsor. I am so thrilled to share this great company and their products with all of you who want to prevent ticks and fleas without the use of toxic chemicals. That's right, no more harmful chemicals need to be applied to your dog. Tickless devices are ultrasonic, flea and tick repellers that emit a series of ultrasonic pulses that humans, pets and wildlife cannot hear. These outstanding patented products are the number one selling chemical free repellents in Europe that are proven safe in multiple studies. They offer various versions to be worn on the collar, and they also have units for the home. They're not only for pets, but they have tick repellents for people as well. You can't go wrong with these environmentally friendly chemical and fragrance free ultrasonic devices, making them perfectly safe to use for your entire family. Order your Tickless device today by going to TicklessUSA.com and use the discount code WAGOUTLOUD That's all one word with no spaces to receive 15% off of your order. Hello, everyone. We are back. I can't wait to hear more about natural flea and tick prevention from Adam. Adam, you just mentioned with global warming and climate change that fleas and ticks are really here all year round. That we really have to be diligent about the prevention all year. Are there certain areas or climates that are more prevalent with fleas in ticks? Climate Change Yes, absolutely. So good weather is good for ticks. There was an experiment where there was a tick, they lowered the temperature. So the tick froze. And that's what normally happens. In the winter they continued this study. So after the tick froze, they higher the temperature, and the tick started walking again. It's crazy. So that's why I say that these mild winters are really good for ticks. Because it's really good for ticks, it's not naturally good for us. Because previously, the ticks could have just died during the wintertime. And we could get rid of lots of ticks. But now with these mild winters, in certain areas, well, in some areas, there are no winters at all. But still with with the mild winters, ticks can live during the wintertime as well. So that's why this is an all year round problem. And we have to think about prevention for the whole year as well. That makes sense. Well, there are things on the market that are natural that people are using, for instance, natural shampoos and sprays. But of course, those require frequent application. Another one is essential oils, which I've heard, there are good oils and bad oils, especially when it comes to our dogs. But I've read that the top reason for calls to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ,Animal Poison Control Center was for tick product related concerns. And that was essential oils. So no matter what we're using as a treatment, we really have to know what we're doing do our research. And is it true that a healthy dog will attract fewer fleas and ticks than a dog who has a weakened immune system? It can be depending on many things in general, if their immune system is weaker than absolutely, the problem is much bigger for them. That makes sense. Okay, this is what we've all been waiting for. Adam is going to tell us about his product, which is Tickless and I just I love this product. So Adam, tell us about the science and the technology behind Tickless. What Makes Tickless Different Right. So first of all, we say that people should use the best treatment for themselves and for their dogs as well. We know and we are honest about it that nothing is 100%. Even some chemicals, just killing ticks is not a 100% solution. Natural oil is also not a 100% solution. And also Tickless has a great efficiency level. So we did studies about it, several ones. And the technology itself has been around for more than 20 years now. And we just put the whole science into the Tickless products. So the great thing is that we can have the efficiency level above 90%, which is actually really great. We can actually say that we have the same efficiency level as as the chemicals, but without using any chemicals. So the thing is that it's science based technology. And we use an efficient sound technology in our devices. So all of our devices work with the same methodology. There is just some function differences. And we have it for dogs. We have it for cats, horses, and also for people. And the great thing is that Tickless has zero chemicals in it. It's an absolutely natural product. And the great thing is that you can use it for yourself, you can use it for your dog and basically you can use it for everyone who you love. Yes, and these are ultrasonic devices. So tell us about how the frequency in these devices work against fleas and ticks. The devices themselves have a frequency level around 40 kilohertz. And it's too high for for people of course, because we generally hear only until 20 kilohertz and it's also too high for for most dogs and cats. There are some species that can hear until 45 kilohertz, but still the decibel level is another thing that said it's really important with our sound because it's so low in the device that it's absolutely harmless for all dogs or cats. We have studies about it. But I always say that the best study is just to have a device close to your dog's ear. And we know that they just wouldn't care about it. So just to have an idea about the decibel level, I’m sitting in an empty room right now. And if I'm not talking, the decibel level can be around 50 decibels. And I'm not speaking, nothing is on. So just being quiet itself is is around 50 decibels and Tickless works with around 25 decibels. So that's a really low level. And that's why it's absolutely safe for dogs and cats as well. And also for people. And how are these devices placed or worn? We have two different devices for dogs, and the one that we started selling 10 years ago. That's the Tickless Classic Pet. This is the still the best selling device in our portfolio. Because most of our customers are buying it. This is actually good for the whole season. So you should put it on your dog's collar or harness and it covers their whole body. There are different color options, but they're all the same on the inside. So it's really just a preference of yours which one you are using: the beige, orange or pink one, you can use your favorite color. It goes for all sizes of dogs. So one device is enough for at least six months. And it's on all the time. So your dog should wear the devices all the time, that's what we recommend. Or if your dog is wearing a harness only outside, then we recommend having a Tickless Home Device in your home. Because this way, you can also prevent ticks and fleas in your home. So that's the best thing that that we can offer. Also, there's another device for smaller dogs. There's the Tickless Mini, and that is good for smaller sized pets. So we have a small dog version and also cat version from it. And that was with the same technology. The main difference is that it sticks to the color. So that's why it's good for for smaller pets. And also it's a rechargeable device. Yes. And that's the one that I tested on my dog Winston and I forgot that it was even there it is so small. And you know, he wasn't bothered by it. And it works. You know, I've seen videos of fleas and ticks that are hearing the frequency and, and they it looks like they're having seizures, they're obviously affected by this frequency. It's just so cool. The Tickless Technology Ticks have a so called Haller's organ, so they actually have eyes, but they don't necessarily use it to see. They use their Haller's organ to sense everything around them. So for example, the co2 level in the air, also the temperature level… and Tickless devices actually disturb this Haller's organ. So once a tick is activated, then they get an overdose of information. And that's what's actually causing them to leave. So if you're using Tickless on your dog, and for example, they are going through a tick nest, then they could also get some ticks crawling on them. But they will leave eventually. So you can imagine it like they cannot feel anything around them. They just have a really annoying noise. And they just want to get rid of it. And they just want to get away from it. So for example, in one of the studies that we cover, 94% of the participants had no ticks at all, and 6% had less than before. And none of them had the same amount or more than before. So that we can actually say that we have the same efficiency as the best products on the market but without using any chemicals. And just so everybody knows, Tickless is the number one selling chemical free repellent in Europe, obviously with their studies that has been proven safe and effective. So you can always go to their website to check out the studies. And now you also are available now here in the United States which is awesome. So Adam and his team from Tickless USA are making an outstanding offer that you guys can try these devices. If you go to TicklessUSA.com and use the discount code wagoutloud to receive 15% off of your order. So that's no spaces “WAGOUTLOUD”, and you get 15% off of your order. And I urge you guys to try these amazing products. You will love them, your pets will love them. So one other thing before we sign off today, maintaining your yard is also really important, just as a line of prevention. Is that right, Adam? Yes, absolutely. So keep your grass mowed and remove leaves and clean up brush. Because that's where ticks and fleas love to live. And they'll just hop on and come into your home. So this is a great product. I want you guys to check it out again, that's TicklessUSA.com Instagram: @ticklessusa Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TicklessUSA.official LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/protectone-ltd Adam, do you have any parting words for us? Yeah, just just one more thing, if let's say somebody's not using Tickless already, but they find a tick on themselves or on their dogs, then it's really important to take it out as soon as possible. So checking yourself and your dog after a long walk is essential. And if there are any ticks found around, then you should always consult with your veterinarian or with your doctor to make sure that you're healthy. And you can use this with the special discount offer for yourself and for your dog to do your prevention part. Great advice. Well, Adam, thank you for being here. And thanks for all that you're doing with this amazing technology. We really appreciate you being here. Thank you. It's been great being here. Thanks again to our friends at Tickless USA for sponsoring this month's episodes, and for making such incredible products. Order your Tickless device today by going to TicklessUSA.com And don't forget that code WAGOUTLOUD, no spaces gets you 15% off.

 Kindness Will Get You Everywhere | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:31:06

Hello everyone! This is Krista with Episode #156 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. My dog Winston just turned 13 And over time I've noticed that his eyes are a bit cloudy and he sometimes hesitates when going downstairs. And in full sun, he squints. So I decided to take him to a canine ophthalmologist to get checked out. I just wanted to know if he has the start of cataracts. What I learned was that he actually has lenticular sclerosis, also known as nuclear sclerosis. And the bluish haze that I've seen is not a cataract, but a common normal part of aging. Who knew? Lenticular sclerosis is simply a hardening and thickening of the lens fibers. And with aging, the old fibers in the lens become compacted and create a cloudy appearance in the eye. So I was so relieved to hear that Winston is still able to see, maybe not just as in much detail as he did in his younger years. But fortunately, this is a harmless condition that requires no treatment. But cloudiness of the lens should always be evaluated by a professional to rule out conditions such as cataracts, or glaucoma. Did you already know about lenticular sclerosis? Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Since she was a little girl, Gail Green has always been fascinated with dogs.  She has done rescue work with major disaster response in a variety of places in the USA as well as individual rescue and placement for individual animals.  She founded an award-winning animal assured therapy program in the east Bay - still thriving today and is the Co-founder of the first designated dog park in the country. Gail also authored the book, “Dog Parking It!” which is available on Amazon. Throughout her amazing career, she earned a variety of effective and loving methods to train basic obedience and behavior problem solving ideas and has been fortunate enough to learn from several of the top trainers in the world. Gail’s philosophy has always focused on positive training methods and fear free work. Hello dog lovers! We have another learning opportunity in store as I chat with Gail Green. She's gonna tell us about her input as a trainer of 60 years. Kindness will get you everywhere. Gail, thanks so much for being with us today. You bet. Thank you for having me. This is so exciting. I'm going to ask you to introduce yourself and tell us about how you adopted the philosophy that you use when working with dogs. Yes, I've been training for about 60 years. I started I consider my career that started at six, because I was bitten by a dog across the face. And went home, not feeling scared or bad or whatever. But I couldn't understand what the behavior was. Why? What did I do to cause this behavior. And I started doing reading and started helping other trainers and got me where I am. I am the co founder of the first dog park in the country. And it is still actually going really well. I have written a book about dog parks called Dog Parking It. And it has reviews of 237 parks that I visited in 2008. With my dog, and it was it was an incredible experience. It taught me a lot about people and animals together. Well, you've done a lot. Yeah, I've been very lucky. I've had the motivation, you know, it's working with dogs is just part of who I am. And I found that out when I was six. That's amazing. And you're still going strong. I'm telling you, you know, I just I it's just part of me. I can't not do it. Well, Gail, you're all about kindness in training. And that's what we're going to talk about today. How does that differ from reward or positive reinforcement dog training? What is Kindness in Dog Training? It's very different. Kindness is not about reward. It's about a visceral presence, not keeping track of things not owing and being owed. Just being kind. The energy we put into kindness is paid off 1,000% In the small victories that we’re afforded when we're kind without expectations. So, dog training with kindness, I guess, are you saying that it's using motivation and encouragement as opposed to fear, punishment or reward? Right. The reward is absolutely needed. And we need to be able to communicate our pleasure with them and their success. And that can be through treats through, you know, getting on your knees and hugging him. I want my dog to feel like if I walk into the room, that something wonderful is going to happen. I don't want it to anticipate My response to that kind of thing, I want her, I want her to seek out the fun loving stuff. And not act because she thinks I am going to act a certain way or not. It has something to do for me about dominance and submission. Dominance, to me, is something that dogs do with each other. We don't speak the same language we don't. We act in behaviors in response to them. And in order for them to get the behaviors that we that they want. We expect the response in order to get that response, I want them to want to do it. I want them to see that doing this behavior, whether it's shaking hands, or you know, chasing down a burglar, I want the dog to feel like you know, they're doing it, right. And if they're not, that's my fault. I need to change my response and behavior. And with submission, a lot of times people think that submission is something where you have to be mean and in charge, I see a lot of people continuing to do the rollover, you know, they go over on their back, and you hold them there until they get it. But what they're getting is not necessarily that you're in charge, they're getting that you're being forceful and scary. That's why the behavior changes. I don't want my dog to change her behavior, because she's afraid. Well, Gail, you've been, as we mentioned, that you've been working with dogs for over 60 years. So how has your mindset changed since you started all of this? What’s Changed in 60 years with Dog Training? Yeah, I went with what was happening in training at the time, and that was mostly to obtain graduating to pressure collars, to the E collars, and all of it done about manipulating their behavior with our actions, and not not being kind in the process. But you know, for us, positive reinforcement was you choke the heck out of until they do what they want, what you want, and then use praise, instead of taking every step and talking through it, and being present with it being a support system almost. And when did that change, when during your career did positive reinforcement come in? I was working at different shelters, doing training and teaching classes and that sort of thing. And we were doing, you know, what normal people were doing which was with choke chains. And we had a trainer, who is well known around the country that Jean Donaldson came in and was our boss. And we were all kind of like, Oh, should we expect because he's one of those kindness trainers, you know. And we were all like, nervous about the whole thing, because we didn't want to not do it, right. But we didn't want to be forced to do it her way. And it showed the benefits of kindness that she showed the benefits of understanding what you're dealing with, to in order to get to the motivation that the dog might have. And I was like ecstatic. We started doing shaping of behaviors, we started doing the positive positive you know I’m coming in, but I'm not gonna make you do anything just coming in. And being and that has, that's influenced me so much. And, you know, we weren't, we weren't forced to change it, which was kind of interesting to me, because of that dominance thing. Was this person going to come in and be dominant and have us do it this way. And we were we were challenged. I think that was probably the biggest turning point is when I suddenly got my own Aha. About, you know, looking at the animal, looking at the body language, looking at the face, you know, getting the dog to be comfortable to sit and stare at you. So I'd say probably it was in the 90s that I started to, to make that change they call it the crossover, and just saw the benefits of it. Instead of you know, I mean, if I make a certain clicking sound in my house, she will come running. And it's because there's something there for her. And, you know, it could be a toy, it could be a treat, it could just be me. And I wanted her to get excited about doing what she was doing. Right. And she does. I mean, I have so many pictures I have of her tail is blurry. You know, she's, she's comfortable with all kinds of people. I have to say that the people that had her before me treated her really well. So she came out being confident and silly and happy and she's learned probably faster than any dog I’ve had. And Gail, I know that you mentioned back in the day, the choke and the shock collars, which unfortunately are still being used today. Those E collars are not any better, but really have to think it's not just those methods, but even yelling or jerking the leash. There are so many things that we do when we're training that affect our dogs negatively as well. So why don't all of these negative methods, why don't they work? Negative Training Methods Well, I'm not gonna say they don't work in getting the behavior that people want. They don't work, as indicated by, you know how trusting the dog is. And I saw one video of a guy working with a dog and the dog was just hangdog, the head was down, the tail was under, and the dog would just stop moving, because it's the safest place to be, and yet would get corrected by this collar. And, and, you know, they called the training session that I watched a success because the dog ended up dealing with it. But the dog wasn't even there. I mean, he was just acting on pure fear, and avoiding conflict. So it's really kind of amazing. You know, I mean, I've been told that the reason that I don't find it useful is because I don't know how to do it, right. And I don't know what's right or wrong about pushing a button. And so I've asked people I said, teach me what’s right with it. And there's a lot of negativity between force free trainers, and trainers who use the kind of aversive methods. It’s a them versus us kind of thing. And that's really too bad, because then nobody wins. So you're saying that dogs are, it's better for them to work for something than against it? Right. I want them running to me, not away from me. Well, I wanted to bring up a study that I found it was done in Portugal a couple of years ago. And it addressed the common question that if dogs can learn from both positive training methods, and those that are considered punishment, does the choice of method matter. And I guess the dogs who experienced punishment during this study, were more pessimistic than the dogs that did not get punished. And that makes a lot of sense. So I think this study supports the idea that dogs are harmed, even with the use of the less extreme methods that we talked about. And offers evidence that the use of punishment in training is really a problem for canine welfare, their entire being. A Fearful Dog And the, you know, being grounded or trustworthy, you know, if they have the opportunity to get away from whatever that behavior is, then they're going to do that. I do a lot of work with disaster response, then was down in the south right after Katrina, and watched some of these dogs. So many were, I mean, it wasn't necessarily even negative. Work with them, but, but neglected, work with them, you know, and then somebody suddenly, you know, thinks that then we're gonna get a scared dog to sit and down and stuff. And that’s how we’ll take care of it. W e had several dogs that had clearly been backyard dogs, we had to set them up with igloo, kennels, and, and a 50 foot cord. And we did that we put it right outside of mess hall area. So that they had to get used to at first seeing people walk by. And that was the first step, I had one little chow that I worked with it, she would just panic at the end of the 50 foot cord, if you ever even came within 75 to 100 feet. And at one point, I started to walk up the cable, I would step on it as I went so that she couldn't really go very far. It took me two hours to get 50 feet with her not panicking. And finally was able to like go for a walk and stuff. And you could start to see these little tiny glimpses of her emotional mental healing. When I got to her, I just stood there with my back to her for 20 minutes. And she came over and started sniffing. And then I felt a little nudge in my hand and it was like, ok we're getting there. And not every dog is you're not able to necessarily rehab every dog you work with. And that's, that's something that as a trainer, it's a tough thing to accept. Sure, because you want to help them all. Exactly. And I you know, I finally got to the point where I knew what, what issues I was most comfortable with, and what issues I was no good at. And I had, you know, I think we need to have a lot of self disclosure and honesty about, you know, what our limits are so that we can continue to help the dogs and not just la ti da. That's a great point. Well, Gail, I'm going to stop you there just for a minute so we can take a quick sponsor break and we will be right back. A special thanks to our sponsor of the month, Poochcasso. Of course, we all absolutely love our dogs and I bet that you have many pictures of them on your phone.  Well, why not take that a step further and have a unique and colorful portrait made of your pup!  Bruce is the artist behind Poochcasso and I absolutely love the piece he did of my dog Winston!  Bruce’s art is unlike anything I’ve ever seen and he so perfectly captured Winston’s spirit and personality in such a unique and colorful way.  I even got updates and pictures of the artwork throughout the process.  This is a one-of-a-kind piece that we’ll treasure forever.  These high-quality acrylic portraits on gallery wrapped canvas can be created of ANY animal and come with hanging hardware so you can display them immediately. They arrive carefully packaged and are shipped anywhere in the world at no additional charge. I can’t speak highly enough of Bruce’s work.  Go to poochcasso.com and see for yourself how Bruce can capture your dog and bring such colorful joy to your home.  Be sure to spread the word about these custom keepsakes and all of our Wag Out Loud pawdcast listeners can take advantage of a 20% discount.  That’s right, just use the code WOL when ordering from poochcasso.com and get 20% off of your order.  I’ve included the portrait of Winston (above) so that you can see my finished piece! Welcome back, everybody. We are chatting with Gail Green about training with kindness with our dogs. Gail, obviously this boils down to mutual respect. Can you unpack that? The Must Be Mutual Respect Yeah, I mean, I think the mutual respect and trust comes from us first. You know, I don't want to make a dog. I mean, somebody has pointed out to me that, you know, the fear could be thought of as respect. Okay, he respects me, it's not that simple. You know, when you do the putting down on their back, and you're sitting on top of them, and they're scared to death, and they've stopped their behavior, they haven't stopped it because they go, Oh, you're in charge, okay, I got it. They're just frozen because of the fear. And if they had a chance to do it, they will get out of there. It does change behavior. But it doesn't change it to a place where it's trustworthy. And the motivation is to stay where you are and work together. If somebody doesn't have respect for a dog, that's not the dog’s problem. That's a person's view. And I think kind of ego motivated. You know, he listens to me now, because I did this and that, well, you do this and that, and he's doing it with you, but look at his body language, you know, is he looking at you is he you know, inspired by you? No, he's afraid of you. So he's doing it, so he doesn't have to get hurt. I just I think first of all, you know, eye contact is really important. It's really easy to see the dog's comfort level, but just looking where are they looking at when you're talking to him, I'm my goal is to get her to turn her head sideways every time I talk. And for me to do that, I have to encourage that I have to be the one who takes that first step of respect. And some of it is about like with the little chow that I worked with. She was so scared. And I had to respect that, you know, that's something that's an issue I had to deal with. And if I didn't deal with it, I would never get that nudge that she did in my hand and a little bit of a wag, you know, just walking into a room with a scared dog and sitting on the other side of the room. Well, Gail, you, you bring up the best point because often what appears to be aggressive behavior in dogs is simply fear based. Right. And I think a lot of people don't understand, like, if I have a dog that acts aggressively, maybe toward a stranger, it may simply be that they have fear. And therefore they bark and they growl out of, you know, fear aggression, it is a thing. So it is we are not setting them up for success. Because, you know, for that instance, every time a stranger walks by, this dog is going to learn to fear them even more. Yeah. So we would be setting them up to fail. Fear Might = Aggression Yeah, yes. Well, you know, it's like, bottom line is we have the choice on what they get what they interpret. We make that decision. There was a dog at Katrina that it was probably middle aged-ish pitbull that was in a run that had stacks of straw and hay so he could go high if he wanted to. And that design was out of respect for his fear. And I sat with him for a while and started just kind of throwing treats around and he slowly came down and then he came over to sit by my feet because I had treats on my feet. And just got to the point where I could do, the best I could do is start petting him behind the ears and that kind of thing. People don't want to take that kind of time because it does take more time. But it also creates a more solid dog. A dog with more confidence. People approach from a lot of times that they take a step backwards or so. And if I, if I see that step happen to tell them, we're going to go another way here, because that's what I want to start with, is that step backwards, I want to make a step forward. Meet them where they are. Not with your expectation, right. Right, right. Let them make the decisions on what feels okay. Because if they feel okay, then they're likely to learn better. Well, let's do an experiment. Let's take a dog that either a puppy or an adult dog that does not know how to sit. Okay, we would probably think when we're teaching this dog to sit that we're going to push their butt down to the floor. Can you give us an example, how would you train a dog to sit out of kindness? Teaching Sit with Kindness What I do use rewards, and I do then randomize them, so they don't know when it's gonna come with a puppy, I will run the reward right past their nose, then usually, they will start to pay attention to it. And then I will just run it over their head a little bit. And I usually get a sit, because that's where the body is gonna go. So what they learn, I don't give a command first, when I'm teaching a new behavior, I get the behavior first. I don't want to waste commands, I don't want to have them hear sit 10 times, and then we push them down that teaches from nothing. What that teaches, is that they're going to wait for number 11. So what, what I'll do is start off with play. If you've got a shy dog, or that kind of thing, I don't go towards the dog with play, I go away from them with play. And that can influence them in thinking, Okay, if I step forward, not, it's not gonna happen badly. And I really want that toy, just working with them, to motivate them. And that's the key thing is motivation. I think, you know, if you're motivated to run out of fear, that's what you're gonna do. And each dog is different in motivation. But with a puppy, I will walk around and I'll make sure that that sit behavior is kind of generalized, I'll go into different rooms and that kind of thing, do the treat at their nose, if they jump, the treat us goes away, and then I'll do the treat again. And if they get bored, or tired, or don't know what to do, they will oftentimes sit just to think, and then they get the treat. So you have to wait it out. There's a lot of patience involved. Yeah, yeah, there was a young puppy, it was a little German Shepherd puppy in the shelter. And we were doing the Open Paw program with them. And I was showing the volunteers, this is how we get a sit from inside the kennel. And to hold the treat right outside the kennel door, let them smell it, almost touch it, let them get really frustrated. If a behavior doesn't work, a dog will change that behavior. So if enough times pawing at it and stuff doesn't get them the treat, they're gonna start to ponder what's going on, and most likely sit partly out of frustration, then they get the treat. And so the you can see the brain working. It’s like, wait a minute, what did I do that got me that treat? And this little guy, finally he got he got frustrated. And he did the sit. But he did it. He got went back to the back of the kennel and sat in his bed. And I threw the treat. So he put in another step. That was part of his interpretation of what I wanted. So I would hold the treat out and he would run back to his bed and sit, which is great. I mean, in the shelter. That's a good presentation. But we did have, you know, the different breeds are gonna have different kinds of motivation as well. And we had a little foxhound puppy, and she came to the front of the kennel, and she didn't sit, she did a play bow. And she stayed in that play bow until she got her treat. So when people would come up to look at the dogs, they would all run to the front of the kennel quiet, nobody jumping around. They would all sit right there. You know, people weren’t walking around with their fingers in their ears with the barking. The motivation was, this was you know, the motivation for most dogs is often food related or toy related, and making sure that you follow through when they do what you've asked them to do. Well, let's talk about your dog Frolic. She is adorable by the way and obviously loves to learn as all dogs do and they need mental stimulation. So how do you work with Frolic every day to make her want to get up every day and do things with you? Well, first of all, she's a real chowhound. So she will, if it looks like it might be food, she'll do whatever you want. But she loves life. And when I got her, she was just kind of, you know, she was a happy dog. But she wasn't, she was like, she wasn't expecting anything back. And so she in the first two weeks that I had her, she had no training, when I got her. The first two weeks that I had her, she learned 20 commands. And I tried to make sure I'm doing them different times different places on different surfaces, I'm doing them alone in the house and out in the crowd, just get her so that it's about the behavior, not the environment, I try to introduce new behaviors fairly often every few days or so. And then we work on those and she gets them so fast. I mean, she just like this sponge. So it's a pleasure for me as well. And she you know, and I tried to do silly commands you know, with with behavior so that people can also enjoy it. I had a sheltie that would roll over on her back when I said seduce. So if you could put some humor and play in everything, she was afraid to go into the bathroom. And most dogs are waiting at the door. But she was afraid to go in. So I just did a path of treats in and then back out of the bathroom. So she got something for staying there, she got something for leaving there. And she got two different commands in there. And you've told me in the past, you want her to expect fun and surprises and you actually say, parties. Training Should be Fun! A party party. Yeah. And that's, you know, think about when you're a kid, what kind of what kind of things motivated you as a kid. There were times when you got a positive response to those things, you got rewarded by being often asked to do the same thing again, which in itself can be a reward. It's about feeling also worthy. You know, Frolic knows that she can, I can actually move her around my house just by pointing. And she can do commands. And you know, her favorite thing is sort of run up the little steps, we have at my couch. And she'll run up there and run to the other end of the couch and wait and then I’ll point to the chair to go jump in the chair. You know, she anticipates the fun of it. You know, most dogs don't like baths. So I'll take her in the bath and the bathtub dry and give her treats and stuff. And then she gets a jump up. So we make it so that it isn't about something negative. It's going to happen. It's about here and now. Well, Gail, this has been amazing, and I can't believe our time is running out. But I guess in essence, what you're trying to convey to us that lives with our dogs is a true partnership, that we need to respect each other. Have patience with them. Because we are different species we speak different languages. So as we wrap up, what would you like to leave us with? Just a couple of sentences here. Kindness is simply about noticing and honoring each other. I honor my little stubby dog as she wags 24/7 The response in anticipation. And kindness is not just positive response to behaviors, but acceptance and enhancement of being alive and sharing our time together. I love that is so profound. And you hit it on the head. That's what life is all about. Right? Right. Well, Gail, thank you so much. I can't believe you've done so much for so many dogs in 60 plus years. That's just amazing. So thank you for your heart and teaching us through all that you've learned. Where can everybody find out more information about you? Or if people have questions? How can they get in contact with you? I do have a Facebook page. Okay, Gail Green, located in Forest Grove, Oregon. And that's probably the best way to go. Instagram: joopie2 email: bgdogs1@yahoo.com All right, Facebook. Well, give little Frolic a squeeze for me. And thank you so much, Gail. I appreciate your time today. All right, thank you so much. Thanks again to this month’s sponsor, Poochcasso.  I highly recommend that you check out Bruce’s work! Just send a picture of your pup and Bruce will create  a one-of-a-kind portrait of your special friend.  Remember to use the discount code WOL when ordering at Poochcasso.com to receive 20% off!

 Got Mussels? | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:35:38

Hello there this is Krista with Episode #155 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. After so many dog food recalls, and confusion as to what commercial brands we can trust, many of us have decided to make our dog's food ourselves. Now, that's love, right? You might be purchasing organic and pasture raised and pasture finished ingredients. But are you sure that the meals that you're preparing are nutritionally balanced? The fact is that most DIY diets are lacking some major nutrients. And back in 2013, the UC Davis Veterinary School, published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, that only nine of the 200 homemade recipes that were tested, actually met the minimum nutrient standards for dogs established by the Association of American Feed Control Officials. And that's also referred to as AFFCO. All the others were nutritionally incomplete or out of balance. So if your dog appears to be healthy on a homemade diet, I encourage you to be absolutely sure. Most of the recipes found on the internet are deficient in key nutrients that our pups need to be healthy, and they can only get it from the food that they eat. So my recommendation is to work with a board certified veterinary nutritionist or there are two great resources to help ensure that your recipes are nutritionally complete and balanced. Check out PetDiets at https://www.petdiets.com/ or BalanceIT at https://secure.balanceit.com/, two great websites that are super easy to use. And of course, I highly recommend any recipes from The Canine Health Nut, Nikki, she's also a registered veterinary technician and expert in dog nutrition. She has fantastic complete and balanced home cooked dog food recipes, so check her out. So if you're gonna commit the time, the cost, the effort and the love into making your dog's meals from scratch, please do it right by being absolutely certain that they are getting all the nutrients in the correct ratios to thrive. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Dr. John Howie is the Co-Founder & Chief Innovation Officer of Lintbells – Home of YuMOVE, the UK’s #1 veterinary hip & joint supplement, used by over 1.7 million dogs each year. John started his career in science, with a PhD in Molecular Genetics, and moved into the commercial world in 1997, working in various European food raw material and health businesses. In 2006, he co-founded Lintbells after spotting a gap in the pet nutritional health market for a natural supplement that combined a scientific approach with raw material quality and functionality. With a strong focus on product quality, effectiveness, and outstanding consumer satisfaction, Lintbells is one of the fastest-growing companies in the UK, selling products such as joint, skin, and digestive supplements to health-conscious dog, cat, and horse owners in more than 15 countries. Hello dog lovers. Welcome to another informative episode of the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. And today I'm chatting with Dr. John Howie about the significance of green lipped mussels. I'm so excited about this! Dr. Howie welcome to the show. Thank you for the kind invitation. It's a pleasure to be with you. Well, I'm gonna have you introduce yourself and tell us why you originally started researching the effectiveness of green lipped mussels for canine joint health. Sure, so yeah, so my name is John Howie. I'm the Co Founder and Chief Innovation Officer of a company called Lintbells. We have a brand called YuMove, which is our joint supplement. And we're actually the UK’s #1 joint supplement for dogs. And now over in the USA as well. That's wonderful. And what got you into green lipped mussels and their effectiveness, especially in joint health for dogs? Effectiveness of Green Lipped Mussels Well, we were looking at developing a joint supplement for dogs. And we were looking at all the reasons why dogs get stiff as they get older. And we were looking at the products that were available to pet parents to look after their pets. And one of the things we identified was that one of the key reasons that dogs start to struggle is they start to get much more uncomfortable as they're moving around. So we were keen to try and find active ingredients that will help them to ease their discomfort and help to move more easily. And so we were looking at all of the research, the scientific research that was available to us to indicate which ingredients would do a good job and in that work out came lots of good scientific evidence to support the use of green lipped mussels and that's why we started looking at them. Well let's get into this. You know, this show focuses mostly on holistic and integrative approaches to canine health. So I'm so excited to see that more and more dog parents I think are turning to more natural approaches to keep their dogs healthy. And when we look at the conventional treatments for joint issues, of course, we think of the NSAIDs or the non steroidal anti inflammatory drugs that really can do more harm than good. I think a lot of people don't realize that they can cause ulcers, liver, kidney damage, and even damage the actual joints and soft tissues. So I'm excited to talk about a natural approach, especially with the mussels. So why are green lipped mussels specifically such a great supplement for joint issues? What does it do? One of the key components of green lipped mussels is their Omega 3 content. So they have a number of different Omega 3s, which are really good for easing stiffness in the joints. So it's taking a natural approach to managing that issue. But green lipped mussels specifically have a unique combination. So you get omega threes in lots of different ingredients, fish oils, and flax oil and so on. But the unique combination in green lipped mussel has a particularly strong effect, and so provides that natural relief that many dogs are looking for. That's great. So in addition to the omega three fatty acids, green lipped mussels also have vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, it has glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate. So how cool is that? Because I know a lot of people that take supplements for themselves or for their animals. It's synthetically manufactured supplements and this wonderful green lipped mussel has everything naturally, which I think is wonderful. Yeah, they are fantastic sources of, as you said, lots of different beneficial ingredients within them. And alongside things like chondroitin sulfate, there are a number of those are called glycosaminoglycans. They are a particular type of natural compound that's great for joint structure, for example, there's actually several different types within just within the green lipped mussel itself. But part of the reason for that is the place where they live in New Zealand. They live in the fresh, clear waters of New Zealand, coastal waters in New Zealand. And so they're accumulating lots of natural ingredients coming up through the water, and the ocean currents, and then concentrating them in this superfood, which we now use for joint health. And aren’t they considered the filters in the ocean.? And that's why they have so many bioavailable compounds? That's right. They're essentially they are what they eat. They are filtering nutrients out of the water. And the beauty of the areas where we source our green lipped mussels from is those particular waters are very rich in these natural nutrients. And so there are lots of different types of green lipped mussel, qualities and contents that you can get. But the ones that we're utilizing, are located in areas where we know there's much more of those nutrient flows, which they are as you say they are filtering out of the water and concentrating them as they as they grow. So again, we have to say these green lipped mussels are only found in New Zealand. Is that right? New Zealand Waters That's correct. Yeah, they’re only found and the New Zealand has called them green shell. So it's either green shell mussel, green lipped mussels is what we normally refer to them as. But yes, they only grow. In New Zealand, there are mussels, there are all sorts of species of mussels growing around the world. But these particular type are only found in New Zealand. And that's where a lot of the research has been done to identify them and their beneficial effects for dogs. Well, let's talk about the research because I know that there have been studies and I know you probably know all of them. So can you just share some of the research that is coming out about this magic superfood? Studies on Green Lipped Mussels Certainly. The first studies were done are actually done in humans. So there was quite a lot of work done looking at the effect on human health. And then there was some more research in the early 2000s looking at their benefits for particularly for joint health in dogs. And that was some of the first research we looked at. And over time, there has been an increasing body of evidence being built up an increasing amount of research looking at green lipped mussels themselves and what's in them and how that affects joint health. As a company, we've then taken that research one step further or several steps further, in fact, so we've run our own clinical studies, looking at the effect of our green lipped mussels within our product, YuMove. And identifying the specific ratios that have the greatest effect. So we've identified unique combinations of omega threes that have the greatest effect for dogs. And then we've utilized that research further, to continue to develop our range and, and develop our offerings. So we now understand what levels of what types of green lipped mussels have what effect on the dog. So it's deepening that understanding of these, these creatures all the time. And I think I read in one of the studies that there was such a significant improvement in pain and mobility compared to dogs that were just given a placebo, that nearly 75% of the dogs that were taking green lipped mussel did not need any additional pain meds. So there has been some work absolutely looking at that, that sort of side of things. And so you do see some quite dramatic effects. As you it takes a bit of time, it's not an instant effect, it's not feed them one day, and they're magically fixed the next you have to build this up over time. So it can take up to four or six weeks to really build the levels of these compounds up. And to see that benefit. But having done that, then you do see quite significant changes in in the mobility of those dogs and dogs that were struggling to move around in the house or stuck in their basket or on their bed, and not being able to get out very easily. And then within a few weeks, our customers are phoning up and saying that you've given me my puppy back. He is running around the park and chasing balls and enjoying life again. And that's essentially what we're about. And we're trying to help those dogs to enjoy their life again, rather than being bored at home as it were. And I love that because inevitably, with us and with our dogs as we age, osteoarthritis is bound to be knocking on the door. So this just prolongs that and gives them such a better quality of life. And another cool thing about green lipped mussels is there are no side effects, like there are with the medications that are typically given. Yeah, and in fact, you can see some positive benefits, not just in joints. But you know, for example, there is some research that's shown that it, it reduces some of the the effects you might see in the stomach, for example. So when you're getting some inflammation in other areas, that can help as well. Those same properties and benefits that we're looking at for the joints can also be beneficial elsewhere in the body. That's great. Well, we love to geek out here on this show. So I really urge our listeners to look more into the research that's been done. Because over the past 40 years, there's been about 150 publications that have reported the health benefits of green lipped mussels. So as Dr. Howie mentioned, there's so much beyond just controlling inflammation as far as the benefits. How long after giving dogs, green lipped mussel could we see improvement in mobility? You mentioned it doesn't happen overnight, as with natural remedies, of course, that's the case. But when can we see an improvement? How Long Before We Can See a Difference? So we typically say four to six weeks. But we do get some owners reporting effects much quicker. So to a degree, it depends upon the dog. But some, some will tell us they've seen a difference within a week, two weeks, it really depends on the sort of condition of the dog in the first place. But also then the strength of the product that they're using, because we have a range of strengths. And so for example, if you use our veterinary strength products, something called YuMove advanced 360. That's much higher strength green lipped mussels, so you would expect to see an effect quicker with a higher strength product. But all of our products are clinically proven. So it's not that there's only one or the other is the whole range is proven, but it's just as you increase the amount that you give on a daily basis, you would expect to see an effect faster. Okay, can you talk a little bit about how not only NSAIDs but also green lipped musssels are COX inhibitors? So what does that mean? And what is what's happening in the body? COX Inhibitors? So a COX enzyme is the enzyme that is creating well it can do, you can do one of two things. They can either create what we call pro inflammatory mediators. So compounds that increase the amount of inflammation in the body, or they can produce anti inflammatory mediators. So compounds that reduce the amount of inflammation in the body. Classically, you would expect them to be producing these pro inflammatory mediators as part of a normal reaction, normal immune reaction or an inflammation reaction. And some of that is useful. So if you're talking about a COX two inhibitor. Some of these drugs that you refer to, they're knocking that enzyme out. So they're knocking out the effect of that enzyme. We're looking at things slightly differently, because all of these enzymes are using Omega, usually Omega 6 oils, which will be expressed in that there'll be in the dog's diet anyway, just from their normal food. And those will tend to be converted into these pro inflammatory compounds. What we're doing with green lipped mussels is we're providing these very specific omega 3s, which basically are competing, so they're trying to provide the anti inflammatory path instead of the proinflammatory path in that for the for that enzyme. So we're essentially changing the way in which that enzyme is is operating, but without knocking it out. Whereas nonsteroidals will be trying to knock out the effect of that enzyme. So we're trying to use a natural nutritional route to managing the challenges that the dog might be experiencing rather than a pharmaceutically mediated one. That makes sense. Well, I think now is a great time to take a quick commercial break. So sit tight, everybody, we will be right back. A special thanks to our sponsor of the month, Poochcasso. Of course, we all absolutely love our dogs and I bet that you have many pictures of them on your phone.  Well, why not take that a step further and have a unique and colorful portrait made of your pup!  Bruce is the artist behind Poochcasso and I absolutely love the piece he did of my dog Winston!  Bruce’s art is unlike anything I’ve ever seen and he so perfectly captured Winston’s spirit and personality in such a unique and colorful way.  I even got updates and pictures of the artwork throughout the process.  This is a one-of-a-kind piece that we’ll treasure forever.  These high-quality acrylic portraits on gallery wrapped canvas can be created of ANY animal and come with hanging hardware so you can display them immediately. They arrive carefully packaged and are shipped anywhere in the world at no additional charge. 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 New Leash on Life | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:28:55

Hi, this is Krista with Episode #154 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Just a reminder that you should check out all of the amazing trusted brands that I highly recommend. I have tried so many products and services, and I only promote the ones that I know, like and trust. And of course, I've tried everything on my dog Winston. And these are products that will also help your dog to thrive. Just go to https://www.wagoutloud.com/ and check out the trusted brands section. And I've negotiated discounts for most of the products, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life? Here's an interesting fact. Puppies grow to half their body weight in the first four to five months, and then take a year or more to gain the other half of their body weight. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Liz Rubinstein Co-Founded GingerLead Dog Support & Rehabilitation Harnesses to help her dog, Ginger, recover from orthopedic surgeries and to stay mobile when she had arthritis.  They have helped dogs around the world with mobility problems since 2008.  Liz is also an attorney and mediator.  As a mediator, she helps people resolve conflicts outside of court and especially likes to help people with conflicts about animals. Hi there dog lovers! Let's learn something new today as I chat with Liz Rubenstein. And Liz is going to cover the topic, New Leash on Life. And we're going to chat about helping dogs that have orthopedic issues. And that includes surgery, injury, arthritis or any other conditions that impact mobility. Liz, welcome to the show. Thank you Krista. iI's great to be here. I appreciate you having me. Well, we've had this on the calendar for quite some time. So I am excited to get into this topic. Because many of us have faced or are going to inevitably have to deal with mobility issues with our dogs. So Liz, could you please introduce yourself and share why are you so passionate about addressing these mobility issues and needs? So it's really out of experience. My husband and I adopted littermate Golden Retriever puppies, and we had a male and a female and the female one always seemed to be on the bottom to be kind of struggling against her brother. And at first we thought it was just because she was a female and she wasn't muscularly as strong as he was. And then over time, we started noticing things that were struggles for her. And really it was when she started struggling going up our stairs at just four months old that we took her to the vet and said there's something wrong here and it turned out she had severe hip dysplasia and had to have major reconstructive orthopaedic hip surgery at six months old. And that started a journey with her throughout her entire life of mobility challenges. She had a second surgery when she was four years old on the knee on the opposite side. And then of course, when she was older, she had arthritis. And through that journey, we ended up creating a business out of creating something to help her recover from her orthopedic surgery. And so we've been in the business of helping dogs with orthopedic problems all around the world since 2008. Oh my gosh, and that was Ginger, right? Poor Ginger. That was Ginger, right. Oh my gosh, that's so many issues. Well, this is not uncommon. And first thing that comes to mind, for me to be ahead of any of these issues is diet. And we know that it is an epidemic that so many dogs are overweight or obese. So do you want to talk about that a little bit? Weight Control Oh, yeah. So the very first surgery that Ginger had when she was just six months old. One of the things her surgeon told us after that surgery was that one of the best things we could do for her for the rest of her life and she had already started out with such bad orthopedic problems was to keep an eye on her weight to make sure she was at a normal weight or perhaps even a little bit less than what most consider a normal weight. And she was a big golden retriever. She was about 80 pounds. And but she was a thin 80 pound golden retriever she had a big frame and that was just a huge benefit for her going forward in her life. She did develop arthritis when she was 10 but she had knee surgery at six months old or knee surgery at four years old hip surgery at six months old and She was solid on both of those joints up until we lost her at about 12. So keeping her weight down was key to that, she also was on some special diet that we went to a holistic veterinarian, and she gave us special things to give to her to help maintain her health and mobility. So that was key for us. That's great. Another thing I wanted to hit on was exercise. Because a lot of people think as our dog's age, maybe we do not exercise as much. But I know that there are studies that show that aging dogs that get regular exercise, that actually helps to reduce the pain that's caused by arthritis. And arthritis can actually be caused by the lack of muscle movement or atrophy. So what did you do with exercise with Ginger? Exercise Yeah, mobility is very important, and you want to keep them going. So as dogs age, sometimes if they're very active, and this is applied to Ginger, it applies to my dog that I have right now. My dog’s about to turn 9, and we were noticing is starting to have some mobility problems. So instead of doing the longer outings that are more intense with him, we tend to do more shorter outings to keep him moving, that keep him moving in a safe manner. So yeah, as dogs age, just like people, you know, if you don't move around, and you have arthritis, your muscles will atrophy. And that doesn't help. And that doesn't help with the pain either. So to keep the dogs mobile, you can do all sorts of things. There are places if you're not sure what to do with your dog, or what's appropriate. One of the things that we found was dog physical therapy, and rehabilitation. That's one of the things we did after Ginger’s surgeries, and also when she was older with arthritis. So there's this whole professional group of veterinarians and professional animal physical therapists, that can help people understand what's appropriate for the dog. So for example, for Ginger when she was older and arthritic, they not only had us take her for more frequent, shorter walks, they taught us exercises to do at home. So since her hips were an issue, they taught us these exercises where we would have her go around in a circle to make sure she maintained the muscle mass to support her joints in her hips. That had been a problem from the very beginning. What are some What are some of the steps because we know when dogs actually show signs of arthritis and joint pain, that it's pretty far along? If they're showing that because a lot of dogs hide their discomfort as we know. So if somebody is starting to realize our dogs are struggling a little bit more, they're not as active. They don't want to jump up on the couch or hesitant with steps. What are some steps that you suggest that we take to make sure that we keep them in as little pain as possible? How to Assist a Dog with Mobility Issues Yeah, so And actually, that's exactly what happened with Ginger when she was 10 and became arthritic, we worried that it was actually her other hip and she was going to need surgery again. So we took her back to her orthopedic surgeon. And what he told us and He sent us a study about was that a multimodal approach is what he recommended. And he said, you know, some things work better for some dogs in some circumstances, and other things work better for other dogs. So we took the list of potential things to do, and started with the first one, which was going to the dog physical therapist. And what they did with her first was let her go in an underwater treadmill, where they can see her and monitor her and the water makes her somewhat buoyant. And they can control the speed of the treadmill to help her maintain as much mobility and strength as she could. They also taught us those exercises like the circle exercises, and they gave laser therapy. And that would all happen at the same place on a regular basis. I think we took her for about five treatments and she was dramatically improved, we could tell by how she would get up and lay down how she would go up and down the steps to move around how much she wanted to play. We could tell she was definitely doing better. So then we tried acupuncture. And that quite honestly we didn't see as much improvement with but we did see her gait improve and her posture improved and she loved it. So we kept doing that as well. And eventually we also worked in some chiropractic care for her which also helped with she had a funny gait from that very first surgery and that did help her gait even more. So what we ended up doing was we called it spa day. And every two weeks, we would take Ginger to one of these treatments, we would do the physical therapy, and then the acupuncture and then back to the physical therapy, and then the chiropractic based on where we saw the best results for her. So that underwater treadmill and laser therapy, and now they also have Soundwave therapy that's offered too. So it's really a multi modal approach. And we took it one step at a time, so we could see the improvement from each thing. Now, granted, we did the first thing when she had the biggest problem. So it might have been partially that that was just the first thing we did. But we wanted to be able to evaluate each one so we could figure out which things were the best for her. And we were able to have her improve her mobility over a period of two years, and she was on virtually no drugs. And she did amazing and there are all because of products out there that you can use. For example, Ginger started having a struggle and a lot of older dogs have this getting up on our hardwood and tile floors. So we discovered a product called Toe Grips, which are little rubber cylinders that you can put on your dog's toenails. And it gives them more traction when they push to get up from lying down on a slick surface. And we'd also tried runners, you know, all over the place rugs with rubber backing, she didn't want to lie on those. She was very furry and it was hot. And she would always try to lie on the slick surface. We bought the toe grips, and I was skeptical at first, but I was stunned the first time we put them on her at how much it decreased the effort needed by her to get up from lying down on those slick surfaces. It was an amazing improvement. You mentioned that Ginger had issues at a very early age. What are your thoughts on? Why, you know, Golden Retrievers obviously are a very popular breed. Do you have to think that there might have been an issue with the lineage in her breeding? Do you think that had anything to do with it? What should we look out for as far as especially the purebreds? Yeah, yeah, I suspect there was an issue and we did contact her breeder and we had littermates. So we had a male and female dog from the same litter, the male dog didn't have orthopedic issues at all. But we did contact the breeder and let them know. And her hips were “certified” at the time, so she was supposed to have been checked out for that. So yeah, and we took her to the vet when we first had her and had her checked out. And yeah, it wasn't until weeks later that we discovered the problem and they did full x rays. And we took her to the orthopedic surgeon to fully diagnose what the trouble was. And with Ginger too, she was kind of an odd case, because on her left knee. Normally what dogs of her size would have would be a CCL like an ACL in human problems. Hers was a luxating patella. And that's something that you see often in like chihuahuas, smaller dogs, so she had odd joints, but her littermate did not. So I wish I could give you more insight into that. I know purebreds sometimes do have more issues with that. But since I had two littermates from the same breeder from the same litter that didn't have the same problem. I'm not sure that was it, but we did notify the breeder to let them know but I would say with any dog just watch your dog and if you see trouble, find the people that can help. Go to your veterinarian, go to the specialist if need be so that you can figure it out and help the dog. Good advice. Well, Liz, I think this is a great time to go ahead and take a commercial break. So hold on everybody. We'll be right back back. A special thanks to the team at Tickless USA for being our monthly sponsor.  I am so thrilled to share this great company and their products with those who want to prevent ticks and fleas without the use of toxic chemicals.  “That’s right! No more harmful chemicals need to be applied to your dog! Tickless devices are ultrasonic flea and tick repellers that emit a series of ultrasonic pulses that humans, pets and wildlife can’t hear. These outstanding patented products are the #1 selling chemical-free repellents in Europe that are proven safe in multiple studies. They offer various versions to be worn on the collar and they also have units for the home. And they are not only for pets, but they have tick repellents for people as well. You can’t go wrong with these environmentally friendly, chemical and fragrance-free ultrasonic devices, making them perfectly safe to use for your entire family.   Order your tickles device today by going to ticklessusa.com and use the discount code WAGOUTLOUD to receive 15% off of your order. And here we are with Liz Rubenstein. And we are talking about a New Leash on Life and the issues with mobility. And Liz unfortunately has lived with her dog Ginger that had all of these mobility issues and surgery and arthritis. So Liz, you already told us about some of the treatments that these dogs could benefit from. We talked about the physical therapy, chiropractic, acupuncture, there's also cold laser therapy, and sound therapy. And did you do massage at home with her as well? Yes, they did teach us some massages. And the physical therapy also came with massage. I didn't mention that. But that was part of her treatment there as well. Great. And besides the toe grips, and I know you mentioned the rugs with a rubber backing. I know some people use yoga mats throughout their houses for better traction. What other products are there out there to assist dogs with mobility issues that you like? Car Ramps One of the key ones for us was to get a ramp for the car. (I recommend this one and have a 20% discount with code WOL) So Ginger was a very exuberant dog, as many of them are and jumping in and out of the car with the joint problem she had was just not good for her. So we bought a ramp and anyone buying a ramp, I would also encourage you to do some training with the ramp and to just if your dog is having these problems, kind of look at it from their perspective. So we bought a ramp for the car. And at first, we just laid it out in our yard and taught her to just walk across it because it's a strange experience for a dog. Ours was a metal thing with grippies on it, and it sounds funny. So we would just put treats on it and have her walk across it. And then we have a short step up to our patio. So we put it on a very slight incline and, and repeated it. And then a little bit more and then we took it to the car. And then she used it with our car for years to help decrease any problems she might have caused or injury she might have jumping in and out of the car. So yeah, I used that car ramp for a long, long time. Well, you mentioned in and out of the car, what are your thoughts with dogs throughout their life? Jumping on and off of furniture? That impact has to come into play? Right? Yeah. Oh, and I see that a lot with Dachshunds, in particular dogs that are prone to back problems. And yeah, I would suggest having those stairs or ramps wherever you can or teach the dogs not to get on the furniture, whatever works for you and your household and your dog. But yet the same thing that applies to the car would apply to the couch or the bed anytime a dog is jumping up and down like that. So if you had to put a price tag on Ginger’s surgeries, as well as her ongoing therapy, do you know how much all of that came together to be? Wow, I don't I can think back and this was years ago. So let’s see… her first surgery would have been in 2004. So even the cost that we incurred would be way out of date. But I'd say between the two surgeries and the therapies. We were well over $10,000 Definitely. Yeah. And today it would be more because it's been so long ago. So what are your thoughts on prevention? You know, there are so many products out there joint supplements, do you feel they help to start at a younger age to you know, there's ones with collagen or chondroitin or glucosamine? Prevention Yes, so Ginger. That was another thing that Ginger’s surgeon recommended not only for her, but also for her littermates since they were genetically the same was Glucosamine and Chondroitin their entire lives. And that was about all that was available back then. Now I know there are some products with green lipped mussels and other things like that. And I would say talk to your veterinarian, see what they recommend. I know they're seeing really good results with those and we did have Ginger and her littermate on that and maybe that helped with her littermate not having those problems. Because we definitely did that their entire lives and Dasuquin is out there. Yeah, there are many, many supplements that can help with that. Yep. You are an expert in all of this because you lived through it, and you even developed a product to offer support and assistance for dogs that either need temporary help if they've had surgery or if they need long term help, if they're aging and have arthritis. So why don't you tell us about the GingerLead and how that came to be? Creation of the GingerLead Sure. So the same story, Ginger having her orthopedic surgeries, she needed something to help her recover. So when we would pick her up from surgery, just like if you imagine yourself having surgery on a hip or a knee, you go home and you would normally have crutches. So when we picked her up, they said, Okay, we broke her hip in three places and put it back together with pins and screws. So take her home and for a little while, she needs to only go outside to go potty, and not run or jump or spin. Well, this was a six month old puppy and the surgeon took her pain away for the first time and it was her first snow here in Colorado. So all she wanted to do was run and jump and spin. And at that time, the standard was and often is still used, a bath towel, they handed us a towel and said sling this under her belly and support her weight when she goes outside to go to the bathroom. So we were trying to support her weight, hold a wadded bath towel, hold the leash in the other hand to keep her from running around. And it was like a rodeo at our house. There's no way in and out of our house without stairs. And she wanted to run down the stairs and we worried we were all going to end up in a heap at the bottom and she wanted to chase squirrels and snowflakes and her brother and oh, it was just crazy. So when she was at her second surgery, and we had been through this once, we were determined to find a way to make it more comfortable for her because the bath towel would bunch up under her belly like a rope kind of and easier for us. So what we created was a nice padded belly sling. And for male dogs it has a cutout in it as well. And it has a height adjustable handle for the person to hold on to. And the handle also has a leash attached. So you can attach the leash to a collar to keep the dog from running ahead of you. Or when Ginger was older, we would attach it to a chest harness so that if she stumbled going down the stairs, you're not pulling on a collar we had her under the chest and under the belly. She was essentially a dog suitcase. And we didn't create it initially to start a business. We were just helping Ginger recover. But then my husband and I, some of the veterinary technicians at the specialty hospital, having the same struggle with her she went running down the hallway at the hospital. They were chasing after her. So we decided to show her surgeon and he helped us get our patents and we've we named it after her. It's called GenderLead. And we've been selling it all around the world since 2008 now. Yes, and it is a fantastic product. And what would you say differentiates the GingerLead from similar products on the market? Is it the built in leash? Or are there other aspects of it? The leash attachment, the padding, the cutout for the male dogs, our mini size for all those dachshunds is unique out there. Yeah, there are a number of features that set us apart. Well, I can I can just think of off the top of my head. So many uses. Not only, you know, to help rehabilitate after surgery, but I think you said this works on cats as well, right? Yes, we've helped several cats, we have a picture on our website of a little kitten using it. We've had goats, pigs… Anything goes. And then we just had Jim and Rene on a previous episode from Tripawds. So you know some dogs that unfortunately have to get a limb amputated, this would be great for them to use in the beginning until they get used to living on three legs. And yes, to your point, you know, helping up and down stairs or in and out of your car. So it is a great product that makes life so much easier, not only for the dog or whatever animal we're talking about. But for us as well. I mean, if we're trying to pick up a larger dog to go outside, let's say, we could hurt ourselves our own backs. Yeah, vet techs are some of our biggest fans because their backs hurt trying to use a towel and whether it's a big dog or a small dog, a big dog has more weight, but a small dog is lower to the ground. So imagine these dachshunds that have back surgery oftentimes have paralyzed hind legs while they start recovering. And imagine trying to bend down to the level of dachshund to support them to help them get their legs moving again. So our mini size is much more petite and has a really long handle so you can still stand up straight so yeah, it is it does definitely help take the strain off the person's back while assisting the dog with their balance and mobility. How many sizes does the GingerLead come in? Seven, but three of them have male/female versions. So it's really four but male, female, the mini size is unisex, and the rest of them have a male/female. Great. Well, so they fit every size dog. And we wanted to make a great offer for anybody that would like to buy the GingerLead. I am an affiliate. And as you guys know, I only affiliate with manufacturers of products that I've tried, I know, like and trust. So if you would like to get a GingerLead for your dog, the affiliate code is WOL and that gets you 10% off at https://www.gingerlead.com/ . So Liz, as we are wrapping up here, what would you like to leave us with today? I would just say that if your dog is having trouble, think about it. The way you would think about yourself and talk to your veterinarian, do research. There are so many services and products out there to help dogs. And also be aware of how your dog is looking to you. One of the things that I did when Ginger was recovering from surgery is I felt bad for her. So I would say Oh, come on, come on, come on, let's go. And she would sense that in the change in my voice and I didn't even know I was doing it. My husband pointed it out to me. And as soon as he pointed it out, I conscientiously went out and put the GingerLead under her and said heel in a regular tone of voice and everything was much better. So sometimes we humans can help a lot by doing the research and looking at it from our dog's perspective, but they also feed off our energy and our tone. So try to help them by being conscientious of what they're going through and also of how they're reacting to us. That's great advice. Well, Liz, where can everyone find out more information about you and GingerLead? On our website at https://www.gingerlead.com/          Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/gingerleaddogsling          Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/Gingerlead/          LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/gingerlead Wonderful. Well, Liz, thank you so much for being here and for creating such a wonderful product. We really appreciate you. Thank you for having me, Krista. It's been a pleasure. We want to again thank our friends at Tickless USA for sponsoring today’s episode and for making such incredible products.  Order your Tickless device today by going to ticklessusa.com and don’t forget that the code WAGOUTLOUD (no spaces) gets you 15% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode? Don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE and please leave a review: Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify I Stitcher I iHeartRADIO The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. The host as well as guests who speak on this podcast express their own opinions, experience and conclusions, and Wag Out Loud LLC neither endorses or opposes any particular views discussed here.

 Loving Life on Three Legs | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:32:27

Hi, thanks for being here. This is Krista with Episode #153 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Have you heard that feeding your dog a raw food diet is unsafe? Or maybe that raw food has a much higher potential for bacteria contamination? Well, that is false. And a recent study debunks that myth and confirms the safety of raw pet food. Yay! Now this is a mouthful, but the title of this study is called The Low Number of Owner Reported Suspected Transmission of Foodborne Pathogens From Raw Meat Based Diets Fed to Dogs and/or Cats. It was written by independent researchers and published recently in the journal Frontiers in Veterinary Science. And the authors of this study found that not a single confirmed case of raw pet food transmitting disease-causing microbes to humans, was reported in the entire world. And this is great news and hopefully gets more pet owners to think differently about feeding a species appropriate diet to their pets. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Jim Nelson and Rene Agredano created Tripawds in 2006 when their dog Jerry lost a leg to cancer. The Tripawds Foundation now hosts 1800+ three-legged dog and cat blogs with numerous pet amputation resources and assistance programs. They tell the whole story in their book, Be More Dog: Learning to Live in the Now. Welcome all dog lovers! Today we are having an inspirational chat with Jim Nelson and Rene Agredano, who created Tripawds, and they are going to cover Loving Life on Three Legs, how Tripawds is helping all amputee pets. So Jim and Renee have been on the calendar for quite some time. So I've been looking forward to this. If you both can please introduce yourselves and tell us why you started Tripawds. Sure, happy to do that. Thank you for having us here. I'm Rene and I am known as Jerry on the Tripawd website. Jerry was the whole reason we started Tripawds, but we'll talk about that in just a sec. I'm Jim and I am admin at the Tripawds blogs and forums, and we'll get into what Tripawds is like Rene was saying, but she acts as Jerry, because Jerry was our first dog. And you can explain how that turned into what we do. Yeah, so Jerry was our first dog. He was a German Shepherd mix who had all four legs when we adopted him as a puppy. And he was our Chief Fun Officer of our business, we like to joke and call him that because he was the one who broke up our day and got us outside. We've always worked on our own, and we were starting a business and Jerry came along and, and really showed us how to have fun during the day. This was way back. This was 1998 when we adopted him. That was a long time ago. He was an awesome dog. And we went hiking, we did beach trips, we did all kinds of fun things together. He was a very active dog. So when he started limping at eight years old, we thought it was kind of unusual. And we took him to the vet. And the vet said, Well, it's probably arthritis, he's getting old. Here's some NSAIDS. Go home, and this should take care of it. Well, it didn't. And about three visits later, we were really frustrated looking for a reason why our dog was still limping. And that's when the veterinarian technician took us aside one day as we were leaving the clinic, and she told us, Hey, I think you guys should get a second opinion. How about you just go to this other clinic up the road and do this very discreetly? And he told us, yeah, and she said, I think we should try try another place. So we did and that veterinarian said I don't know. So she sent us over to University of California Davis. And within about 15 minutes, we had a reason why Jerry was limping. Cancer And that’s when we discovered dogs get cancer. Up until then, we didn't even know what osteosarcoma in canine forelimbs meant. Then we learned dogs get cancer and long story short, Rene sat me down one day and well, we proceeded with the amputation but we were lost and alone not knowing how he would pee. You know, we had no idea if he could ever swim again or what hikes would be like so we turned to YouTube and saw a video of a Great Dane digging up a gopher with one front leg. And we thought, if that dog can do it, Jerry could do it. And on Thanksgiving Day 2006, the surgeon came in and led Jerry out of the hospital hopping along with a smile on his face. And Rene sat me down and said, Let's sell everything. Let's let's, you know, sell the house, buy an RV and travel with Jerry, since he only has six months to a year to live, they say. So we made a promise to him to hit the road. And after six months, we hit the road and he lived two years and loving life on three legs. Oh my gosh, you guys, that is an incredible story. And obviously Jerry’s situation was for a reason. He was here to help out so many more dogs. And you are sharing that message of Jerry.’s So you're living out the most amazing dream, I can't thank you enough for taking that step. And I just think it's so amazing how adaptive dogs are. If they become blind or deaf, or in this instance, you know, a limb is amputated. They just acclimate. It's just incredible. So I love what you guys are doing. What is Tripawds? Why did you put together this organization? The Start of Tripawds Exactly. That first couple of years on the road, we just started a little blog at Tripawds.com. And that's P A W in the middle… Tripawds, just to share videos and photos of Jerry loving life on three legs. But then we started getting tons of email from people with different types of dogs and different types of cancers. And we installed discussion forums, and then we added a live chat. And now, Tripawds is a network of 1800 plus three legged dog and cat blogs, live cat videos, we've got the Tripawd Talk Radio Podcast, sharing information from credible sources, because we don't want anyone to ever feel lost and alone like they did. So we created a community of support because the animals usually adapt pretty quickly. And the people freak out. Yes, that's how it usually is. What you were saying about animals being resilient. We didn't know that when we agreed to have Jerry’s leg amputated. And and we really thought he was going to be this sad, sad dog when we brought him home. And the first lesson we learned was that Jerry just wanted to get on with life. He wanted to continue doing what he always loved to do. And that was a lesson that that took a lot of learning over and over again. He just kept showing us look, I'm okay, I'm okay. And then other people learned from that. And then other people learned from them. I mean, it was just like this this wonderful chain of events. That happened once Jim put up those discussion forums and other people could we could all share stories and support one another so that we could see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel after amputation recovery. Right. And what did you to learn about Osteosarcoma, because it is more prevalent than a lot of people realize. Yeah, that came as a really big shock. So this was, you know, like we said, this is way back in 2006. And veterinary oncology was just becoming a thing. But you know, we just we didn't even know that dogs got cancer, we thought we did everything right with him. And we kept blaming ourselves, maybe it was his diet, maybe it was his environment, we had no idea what caused the cancer. And as more people started coming over to the Tripawds website, we started learning, man, this is this is a lot more prevalent than we even realized. And other types of limb cancers, too, that can cause amputation, like mast cell cancer, or soft tissue tumors that aren't cancer, but they can invade the vascular system in the limb and require an amputation. So you know, one of the first lessons we learned was deal with the pain first, chemotherapy and and all that stuff to treat the actual cancer. That's your second decision you can make later but first, help your your animal get out of pain. And unfortunately, amputation for a lot of those cancers is the the fastest way to go to help your animals feel better. We learned with especially with bone cancers, that amputation it won't cure the cancer, it won't get rid of the cancer, but it will get rid of the pain because a bone tumor is just going to continue growing and really degrade that bone causing a pathological fracture and it’s a way to help improve the quality of life after surgery. That makes sense. Well, let's get into this. Let's assume that we have a dog that needs an amputation. I mean, after the surgery, of course, there's a lot to think about. So if you both wouldn't mind, I'm just going to bring up a topic and if you can just expand on that. That would be great. Sure. Happy to do that. Well, let's talk about once the surgery is complete, pain management, what options are there? How long are you probably treating for pain? What does that look like? Pain Management Oh, wow, you know, I would say that the the number one factor that can make or break an amputation recovery is pain management. And it actually should begin before the surgery happens. So we really encourage people to have a conversation with their vet, and ask what kind of pain control is my dog or my cat gonna get? And what does that look like? How often do I need to give them medication? What are the possible side effects? How do I know if I'm giving too much or too little? It's really it's a separate conversation with the vet before surgery. Because a lot of vets have found that if you start giving gabapentin, which is a nerve pain reducer, we start giving that before surgery, when those nerves are severed during the procedure. Afterward, they aren't as angry. So you get your dog started on that or your cat started on that before surgery. And then afterwards, it makes recovery just a little bit easier. There's really no standard of pain management that like, like a recipe for every animal because each animal is different. And cats have different needs than dogs. But in general, they should come home with an NSAID, Gabapentin, and oftentimes, a lot of animals are now coming home with a drug that was given during the procedure. It's called Nocita and it's a three day injectable pain reliever which makes those first three days a lot easier. Okay. And are you familiar with any maybe more natural supplements that people have found useful maybe in conjunction with actual medications, you know, whether that's CBD, THC, any other anti inflammatory maybe? Natural Treatments Um, as far as that goes, you know, that's really something to discuss with your veterinarian. There's a lot of really good quality cannabis based products out there. But because amputation is just such a major surgery, it's really not the time to solely rely on any kind of non pharmaceutical pain relievers. You can certainly talk to your veterinarian about incorporating them. But honestly, you know, we have found that the things that help the most are the ones that come from a pharmaceutical prescription. And also, laser therapy is definitely something that helps. Acupuncture, that can help during the recovery process as well. And as far as CBD goes, that's a real hot topic these days. But Rene is speaking as a certified veterinary cannabis guide. That's a thing now. It's a certification process. And she knows what to look for and how to read a certificate of analysis. But there are natural things like hot cold therapy, especially right after treatment, a hot cold compress applied the right way, the cool is going to reduce inflammation while the warm is going to increase circulation. And if you do that periodically and end on cold all the time, you can help reduce the amount of swelling and bruising and that sort of thing. Oh yeah. And then there's also an EMP therapy. So the Assisi Loop and pulsed electromagnetic frequency. That's also a natural remedy that people can try. It's hit or miss. I've heard some people say their their pet responded really well. And I've heard some people say they didn't notice anything. There is another product called a feral block blanket, which is a product for human amputees that we have found works really well in cats and dogs. And it's just a sheet of fabric with a mesh, a metal mesh embedded into the layer, very lightweight. And what it does is it blocks electromagnetic frequencies, from your pets environment, in order to promote wound healing and reduce any kind of nerve pain that's aggravated by this EMF flooding around your home. There are also two very important all natural modalities per se, when it comes to you know, helping the animal through recovery. And one is moderation of activity. You know, unfortunately, there are vets out there that still say, you know, here's your pain meds, go let him be a dog. But that's to an extent if we moderate their activity and keep them confined and play brain games to stimulate them and keep them engaged, that can really go a long way to a quick speedy recovery. And the other one is our human emotions. The dogs are going to adapt and overcome and persevere. Whereas the people who freak out the most have been the worst recoveries we've seen. The people with the dog having the worst time tend to be the people who are you know, picking them up and going everywhere and hand feeding them because the dogs get used to that behavior and then that goes on and on. But regardless, when it comes to actual pain and nerve pain, we stick with the tried and true pharmaceuticals and we recommend people speak with certified pain management experts or go to an AHA accredited clinic that's the American Animal Hospital Association, because they have certain guidelines that are very current. Like for instance, many vets tend to disagree on how effective Tramadol is when it comes to actual pain management unless it's used as part of a multi modal approach. Okay, well, Jim and Rene, I am going to stop you right here. This is a great chance to take a quick commercial break. We will be right back. A special thanks to the team at Tickless USA for being our monthly sponsor.  I am so thrilled to share this great company and their products with those who want to prevent ticks and fleas without the use of toxic chemicals.  “That’s right! No more harmful chemicals need to be applied to your dog! Tickless devices are ultrasonic flea and tick repellers that emit a series of ultrasonic pulses that humans, pets and wildlife can’t hear. These outstanding patented products are the #1 selling chemical-free repellents in Europe that are proven safe in multiple studies. They offer various versions to be worn on the collar and they also have units for the home. And they are not only for pets, but they have tick repellents for people as well. You can’t go wrong with these environmentally friendly, chemical and fragrance-free ultrasonic devices, making them perfectly safe to use for your entire family.   Order your tickles device today by going to ticklessusa.com and use the discount code WAGOUTLOUD to receive 15% off of your order.

 THE Biggest Mistake in Training Your Dog! | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:35:13

Hello there! This is Krista with Episode #152 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Have you checked out all of the amazing trusted brands that I highly recommend? These are products that I've tried on my dog Winston and that I know, like and trust. Products that will also help your dog to thrive. Just go to https://www.wagoutloud.com/ and check out the trusted brands section. And I've negotiated discounts for most of the products, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life. According to the 2021-2022 American Pet Products Association, National Pet Owners Survey, dogs continue to run as the most popular type of pet owned by 54% of US households compared to cats, owned by 35% of households. This equates to an estimated 69 million US households that own at least one dog. A big shout out to all of our awesome dog owners! Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Doggy Dan is the creator of the 'Dog Calming Code ™' and has helped over 57,000 people successfully train their dogs using the simplest, gentlest, and most logical way to change their dog’s behavior. Dan is an author, speaker, was the Judge on Dog Almighty and was the featured celebrity Dog Trainer on The Real Housewives of Auckland. His mission is to share his kind, gentle and unique approach of creating and building deep connections between dogs and their owners so we can change the world of dog training, one dog trainer at a time. Hello dog lovers! Today we have Doggy Dan with us and he is going to share THE biggest mistake in training your dog. So Doggy Dan, I want to welcome you to the Show. We've had this on the calendar forever. And Doggy Dan is actually coming to us from New Zealand, which I am so jealous. He's in his campervan, you guys. Oh, how cool! So Dan, I'm gonna ask you to introduce yourself and what makes your approach to dog training different because let's be honest, dog trainers are a dime a dozen, you can find them everywhere. So what makes you different? Different Methods I'll explain what's different. And then we can dive in. And yeah, the biggest mistake, we’ll cover it all. So basically, obviously, my real name is not Doggy Dan, but that's the name I'm gonna go with. It’s just easy to remember. And I've had a lot of different jobs. I was a policeman, a civil engineer, a teacher, a math teacher, and salesman, and I just wanted to find something I was so passionate about. So basically, I set up as a dog trainer, found a phenomenal approach to training dogs that I'm so excited about sharing with you. And it was so powerful, I decided I had to set up an online training program. And that's what I set up over a decade ago, one of the first in the world. People didn't even know what a membership site was back in 2009. I had to explain to people how you could train your dog, they thought your dog actually sat in front of the screen and watched the videos. But um, over 60,000 people have used that program, and I then set up a Dog Trainer Academy to train people online. So we've got people all over the world doing that. And yeah, I've been to over 3000 houses and shared with people, one on one, what's going on with their dog. And it's really the kind of the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff is how I see myself. So my area of expertise is people whose dogs are aggressive, and they don't understand why pulling on the leash, behavioral issues, you know, separation anxiety. I love to help people understand what's going on with their dog, because I'll be honest, I don't think the standard of dog training is very high worldwide. Especially not in the Western world, it's probably in my opinion it’s probably lower than a lot of other places. Believe it or not. No, I totally agree. So you just mentioned behaviorist, what is the difference between a dog trainer versus a dog behaviorist? What is a Dog Behaviorist? Great question. So in my opinion, everything I'm saying here is my opinion Take it or leave it. I don't mind but… So in my opinion, a trainer kind of just is I would say just it's not just it's a trainer is more focused on... Look, there are trainers who are behaviorists and there's behaviorists who do more training. So let's get that sort of straightaway. There's some people who have in their name. I mean, my my website says The Online Dog Trainer, but I'm actually a behaviorist. So that kind of just proves that point. Behavior I would say is where you're looking at how the dog’s emotions and where the dog is coming from at a far deeper level than pure training. Training is more about repetition in my opinion. You know, it's about shaping, it's about saying, No, I want you to do this, I want you to do this, I want you to do this, I want you to do this exactly right. And it's more kind of repetition, reward based, treat based. You can have corrections in there. But it's, it's more trying to get the dog to do what you want them to do. I would say a behaviorist is going a bit deeper and saying, Well, let's have a look at what's really going on in the dog's nervous system, the dog's mental state, it's a far deeper kind of approach to why the dog is behaving like they're behaving. That's, that's how I would name it or explain it. And that's why I love your program. You are putting yourself in the dog's body and mind, literally, you know, where so many trainers they use the clickers or the treats, which is really bribe/reward. You know, if you do this, I'll give you this. But nobody that I have found, besides you is addressing the why. Why do we need to approach it this way? So when did you figure all that out? It's been a long process, it didn't happen overnight. I would say, the more dogs I worked with, the more the penny dropped for me that hang on, we're speaking a different language. And the biggest mistake I would say, in dog training is we are speaking different languages. You know, we speak, you know, English, or whichever words, we speak, human speak, the dog speaks dog speak. And the biggest mistake we're making is we're trying to force the dog to think like us, we're trying to get them to understand English. Well, hang on, if we're so smart, wouldn't it be wiser if we actually learn how the dogs think, and feel, and communicate and what's going on? I mean, imagine it like this, if we speak English, and we meet a French person, and all we ever do is keep speaking English. And the poor French person doesn't speak English, and they speak French. If we could learn French, then we can communicate so much better. And it's kind of like that with a dog, we’re just expecting our dogs to think like a human. So the flip side of what I do is almost I say, Well, hang on, let's learn to think like a dog, let's really understand what's going on in a dog's nervous system or body. Because some of the actions we take are, they're so damaging to dogs, and we have no idea how damaging they are. And when I say damaging, I'm talking about behavioral state of the dog. So we do stuff on a daily basis, nearly all of us. Unless you're very, very, very aware of the approach that I'm talking about thinking like a dog, we do stuff which says to the dog, let me put it in these words, we say to the dog, you're in charge, you're the boss, you protect me, you protect the property you lead, you make the decisions, you do what you want. And then we try and train the dog. So it's backwards. We say, You're in charge. You don't know what you're charged. No, listen to me. Come here, do that. No, you can't do that. Dogs go, well, hang on, hang on. Hang on, hang on. All right, so you're advocating for the dog, which is going to be better for everybody. But in essence, are you really training the people? Yeah. It’s not the dog. I mean, I’ve got the most hilarious stories where… the one that springs to mind that I've got hilarious stories. But let me just finish my sentence before I move on to the story. Where I don't touch the dog. I've done nothing with the dog and the behavioral issue disappears. It’s proof. Yeah, I mean, there was one lady where, you know, I've had this so many times with dogs are barking and aggressive around the property. And the way I work is I go to people's houses, and I sit with them, and I chat to them. And I quote, quote, work with the dog. Because really, I'm not working with the dog as much as just relaxing state of the house and relaxing everybody. And I'm just talking in the dog relaxes around me. And next thing, you know, the dog isn't barking at the persons who walk past the front of the house. And that's why I'm there. And I'm saying so you told me that, you know, this has happened so many times you told me that the dog attacks the window. And when people walk past. Well, this lady just walked past. Yeah, that's rather strange. And then another person walks past they go, that's really strange. I've never seen this happen before, which is the classic sentence. He's never done this before. And then there was one situation where they said, but you wait till you get the lead. When you pick up the lead, he will go berserk and he pulls so hard. He's injured my arm. Anyway, you know, I've been there an hour, and I decide and I haven't touched the dog. And I said, Well, let's get the lead out and see how it goes. And they're laughing thinking you wait, you wait. I picked up the lead and the dog just laid there. And they said I honestly remember them saying sort of. Oh, he hasn't seen the you've got the lead. I said but normally he would oh yeah normally be jumping up and down. I stand up with a lead and he looks at me I said, Well, he can see me now. Yeah, but you haven't called them over. Wait till you call them over. And I said Rover come here, I Rover walked over calmly all four feet on the ground. And I can see their mouth, their jaws are hitting the ground. Because normally he'd be jumping up mouthing them pulling, put the lead on. And they are absolutely gobsmacked because normally he's yanking them to the front door pulling, he's perfect. And I haven't touched. And that's happened so many times, we're not talking five or 10, we're talking probably 50 or 100 times that exact situation, the dog did not need training, the dog was pretty much saying, Well, if you're in charge, you can walk first, I'll walk calmly with you, but not with those owners until they learn my language. That's why I love watching your videos, the course is just phenomenal. And for each area that you're working on, it doesn't matter if your dog has the same issues or not everybody can learn from each instance, each video has the most amazing aha moment that we can use with our own dogs. And that's what I just love is you're in the dog's mind. And shame on us as people. Many of us have turned our dogs into either literally our children, or they know that they have behavioral issues. But they work their lives around that. Maybe I have a leash aggressive dog. Oh, well, I have to walk my dog at 2am When there's nobody else out there. No. We can live in harmony. And as you said, if our dogs just understand what we want, we can live harmoniously and have an amazing life. And that's what I love about your program. It's really simple, you just have to do it. Yeah, it's it is it's very simple when we understand what we're doing wrong. But when we do it wrong repetitively on a daily basis for years and years, it doesn't matter how long you are training your dog in the wrong way, if you're speaking Chinese and the other person speaking Dutch, then.. Yup, you're not going to get anywhere. All right, well, let's just dive right into it. We're all dying to know what is THE biggest mistake when it comes to training our dogs? THE BIGGEST MISTAKE IS… Well, on a practical level, and I wanted to put this out here just so people can get an idea of what I'm talking about. On a practical level, the biggest mistake the fastest way, in my opinion, having worked with 1000s of dogs that you can I say screw your dog up kind of mentally kind of confuse them as to who's in charge is to leave food on the ground for your dog to control. So if anybody has a behavioral issue, and you've got a dog who grazes or eats half the food, and then leaves half the food in the bowl or comes back later, they're controlling the food and you basically you'll never win convincing your dog that you're in charge if the dog’s controlling the food and that includes bones and pig's ears and rawhide. You I can opened up Pandora's box. Well, Dan, we take a yeah, this is going to be great. Cool. We're gonna take a quick sponsor break. So hold on everybody. We are going to be right back. Thanks so much to the team at System Saver for being this month’s feature sponsor. Dr. Baker’s Canine System Saver is an outstanding all-natural supplement that promotes healthy aging.  Originally created by a veterinarian to help restore health and soundness to dogs suffering from chronic inflammatory and degenerative conditions, this is one product that does so much! Perfect for: arthritis, hip dysplasia & joint support, chronic dermatitis, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, and geriatric support for successful aging and quality of life extension. At 13 yrs old,my dog Winston has a better quality of life and has found so much more energy being on this amazing product!” Now with the start of allergy season, System Saver works wonders on canine allergies as well. Learn more by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ to relieve your dog’s discomfort naturally.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! Here we are back with Doggy Dan, who just blew my mind before we went on that commercial break. Can you repeat Dan, what is THE biggest mistake when training our dogs? Yeah, so the biggest mistake in my opinion when you're training your dog is to leave food down for your dog. And the reason being is, as we mentioned before, you have to learn to think like a dog, you can't think like a human being. And yet, to be honest, even if you think like a human being, it's not the smartest thing in the world. You know, a lot of a lot of what I talked about with dogs is, you know, if you think about raising children, which I know they are different species, but so many things are the same. You know, leaving, leaving a bar of chocolate for your child to eat at any point in time is not the cleverest way to be a parent, partly because you can't, you can't motivate them to do something, if you have, you know, they've got eaten chocolate all day. And then you say, Hey, can you help me wash the car, and I'll give you a piece of chocolate, they're not interested. But there's something even bigger than this going on with food with a dog. With dogs, you have to think of food is life and death to a dog. What I mean by that is, we take food for granted now we've got cupboards full of food, and most of us have food kind of you know, it's what you want to eat not is there enough food to survive. Whereas to a dog, there's still more more about survival. Food keeps them alive. You can almost think of food is like money to us almost. That money is so powerful to us, you know, the more money you have, the more more you can do. And with the dogs think of the food as almost like money. And when you give your dog control of the food. I think the analogy I've got is it's like giving a child $1,000 every week. You get them way too much control way too much power, way too much importance, they can do whatever they want, they don't need you pretty much. If I'm if my child had $1,000, and he was spending on those cars, he got to eat what he wanted. Imagine a 16 year old boy, you give him $5,000 Every week, he's gonna get into trouble in no time. Because he doesn't need you probably isn't going to come home the first few nights because he's going to be staying at his mates, party get up eating what he wants, doing what he wants. He’s gone. So what happens with the dogs is when you leave food on the ground, you pretty much give them the message. They're in charge, they can do that what they want. And it's almost impossible. I've found if they're controlling the food, there's food, and it's impossible to convince them otherwise, doesn't matter if you do all the other things, right. It almost negates everything else. So you're not a fan of free feeding. Obviously, they get fed their meal, or meals. And then yeah, if there's anything left over… Food? You walk away, you pick that bowl up. Yep. And I have tried and tested this. I have come at this from so many different angles. Like I'm like a scientist and detective. I've analyzed this. And I put tests and tricks down to test this theory. And every single dog has proven the theory to be correct. No dogs ever got worse. No dog, let me repeat that no dog out of 1000s and 1000s have ever deteriorated in behavioral long term short for a few hours or minutes or days. They may. But long term, no they always improve when you take control of the food. And some of the things dogs will do. They'll go to extraordinary lengths to control that food. So the dogs would pick up biscuits and move them into another room. I mean, it's just hilarious. Right or, or they leave there was one lady. She actually had a Whippet cross Pitbull. I’ll never forget it. Interesting breed with a cross Putbull. And I said to the lady, does he always eat all his food? And she said yes, yes, yes. Well, we fed him there and then. And then when he'd finished his food, quote, quote, finished, I went to have a check in the bowl. There's just two or three biscuits left. I said to her, there’s a couple left. She said yeah, he always leaves a couple. He comes back later and eats them. I said really? He always leaves a couple of biscuits. She said, Yeah. I said, Well, why do you think he does that? She said, Well, I think either he doesn't see them. Or he's full. I thought about it, I thought can't see them? This is a dog who’s nose can pick up a biscuit if 20 yards away hidden under a bush . And full? She was putting a random scoop of biscuits in the bowl every day. You know how much a dog can eat if they need to. It wasn't full. It wasn't like these posh English people who leave a little bit of food on their plate. You know. The dog was basically saying I'll save that for later I control the food. I'll come back and and sure enough, we pick the bowl up as soon as the dog’s finished and walks away. And within a few days the dog stopped doing it. And his behavior improved. But I got so many stories about food and dogs controlling the food. It's incredible. Wow, this is brilliant. Because on this Show, of course, we talk about food as the base of our dog's health. You know, this is the foundation. So hopefully all of our listeners are doing the best that they can, feeding the best that they can. What happens. You know a lot of people have one dog and you're focusing on one dog. What if there's a household with more than one dog? How do you address that one dog’s issues? In terms of the feeding or in general? Well, with feeding, if I have a multi dog household, and we want to make sure that they know they're not in control of their food, does everybody eat at the same exact time? Yeah, so with the training program that I share with people, it's really a case of the same principles are applied to all the dogs in the household. So we used to have five dogs in our household. And when we fed the dogs, we said all dogs come on dinnertime. We would round them up and put five bowls down and say, wait, wait, wait, it's quite a quite fun thing to watch five dogs all waiting, okay. And they'd all eat. And they'd all eat. And this is the whole point they there was no, nobody leaving anything. Of course they'll then check each other's bowls at the end. One thing in your video series, which I thought was just amazing that I tried is that with your dog's bowl before you put it down, act like you are eating from the bowl first. Now, pretend I'm grabbing a piece and I'm it's delicious. And then I'm putting it down for my dog. And that was a mindset shift for him and for myself. Yeah, you eating first? Yeah, it's a phenomenal thing. I call it gesture eating, where you eat a little bit of cracker/ biscuit bread from above your dog's bowl, and you don't have to do it for the rest of your dog's life. But certainly a few times a week, you do that for a few months, your dogs know what's going on. And for those dogs that really think they're in charge, top dog, that brings them down a peg or two so quickly. So the number of dogs who when you do that, they will then refuse to eat. And that's okay. That's okay. Because it'll only be a couple of days or a couple of meals, usually one or two meals maximum, where the dog goes, I'm not eating if you eat first. But then after a few days, they go, Okay, fair enough. And that's got that's like with a big, yeah, I give up. It's like a snowball or ball trying to get some moving, you get the momentum. And then you can put the rest of the program in place. But if you don't get this bit, right, it's sure it's tricky. It's tricky if you've got the food mixed up and wrong. Yeah. I just want to clarify, if you have a really well behaved dog, and your dog is grazing all day long, don't get me wrong, I've got no problem with that. If your dog’s happy, you're happy, no behavioral issues. Dog listens to you generally, cool. Just graze, that's fine. Bones laying all over the property. Cool. So this is really a case of, it's almost like, if you're eating whatever foods you want, and you're healthy and fit and you haven't got any issues, then I don't have a problem with you, you know, you might have three pieces of chocolate or half a bar of chocolate a day. I got no problem with that. But if you are struggling with all sorts of issues, and you're, you know, shoveling half a bar of chocolate down and three cans of fizzy, sugary drink, you know. So it's really specific for those people who are looking for help and wondering what else could be going on. Because they've tried the training approach, whether it's the clickers and cheese or more correction based with telling the dog off and shock collars and that sort of thing. So this really is for those people who are struggling. Okay. Well, tell us about you have the Dog Calming Code. What is that? And how does it work? The Dog Calming Code Yeah, so the Dog Calming Code, if you think of it, as we talked about the training and the behavioral side of things. So we got hundreds of videos, which I share with people in the Online Dog Trainer, when I go to people's houses, maybe to do with recall, or stopping a dog from doing some strange like jumping up and stuff. But the Dog Calming Code is the initial program, I suggest everybody should put in place. And it's the piece which is like the behavioral piece, where it's basically the part which says, I'm in charge, you should be listening to me. And it's called the Calming Code because when you say to your dog, I'm in charge, it allows the dog to switch off and relax, as well as helping them listen to you. So the best analogy is almost when you have a dinner party, or if you ever have a dinner party, you know you have 20 people come around and or 30 people you end up a lot of times people end up kind of wandering around with a bottle and food going Do you want more drinks, more nibbles? Anybody want more drinks, and and everybody's saying, you know, sit down, relax, sit down, and you're running around. I'm not saying you do this. But you know, people run around, offering drinks and nibbles and the next thing you know people are because it's their party. They're wiping the surfaces down in the sweeping the kitchen and they're not relaxed. They feel like they've got to do something, because it's their party and they're in charge. Now, if you go to another person's house since it’s their party, you're far more likely to kind of sit down and just relax and chat and like find a book on the bookcase and start reading it or a magazine. You put your feet up you relax, enjoy yourself. Because when you're not in charge, you don't have that responsibility. And what we don't realize as dog owners is so many of our dogs are way more stressed and on tender hooks than we realize. You know, all of these little dogs who are nonstop running around chasing flies barking jumping up the windows yapping, non stop, go, go go. That's not a happy relaxed dog. Yeah, mouth open, panting looking around, eyes on. So these are all stress signals. The happy dog is the one, the one who's in the front of my campervan, now. He's just lying there. He's relaxed, you know, my dogs will happily go into a space. And they'll just sleep for five hours. I’ll be there or not be that doesn't matter. They can sleep for hours and hours. They're relaxed, happy dogs, they tend to sleep for kind of 12 hours a day. And they’re not always on alert and hadn't got one ear up the whole time. They don't follow you around the house the whole time. That's not a happy, relaxed, dog. It may make you feel like unloved. But the happy, relaxed dog doesn't need to do that, they realize they can just switch off and relax. So the Dog Calming Code helps your dog get that message or it helps you understand how to give your dog that message. And of course, the happy relaxed dog who's not in charge doesn't have to be protective of you or the property doesn't have to lead on the walk that doesn't pull on the leash doesn't have to be protective when you're walking in the park. It just switches off and relaxes. And then you see the dog actually playing more. You see dog’s that have never played before in the house with you know, I go to houses where there's two dogs and one's very stressed and one's kind of bit more chilled out. But they don't play. And there may be another issue. But often when I'm there or a bit later on after a week or two people report, you know, Butch the dog has now started to play with Minnie. Butch and Minnie are playing again. They haven't done this for years. And it's because the responsibility that they had is, is gone. You know. I want the People Calming Code. Because I know my dog Winston picks up on my stress and I am just so wound. And I'm trying to work on that. So is it as easy as saying leadership is the key that if they know that you are the leader that they are not that that puts them in a better position. And us ultimately as well? Should We Lead Our Dogs? I'll be really honest, I stopped using the word leadership because everybody's getting offended by the word but it's partly because we don't have that many great leaders. In human terms, a lot of leaders are self centered a lot of leaders kind of look after themselves and, and try and, you know, line their own pockets before looking after the people. So, leadership has a funny connotation of being threatening and a bully. But I would agree with you in My Word idea of a great leader like a Nelson Mandela or something. A person like that, who cares for the people, first and foremost. So I'm happy to use the word leader if we think of leader as non bullying, non threatening, loving the people and caring for the people and the dogs. The other word is parent, you know, if you think of a great parent, they are in charge. So my wife and I, we’re in charge with our kids and our dogs, we make the final decisions and that does absolutely allow our children to relax. You know we're on holiday in a campervan, my wife and I've got all the responsibility of where we're going to park up for the night, where we're going. When we're going to leave, when we're going to get food what we're going to do, our kids love it. They relax. Structure. We’re the safety net they get in the campervan, they climb up onto their bunks, they've got no idea half the time where we're going. They got no worries in the world. Their biggest worry is Can we jump in the water? How warm is the water? How big are the waves? My wife and I have all the responsibility where we're like ducks. You know, we may look like we're gliding along, but under underneath the surface. Our feet are paddling, you know. Have we got enough water? Have we got enough gas? Have we got enough… Is that the premise of your book, I know that you have What the Dogs Taught Me About Being a Parent? Parenting Yes, that's right. Yeah. Okay. So what the dogs taught me about being a parent is, was this idea that I had that hang on, there's a real correlation, but between parenting and dog training, but I didn't have any children at the time. So I started thinking about it. And when we had a child, I think Stanley was about one or two years old, I decided, you know, I believe this to be so true. And I wrote the book. And I'm super proud of it. Because it's true. That the premise of being a great parent or being a great dog, owner or trainer or dog parent, there's so many similarities and the key ones, you know, the big ones about taking responsibility for your own actions. And, you know, it's easy to blame your dog. It's easy to blame your kids. But actually when you change how you do everything, how you talk to your children, how we communicate body language, and we when we change that with our children, our children respond differently. They change. We evoke a different response in our children. And the same thing with our dog when we change how we're acting around our dogs, and what we're doing and how we're being, we evoke a different response from our dogs. And picking up the food and not letting them graze is a real good example. Yeah. Well, Dan, I can't thank you enough for being with us today and sharing this great information. I told everybody how much I love your program. It is simple. But we just have to learn how to do it the right way to make our dogs calm down and be happy. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Well, I know that Dan has an amazing offer for all of our listeners. And I can't believe that you're offering a $1 trial to try out your online program. Do you want to talk a little bit about that? Sure, sure. So what what I'd love to do is basically let people check it out and try it. And so we decided to do a $1 trial for people who want to check it out. And you get three days access. And the main program you could start with is the Dog Calming Code. So it's the key program straightaway, says Here you go. It's a step by step program. So you kind of can't go wrong. And you'll know, within an hour or two of watching the videos, you'll be like, Wow, this is unbelievable. It's so different. And you'll see the change in your dog. And if you want to stay on, it's $37 per month, cancel whenever you want. But if you don't, if you go, you know what I like free stuff and $1 stuff, and just cancel within three days. Just email us and Yeah, the thing is a lot of people, a lot of people actually, they take the trial, and they cancel within three days. And when we check we say Is everything okay? No worries, canceling. We say why you cancelling just just so can we get some feedback. They said, Well, my dogs, my dog solved the problem, problem’s gone. It's that it's that powerful. So I'm always happy. It's no big, no big deal for us to give people three days access for $1. Well, Dan, thank you so much for all that you do. Where can everybody find out more about you and the Dog Calming Code? What is that website. So you may want to repeat it because of my funny accent, but it's www.theonlinedogtrainer.com www.theonlinedogtrainer.com . And I'm going to put that as well as where people can find you on social media in the show notes. So check that out. Any parting words? Dan, before we leave today, And I'm going to put that as well as where people can find you on social media in the show notes. So check that out. Any parting words, Dan, before we leave today? Social Media          Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doggydandogtrainer/            Facebook: www.facebook.com/DogTrainerDoggyDan What I would say is if you've tried lots of different approaches, and you're still struggling, then give this a go. Because it really is so radically different. It's you know, somebody once said to me, training is about trying to get your dog to do what you want them to do. And this approach is saying Hang on. Before we do that, let's make sure we're communicating with our dog and understanding where they're coming from. That’s why you stand out. It works. It's the same with people you know, before you try to tell somebody some thing, try and listen, try and understand where they are. Before we start, yes, beautiful lesson for life. Oh my gosh, so much great words of wisdom. Dan, thank you so much. Again, everybody. Check out Dan and his Calming Code program at www.theonlinedogtrainer.com. Thanks, everybody! Thanks again to our friends at System Saver for sponsoring this month’s episodes .  Check out this fantastic all-natural formula by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode? Don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE and please leave a review: Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify I Stitcher I iHeartRADIO The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. The host as well as guests who speak on this podcast express their own opinions, experience and conclusions, and Wag Out Loud LLC neither endorses or opposes any particular views discussed here.

 Are You Over-Vaccinating Your Dog? | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:33:08

Well hello everyone! This is Krista with episode #151 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Are you making the most out of the time spent with your dog while on a walk? Or perhaps instead you listen to audiobooks, podcasts, music, or are talking on the phone during those times? Well, I just want to encourage everyone to have more mindful walks with your dog, and to use that time to bond with them in nature. We should take a cue from our pups to slow down and live in the present moment. Research shows that this may help decrease depression and anxiety, improve memory, and to boost our mental and physical health. Walks are also the perfect time to let your dog be a dog. I call it taking them on “sniffari”, which is great for their mental stimulation. So being present during walks with your dog only deepens your connection with them. So pay attention to how you both are feeling and reacting to your surroundings. I don't know about you, but the best ideas come to me when I'm out for a walk with my dog Winston. That is when I'm relaxed, my mind is open. And we enjoy our bonding time. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Dr. Jodie Gruenstern is an experienced veterinarian who has performed thousands of titer tests and can explain why you are risking your pet's health and wasting your money by blindly repeating unnecessary vaccinations! Dr. Jodie received her DVM degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1987. She has practiced small animal medicine in Wisconsin and now Arizona. She is a national presenter, journal writer, and author of "Live with Your Pet in Mind". She has been filmed for PetMD and PetWorld Insider. She has been taught by and presented with Dr. Ron Schultz, the world-renown Ph.D. immunologist instrumental to the development of titer testing and the core vaccine principles. Hello there dog lovers! We are going to learn a lot today from our guest, Dr. Jodie Gruenstern and she is going to set us straight on are we over-vaccinating our dogs? Hot Topic! Dr. Jodie, I am so excited to chat with you about this very important, but controversial topic. So could you please introduce yourself and tell us why did you start thinking differently when it came to canine vaccinations and schedules? Sure. Thanks, Krista. Thank you so much for having me. This should be fun. I'm very excited to get this information out to all the pet parents. I have been a veterinarian for at least 35-36 years. I graduated from UW Madison, in Wisconsin in 1987. And even as far back as conventional veterinary school, I had an instructor that was a PhD immunologist for our immunology class named Dr. Ron Schultz. And since then he has become world renowned, holistic and conventional. Veterinarians all admire him and his knowledge and his dedication to our field in the area of vaccinations, helping vaccine manufacturers make vaccines, and then also helping companies develop what we call titer testing, and reaching out to the veterinary community and even the American Veterinary Medical Association to develop what's called core vaccines. So we're gonna get into all that I think a little deeper. But even as far back as veterinary school, I was really fortunate to have that kind of influence. Wow, that's great. Well, I'm glad that you're part of the fight, because we're hearing more and more about over-vaccination and what it's doing to our dogs. So why don't we quickly go over, what are the core vaccines? And when would a puppy get these? The Core Vaccines Sure, so the core vaccines are considered distemper, parvo, and rabies. And when a puppy is vaccinated, at less than eight weeks of age, the vaccine regardless of which one of those it is usually never works. Not at any fault of the vaccine itself, but because the puppy's immune system is not competent to respond to the vaccine. So you cannot be immunized and protected unless you actually respond to the vaccine. And that's really important for everybody to recognize just because you get a shot, that doesn't mean that you're protected. With COVID, that sounds very familiar. Yeah, so maybe we won't go there. So anyway, it's very important for pet parents to recognize that and especially breeders, because right away when we start talking about over-vaccinating, some of these puppies are taking a risk and being over-vaccinated before the new pet mom even has acquired the puppy. And so at eight to nine weeks is when a puppy's immune system is usually competent to respond. And so that's when vaccination should begin. So prior to that, you do have to be careful that you don't expose a puppy to something like parvo or rabies, because obviously, then they could get the disease. On the other hand, what we need to recognize is that most of them get passive immunity from their mother. So it crosses the placenta, it is transmitted through the colostrum of puppies first milk, and those puppies get protection. That protection stays in their bodies for up to 12 weeks. So when you give a vaccination at eight to nine weeks, they may be competent to respond. But they often are not protected from the vaccine because it is blocked, because the mother's protection is still present in that puppy, and blocks the effectiveness of the vaccine. So we know that by about 12 weeks in most breeds, mother's protection then goes away. And then if we give another vaccination at 12 weeks, then that puppy will be protected. Because we don't know for sure if that immunity was passed on from the mother to the puppy or not. That is why we typically recommend starting vaccination at eight to nine weeks. Now, if we actually knew if that puppy was protected or not, then that would guide our decisions better as to whether or not that vaccination given is needed and whether or not it will be effective. Okay, well, that's all really good to know. So in your mind, puppy has their initial puppy shots, do they then continue throughout their entire lives with the recommended vaccine schedule? When to Give Vaccines Right. So not necessarily. So that's especially what I like about my holistic practice is we really look at every patient as an individual. And we ask the questions, we think about what has gone on in that Puppy's background. And then we can even go further to actually check their immunity. So there's testing we can do to check that. And there's a cost involved, of course, so we can also delve into the pet parent’s financial situation a little bit and what do they prefer. So if we want to play averages, then we would just vaccinate with a distemper, Parvo complex at eight or nine weeks, again at 12 weeks. And then in some cases, and in some breeds, 16 weeks, and then again a year later, and then it may be year after year, or some vaccines are labeled as every three years. Now, what we know from studies that have actually been done is that if we check their blood at 16 weeks, that the majority of them have protection at that point from the vaccine that was given at 12 weeks, and they don't need that vaccination at 16 weeks. If we check their blood again, a year later, we can then determine did they mount that immune response? Is it still present. Studies have actually been done to determine the actual numbers that are needed for protection? And this is based on challenge studies. So what we're talking about what we're getting into right here now is what's called titer testing. And it's not teater, It's not Twitter, it's titer. And it is spelled two ways, t-i-t-e-r, or the British spelling, which is t-i-t-r-e, and I think that all confuses a lot of people, but it's titer testing, and it's a blood test. So it's not an injection. Titer Testing to the Rescue! So in essence, for the core vaccines, is that what a titer can be used for, the three that you mentioned? Yes. So the titer’s done typically at most labs. It measures Distemper and Parvo. And then Kansas State is sort of the gold standard place to send the blood for a rabies titer and they can do Distemper and Parvo as well. And pricing varies depending on the Veterinary Clinic submitting the blood, and there are other places to send it. But Kansas State is very reasonable and can check Distemper, Parvo and Rabies. Okay. Now, do all veterinarians offer titer testing? They do not all offer it. They pretty much can all do it. Sometimes there's a little pressure that needs to be put on them in order to have it done. And it's pretty simple. You know, veterinarians are busy and we get set in our ways. As a group, I think we're slow to change. And we're not always learning what's really current when we've been in the field for a long time. And certainly that's not right. But that's the way it is. And so we give vaccinations the way maybe we were taught to do it in school, or maybe we get set in our ways because of the first employer that we had. And it becomes the bread and butter, so to speak of the practice too. And it's a quick in and out. It's a way to encourage your clients to come in every year, like well you’re due for your shots. Well, or you really due for the shot? Really, we should veterinarians should be promoting wellness exams as putting an emphasis on that, which is extremely important. And take the focus off of coming in for a vaccination, because the vaccination not only may not be needed, but it may actually be detrimental. Over-Vaccinating Can Cause Illness & Disease Well, you've hit the nail on the head. And I have to question why so many veterinarians, especially the conventional vets are sticking to these schedules. When in all reality, more and more research is coming out that this over-vaccination is actually causing the illnesses and disease that these dogs come in for. So it's is it kind of like a vicious cycle? Yes. And the other part that's difficult is, we're all taught what anaphylaxis is. And that's a serious reaction that happens immediately when you get a bee sting, or when you're allergic to penicillin, and somebody gives you penicillin. Or peanuts. And certainly vaccinations can cause a rapid anaphylactic reaction when a patient basically goes into shock. And I have seen that happen. And I believe it's very important that if you're going to give a vaccine, you should be in a veterinary facility that has the ability to get the patient on oxygen, put in an intravenous catheter, administer steroids or epinephrine or whatever is needed. So I don't believe that vaccines should be administered outside of that kind of a realm. But and those might be fairly rare. Those kinds of reactions, although I have seen them, and when it's your own pet, it doesn't feel very rare. And that's why to think that you've given a vaccine unnecessarily that if you had checked a titer, instead, you wouldn't have given that vaccine and then lose your pet to an anaphylactic reaction. That's just horrific. But what really is not considered is what you're getting at is the number of different kinds of chronic disorders, where the disorder isn't even correlated with the administration of that vaccine, because it doesn't happen immediate. Many veterinarians will not report reactions, there is not a standard reporting mechanism in the veterinary field like that actually is in the human field. So to even try to look at statistics, like how many reactions are there? There is not any kind of accurate information out there. And if you do read, the vaccine manufacturer inserts, they say right on there, you know, they have a handle on in their studies, and the reporting that's been done directly to them, which they do not have to make public knowledge, but they have more of a handle on Yes, our vaccine does cause this problem or that problem. And if you read their inserts, you will see that they say right there that their vaccines can cause immune mediated disease. And so what is that? It doesn't sound like much was just some words on paper. But an example is immune mediated thrombocytopenia, and that's a serious bleeding disorder. And it takes anywhere from oh, two to seven days, maybe even 14 days to really start showing up after that vaccine is given. And one of the vaccines that is notorious for causing that is the lepto, leptospirosis vaccination. So my like when you ask, well, what you know, made me change and evolve too is a very sad story, very sad experience with giving a lepto vaccination to a dog. Dr. Jodie, can I stop you right there because we are going to take a quick commercial break and then we want to hear the story. So we will be right back. Thanks so much to the team at System Saver for being this month’s feature sponsor. Dr. Baker’s Canine System Saver is an outstanding all-natural supplement that promotes healthy aging.  Originally created by a veterinarian to help restore health and soundness to dogs suffering from chronic inflammatory and degenerative conditions, this is one product that does so much! Perfect for: arthritis, hip dysplasia & joint support, chronic dermatitis, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, and geriatric support for successful aging and quality of life extension. At 13 yrs old,my dog Winston has a better quality of life and has found so much more energy being on this amazing product!” Now with the start of allergy season, System Saver works wonders on canine allergies as well. Learn more by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ to relieve your dog’s discomfort naturally.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! All right, everybody. We are back with Dr. Jodie Gruenstern and she is shedding light on over-vaccination and the use of titers. Dr. Jodie, I cut you off before you were about to tell us about a story about a dog. Yeah, I left everyone sitting on the edge of their seats. Okay, so back in the day when I was still conventional, kind of a few years out of school. And I really believe that being a good pet parent meant getting your pets spayed and neutered , and getting your pet vaccinated and on a good schedule. And a beautiful two year old, intact male German Shepherd came through my door. Hadn't been neutered, hadn't been vaccinated. And I basically shamed that owner into giving some vaccinations, including leptospirosis. And within a week, that dog had immune mediated thrombocytopenia, which is a severe bleeding disorder, that is listed as a potential complication from that vaccine, the vaccine manufacturer’s insert, and I did everything I could, I did not save that dog. And this is normal 30 years later, and I'm talking about it. So you know, it made a huge impact on me. And so that was one of many. Another one that we do see frequently that often goes uncorrelated is polyarthritis, stiffness, soreness, heat, fever, in the joints. And that can occur anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks after vaccination. And I had personal experience with that. It was a technician, a veterinary technician, who imported a beautiful purebred dog that she wanted to use in agility and a puppy. And she knew all the risks of vaccines. And we both pondered like, oh, you know, are we going to do this? Like, well, we need to get some on board. I mean, I'm not anti vaccs. I mean, I don't want dogs to get distemper, parvo or rabies. So it is important to vaccinate, but we vaccinated this dog, I think it was on a Thursday or Friday. And on Monday, I got a report from the emergency clinic that the dog was in there with this polyarthritis syndrome, not eating couldn't get up. Very painful. And the Tech had told them that the dog had been vaccinated. And they said no, it was too long after the vaccine that it couldn't have been the vaccine. And they weren't even the ones that gave it a shot. I was. And I'm like, I know it was the vaccine, for sure. And so there's just for, you know, in our field, there's just that denial. Well, and you're bringing up a good point, you know, our listeners know that we think that nutrition is the foundation for health for ourselves, as well as our dogs. And I know on all of these vaccine labels that it says for use in healthy dogs only. So nobody defines what healthy actually means. So if you have a dog that already has underlying issues, you know, they don't have a strong immune system, or they have leaky gut or or what have you. Are they already being set up for even worse consequences if we do over-vaccinate those dogs? Vaccinate only “healthy” Dogs Absolutely. And that's, that is a conventional rule, again, that the vaccine manufacturer asserts that veterinarians are breaking you know, that advice every day, and they're actually making themselves liable. For example, if a pet has a reaction to a vaccination, and then the next time they come in to get that vaccination again, the veterinarian gives them an anti histamine injection and then goes ahead and gives the vaccination. That's actually not something that the vaccine manufacturer recommends. They'll say heed the warning. That pet had a mild reaction the first time, they could have a lot worse problem the second time. And the other thing that is done every day is the animals that have the allergies that are on immunosuppressive drugs, like prednisone, steroids, cytopoint, cyclosporin products, apoquel, all of that, which is suppressing the immune system, which makes them unable to respond properly to the vaccine anyway. So they have a chronic disease, they're on a repetitive medication that definitely wouldn't fit in my definition of what healthy is, and certainly not a patient that has autoimmune hypothyroidism, which is like Hashimotos in humans and most dogs have the autoimmune version, or cancer. Certainly, we shouldn't be vaccinating our cancer patients. Well, I'm just so glad that you're here to talk more about titer testing and that it exists. So let's dive a little deeper. How much is it usually to get a titer test? Cost of titer testing Oh, that's all over the board. It can be anywhere probably from around $75, up to $250. Part of it is going to depend on are you just doing just a distemper, just a Parvo? Are you doing a combo of those two? Are you doing a combo of all three? Are you doing the type of tests that run in house? Is going out to a lab where the lab marks up the price and sends it on, let's say to Kansas State, or sending it to the veterinarian to set up their own account and they send it directly to Kansas State or Michigan State? Do you have access to a university, you know, to get this testing done? So that's why it varies so much. And when you get the titer testing done, and you get the results back, and let's say your dog has the correct antibodies for each of the three, how long would that titer be good for that would be in lieu of proof of vaccination? How long are titer’s results good for? So there is, to my knowledge, not any kind of regulatory guidance in that regard. And it depends also, if we’re talking about this distemper, parvo or rabies, because there are no laws about giving distemper or Parvo. Although there are restrictions about will this facility let you come in, if you don't have proof or protection for distemper or Parvo. Or this grooming facility or whatever, most states have a law only for rabies, not for distemper or Parvo. As far as determining how long it lasts, there are studies that have been done to show that the fastest, a distemper, Parvo titer falls, is in half each year, approximately. So if we want to give somebody guidance for their individual pet, and their pet is starting out with a titer, of, let's say, 4000, for Parvo. And it falls in half in a year, for the next year, it's 2000, the year after that it's 1000, the year after that, it's 500. And this is determined from a lot of animals that have been checked. But we can actually now kind of make that assumption. We know that for Parvo, to have what we call a sterilizing level of immunity, which is the level that's reported back on the lab report that they want to see, they actually only need an 80. So if they have 4000, it's going to be a lot of years, before they're going to get to 80 and supposedly need a booster. So even on my website, I have a blog article there about this and includes these numbers, that 80 is sterilizing, 20 is memory immunity level, and there's a difference there. So even with a lower number, you still do have some protection. So titer testing can be very complicated. It is helpful that if you work that you work with a veterinarian that has experience with understanding what those titer test results mean, and doesn't necessarily just take those numbers at face value either. But as far as rabies, which legally we need to be the most concerned about the guidelines there usually go by the World Health Organization, .5 or more level, which comes back from if we send the blood to Kansas State, it comes back if it's greater than .5 and protected. That's less than .5. Technically, they're not considered protected. And that can last anywhere from three years, seven years, maybe even longer. And there have also again, then, some rabies challenge studies done to determine that yes that number is holding and staying and protecting them for many, many years. Certainly more than one year and certainly more than three years. So would you recommend for a healthy adult dog that we get the titer testing yearly? Or, again, it depends on their actual numbers as to how often? Right, so again, that's on an individual basis, or as a blanket statement, I would say, it's not going to be necessary to do it yearly. But depending on the State, if they enact legislation to allow titer testing, they may say that they're going to require a titer test every year, even though a rabies vaccination may only be required every three years. Now I don't like that. But I can understand that because they are new to that. And they're trying to compromise, that they may feel more comfortable being able to assert that okay, it's a year later, yes, this pet is still protected, because they don't know if that protection is waning or not. And if they could really say, yes, this pet’s, okay for three years. And Dr. Jodie, you just mentioned legislation. Where are we with that around acceptance of tighter tests in lieu of over-vaccinating. So again, that's all over the board, depending on the state where you live. So in Wisconsin, I was blessed and spoiled by having an actual waver exemption law. So in Wisconsin, if a pet had had a reaction, or it had a chronic disease, as that individual’s veterinarian, I could decide if that pet should get vaccinated for rabies or not. And there was a state statute I could sign and present this waiver that the client would then keep, and they wouldn't get in trouble for not having injection of rabies on a routine basis in order to get their pet licensed. In Arizona, we do not have anything of that sort. The law is that you need to give that first vaccine by the time the puppy is six months old. You give another one a year later, that one is considered a three year and I use the word considered because based on studies, we actually know that it lasts longer than that in the majority of dogs. The very small number of dogs that actually are called no responders, and they don't even respond to their vaccines, including rabies. It's a small number. But it is not good science to assume that just because someone got a rabies injection, that that means they're immunized, that that means they're protected. That's not necessarily true. But I think if we really care about rabies as a zoonotic, a deadly disease., that's a danger to humans, then we should be requiring a minimum of one titer in every dog after they're vaccinated to tell if they're a responder or not. That makes sense. Well, as we are wrapping up, I just I hope one person listening today, learned something new. That we do have options. I could not believe earlier last year, I was going to get Winston's teeth cleaned. And I have gotten him titer tested and he is way more than adequately protected. They said he would have to get a rabies vaccine to do the dental. And I said well I've got my titer test right here and they didn't care. They said this is new protocol. In case he bites us. We can't perform dental cleaning on him without a rabies vaccination. Yep. So that is that is their clinic rule. That is not, you know, that is not a state law about their choice. And the other fallacy that gets perpetuated is that if your pet is not up to date on a rabies vaccine and it bites someone that pet will be euthanized. That is not true. As far as I know that is not true in any state. They will be quarantined for 10 days. The reason they're quarantined is because if they actually had rabies, and they're not going to be harboring it, they would have had to been bitten by a rabid animal just prior as well. But if they bite you because they actually have rabies, then they pass on within 10 days. And so that's what the 10 day quarantine rule is all about. So all I can say is that it's time for everybody to wake up and do what's best for our pets. And find a new veterinarian, find a new groomer educate, educate, educate. And you know, it's a peer pressure kind of thing. And we just need to let them know that, you know, we're not satisfied with the way you were treated in that situation and that it's not fair. And it's not good science even. Right. Well, Dr. Jodie, this is the perfect example of what this show is all about. That titer testing helps us to be the best advocates for our dog's health and wellness. And bravo to the daycares and the boarding facilities that are accepting titers. I hope more and more do. But again, as Dr. Jodie said, we have to say something, and if our vet does not agree, then we have to move on to somebody else. So Dr. Jodie, I can't thank you enough for chatting with us today. Where can everybody find out more information about you and your practice? Yeah, so simple, just www.docjodie.com. So and I'm Jodie with an “IE”. So it's www.docjodie.com. And I have a blog article right on that site that goes very into depth on this topic, as well as other links and other information about my other passions, like natural nutrition, for example. Maybe we can talk about that sometime. FB>> https://www.facebook.com/docjodie Twitter>> https://twitter.com/JodieGruenstern Instagram>> https://www.instagram.com/docjodie/ Yes, we would love to. That's our jam over here. All right. Sounds great. Thanks for having me today. Thanks, Dr. Jodie. We appreciate you. Thanks again to our friends at System Saver for sponsoring this month’s episodes .  Check out this fantastic all-natural formula by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode? Don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE and please leave a review: Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify I Stitcher I iHeartRADIO The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. The host as well as guests who speak on this podcast express their own opinions, experience and conclusions, and Wag Out Loud LLC neither endorses or opposes any particular views discussed here.

 5 Signs It's Time to Hire a Professional Dog Trainer | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:34:46

Well hello! This is Krista with episode #150 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Have you checked out all of the amazing trusted brands that I highly recommend? I test a lot of products, and only the ones that you find on my site are the ones that I have tried with my dog Winston, and that I know, like and trust. Products that will also help your dog to thrive. So just go to https://www.wagoutloud.com/ and check out the trusted brands section. And I've negotiated discounts for most of these products, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life? Okay, I just have to give a shout out to Italy! Bravo, Italy! The Italian Parliament recently voted to include the protection of animals in the nation's constitution. The Amended Constitution states that the protection of the environment and animals is a founding value of the nation in the interest of future generations. So Italy is widely recognized as a country of animal lovers, and since 2015, the World Dog Alliance has been working with a leading Animal Protection Group to make Italy a model country of animal protection for Europe and the world to learn from. Don't you think the United States needs to follow suit? Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Louie Torres is the founder of Unleashed Consulting Co, the world's leading marketing & consulting experts in the pet service industry & co-owner of Obedient K9 Training, a premier dog training business with locations in Charlotte, NC and Virginia Beach, VA.  After witnessing how professional dog training transformed his fearful-aggressive Chihuahua, Alfie, Louie knew he needed to help spread the word so that more people & pups could learn to live harmoniously with trust, love, and obedience!  Welcome dog lovers to another Wag Out Loud pawdcast episode. I am so thrilled to be joined by Louie Torres. He is going to share with us the five signs, it's time to hire a professional dog trainer. So Louie, first of all, thank you so much for being on the Show. I'm going to ask you to introduce yourself and tell us how Professional Dog Training has changed your life. Absolutely. Krista, thank you so much for having me on the pawdcast. I love what you do, love your audience, love your episodes. So first off, I'm super grateful to be here. For those of you who have never heard of me before. Thanks for tuning in. My name is Louie Torres, I'm the founder of Unleashed Consulting Company. We are a leader in the marketing and consulting space for the pet services industry. I'm also the co owner of Obedient K9 Training, a dog training business with locations in Charlotte, North Carolina and Virginia Beach, Virginia. So it all started about four years ago, when I had been moved in with my girlfriend. And she had a fearful, aggressive Chihuahua named Alfie. Probably not the first time we've heard of a fearful, aggressive Chihuahua. But it was a definitely a transition for all parties involved, including Alfie. And I had not grown up with any fearful, aggressive dogs. So a lot of the behaviors that we were living with and kind of adapted to in our lifestyle were new to me. iI was a challenge, there were times where Alfie and I didn't see eye to eye there's times when Michelle and I didn't see eye to eye. And we knew that if we were going to make our relationship work, I had to make the relationship work with the dog. So instead of, you know, sending Alfie back to live with her mother back in New York, which was an option. We made it work, we sought Professional Dog Training, help and it was life changing. It was just so eye opening, you know how we can communicate with these animals and just live harmoniously with them with the right understanding of how to do it. And next thing you know, I found myself bringing all that advice in to my family and friends and their relationships. And that's when I realized that I wasn't the only one dealing with this. In fact, most people are dealing with a situation like this .And fast forward to today, I get to help other business owners and I get to help my community here in Charlotte with the same situation. Very cool. Well, in your mind, do you think that all dogs need help from a professional trainer? Because you see, you know, videos and books? Can we do it ourselves? Or do you really think we need to bring the professionals in? I think that every situation is different. And that's a great question. And that was one of my, one of my five signs. Spoiler alert, spoiler alert, but uh, no, I definitely do think that, you know, it depends on your situation, how much time you're able to commit, it depends on your dog’s situation, how much time you're able to commit to your dog. And I think professional help is definitely going to help you expedite the process. And you're going to learn things that you wouldn't necessarily be able to do on your own. For example, in the dog training process, timing is key. And sometimes you're not able to see your own timing, even when you're recording yourself. So just having another set of eyes, they can see your timing with your dog, when you're learning how to however, your communication method is, that's really important for someone else to see. Now, for me, I've really invested into I really got an invested into my training program. And if you find someone to do it with you once, and you understand what your communication program and process is going to be with your dog, the cool thing is when you do hire someone, you don't need to hire them again. Because if you have a good trainer, they're not really going to spend so much time training the dog as they will training the human. And that's information and education that you can take with you for all the dogs that you have in the future. So yes, you, you can do it, you can go to YouTube, you can go to these apps, and you can follow trainers. But it really depends on the severity of the issues that you're dealing with, and also how much time you can truly commit to learning the craft. Alright. And I would have to assume that we shouldn't beat ourselves up if we do need to find a professional. That it's not really a reflection of our failure, if we can't get our dogs to act or behave a certain way. So why don't we go right into your five signs that it is time to hire a professional? 5 Signs It's Time to Hire a Professional Dog Trainer Absolutely, it's not your fault, if you don't have the right information. And most of us just don't. But hopefully, after listening to this podcast, you can make that decision if it is time for you to make that decision. So let's start with these are in no particular order, right. But for me, personally, number one, impacting your relationships. And it doesn't have to be just with your significant other, it can be with family, it can be with friends, right? So let's say you're someone that likes to host and you just got a rescue and now your friends are really hesitant about coming over because your rescue may growl. Or maybe it resource guards. Or maybe he just has anxiety, and it's just exhibiting behaviors that your friends or your family don't really agree with. Now you find yourself locking the dog in the bedroom or you know, locking the dog in a crate somewhere and putting it off. And, you know, not only is it going to be impacting your relationships, but maybe your relationship with your dog even, right. So definitely impacting relationships is definitely the number one thing that I hear from working with hundreds of trainers. And it's actually the reason why I got into this space myself. Number two, I would say is eating into your time. So when it comes to dog training, and when you go out and you seek professional help, depending on the level of help you're looking for, depending on the situation you're in, you're going to see a lot of different prices. And you might have a different, everyone has a different budget, right? So when it comes to finding a dog trainer, one of the constraints sometimes is money. And we have to make a decision on the value of our time, right? Because when it starts eating into the eating into your time, that's we're talking about your quality of life. Sure, right? So are you going to, you know, walk your dog late 11 o'clock at night in your neighborhood, because your dog can't be around other people, other dogs. So now you find yourself, you know doing things at weird hours of the night to avoid other people or maybe you're embarrassed. And maybe that's why you go out late or you wake up super early. And now you don't get a good night's rest, and now it's impacting your work. So eating into your time is definitely a big one. Or maybe your dog's not potty trained. And you find yourself leaving, you know, events early or family gatherings which you got to get home to the dog because it's not properly potty trained. Or you don't want to leave it out too long, because it might tear something up or start chewing on something in your house. So when it starts eating into your time, that eats into your quality of life. So that's definitely a reason to start looking for some professional help. Number three is when there can be an underlying issue. So at this point, maybe you've tried to YouTube stuff and Googled some things and you can't really identify why some of these outbreaks or reactivity or some of the behaviors, why are they happening in the first place? Right sometimes they happen. Sometimes they don't sometimes my dog does bark when he sees somebody walk past us. Sometimes he doesn't, right. And if you don't understand the real underlying issue or cause what's going on with your dog, your training, the communication that you're setting up with your dog, you might not be hitting the right thing. So it's important to have somebody else to again, take that second perspective, you know, take a look at what's going on, from an outside view, to see if there's something that they can see to help you out and identifying what that underlying issue is, so that you can make the proper changes in the communication with your pet. And then number four here. When you're out of answers. Passings is an obvious one, when you have, you know, tried the things that you remember mom and dad did in the past growing up, when you have tried to do the YouTube and look for the information on the internet. And there's a lot of good information on the internet guys, I'm not saying don't do that, there's a lot of good stuff on there. There's a lot of professional help on there, there are a lot of trainers that are well known that put a lot of good content out there to help people. But sometimes it doesn't work for your situation, and you really don't know where to go. The last thing we want is dogs to end up in a shelter, or to end up homeless, right. And unfortunately, shelters exist. Because people run out of answers, and they don't know what to do next. So I need professional help, it's out there, and people can help you with you in your situation. And spoiler alert, five. Me personally, I truly believe that everybody should at some point in their lifetime, seek out professional help, because it will help you along your journey as a pet owner. I would imagine someone that has a pet now, will probably have a pet 10 years from now, or 20 years from now or 30 years from now. So getting that professional help can really set you up for the rest of your life. With all the pets that you have. it's not just training the dog, it's actually training you on how you can communicate with all your pets in the future. Love it. So okay, be honest, how much of this training is for the dog versus the dog parent? Or are we really training us the humans? Absolutely, everybody has a different ratio. I would say 85/50. 85% of it is training the human. Yeah. And about 15% actually training the dog. And I think what we have to remember is, you know, whatever is going on with, you know, if your dog is not understanding or picking up on commands, or they have leash aggression, or whatever it is that as frustrated as we are, they are equally as frustrated. So to “speak their language” and understand what's going on and how you both can live harmoniously without running into these issues time and time again, we have to remember that this training, so that we can both live in harmony is good for both of us, our dogs and us as people. That is just going to increase our bond with them. Right? Absolutely. And the one thing that you mentioned a couple times now is the word communication. And I've started to look at training as a whole and this industry as a whole a little differently than when I first came into it. And instead of training instead of because I also like to look at it from the client perspective, right? The clients aren't as educated as someone that's been in the space that's been studying, that’s been practicing. So I want to make it make sense for them as well. And I like to use the word communication a lot more than I like to use the word training. Because at the end of the day, people think that people might have an expectation that, okay, I'm going to go in and get a few lessons, and I'm going to train my dog, and that's it, my dog is automatically going to know what to do. But the truth is, if you don't keep up on the “training”, then what's going to happen is your dog is going to go back into its old habits. So instead of looking at it as training, look at it as communication. And if you look at it that way, it's something that you always have to do. Right now, Krista, you and I are able to communicate, we both speak English. Unfortunately, our dogs don't speak English. So we have to learn and understand how we can communicate with them in a way, but then we have to hold ourselves to that standard. If we expect that if we're going to set expectations for our dogs, we're going to have to always constantly communicate in the same way. We can't just do our training and be done with it. We have to learn that communication system, we have to uphold it for the life of the dog. And if you find yourself doing that, you'll find yourself you're not actually training, you're just communicating. So whether it's with a leash, whether it's with another piece of equipment or whether it's just setting boundaries in your home, if you're consistent with it, it doesn't even feel like training anymore. It just feels like you're speaking their language. Well said! Well, Louie, this is a perfect spot where we are going to take a quick commercial break. We have a lot more to talk about, so we will be right back. SPONSOR AD FOR SPLEASH We so appreciate our friends at Tail Chasers, makers of SPLEASH for being this month’s sponsor.  How do you conveniently carry the water your dog needs while making your routine walks safer AND more enjoyable?  The answer is SPLEASH! This is a handle that easily attaches to your existing leash (whether that be made out of leather, rope or nylon) and is designed to hold up to 12 oz. of water.   SPLEASH is a patent-pending spray leash handle available in two color options and is perfect for: Hydrating your dog on-the-go with its flip-open cup. As well as Protecting yourself, your dog, and potential off leash animals, with a 14-foot protective spray radius of water…it’s like a super cool water gun built into the handle of your leash! You can also use the spray to clean off paws or cool your dog down on hot/long walks. SPLEASH is a brilliant product that gives me an added sense of safety when I’m out on walks with Winston.  Order your SPLEASH today and walk YOUR dog with confidence and ease.  Check them out at www.SPLEASH.com and as a Wag Out Loud pawdcast listener, you get a 15% discount by using the code WOL at checkout. And we are back with Louie Torres. We're talking about the five signs, it's time to hire a professional dog trainer. And Louie, you are just shining so much good light on this topic. Because no dog is perfect. And for sure no human is perfect. So why don't you tell us? What is the difference between a professional dog trainer and a professional behaviorist? Dog Trainer vs Dog Behaviorist Great question. And this is really a tricky question. And I think it's tricky because everyone has a different perspective. And I think it's completely subjective. Because at the end of the day, there's no federal laws or any policy on what it takes to become a professional dog trainer or to become a professional dog behaviorist. Yes, there are organizations that are out there where you can pay to take some sort of certification. But who are actually governing those organizations, it's tough to really identify what it is, what the criteria is that goes into both. I think it's very subjective. For me, the way that I look at it, I think it can be that would…well Krista, you got me on that one. Well I guess, maybe to make it easier. What's the difference between you know, basic obedience training? Yeah, versus behavioral, you know, I have issues like chewing, barking, housebreaking, that really would not be addressed by obedience per se. So I guess my question is, because I know there's two different types of training out there. Yeah, and I guess, there's so many different philosophies. And there are so many different types of training methods, where it gets a little touchy on on that type of subject, right. And the last thing that I want to do is isolate anybody, but I will say based on the training that I've come across, so a quick little, this will help out people in understanding where I'm coming from. So as the owner of Unleashed Consultanting, I've had an opportunity to work with over 200 Dog Training businesses. I've worked with all different types of methods, philosophies, training equipment, I've seen it all and I've actually practiced a lot of it myself. Because for me, in order to be the best marketer and consultant in the space, I need to actually get hands on and and learn and see what my clients are dealing with and actually see what the results and outcomes look like. So I've had an opportunity, very, very fortunate opportunity to really dive into this space. So I just want to start with that. And I was able to find a trainer who I built a relationship with, because I really, really loved his method. He was extremely open minded, and he had a lot of different pieces that he was putting into this puzzle. And the thing that I loved about him was that not every dog is the same. So he didn't train every dog the same. There are some trainers that if you come to them or behaviorists, if you come to them, this is the way that they would handle this type of dog, if you're not comfortable with that, they’ll refer you to somebody else, rather than having multiple different methods, multiple different approaches for multiple different dogs. So that's one of the reasons why I partnered with him with Obedient Canine. So the difference between the two in our system is, like you said, the obedience and behaviors are a little bit different. For us, we like to appreciate behaviors, we like to allow our dogs to do some critical thinking, and reward those behaviors so that they become natural, right? But the basic obedience where you know, you can do commands and whatnot, it can kind of crossover, depending on how you train the behaviors and how you're doing behavior training. So that's where I say, for us particularly, I like to combine the two, and so that my dog doesn't have to just listen to me when I when I repeat a command, if I wish to say place, my dog's gonna go to place, great. When we teach the behavior training that we do, my dog’s naturally just want to go to place just to hang out. If it's not doing anything, because that's the behaviors that we're kind of implementing by playing games with them. So I understand that there are a couple different ways. Our approach utilizes both, which is why I love doing what I do, because we're able to hit both of those. Does that kind of answer your question? Thank you. That does. So for people that would like to get started with finding a professional trainer, is the major barrier cost? Common Barriers Yeah, I think the major barrier is cost. You also mentioned another one, which is, I guess, just from a personal perspective, admitting. Admitting that you need help, which is one of the hardest things, right? I hear it all the time, when you know, we go out and we meet a married couple, one of the spouses is like, Oh, our dog needs training the other one’s like no, I can do this at home. Right. So it's like, just being able to admit that, you know, if you could have done it at home, you would have done it by now. Right? So it's okay. There's so much information when it comes to dog training, there's so much information on the internet, there's so much information from our families and our friends and other people that have dealt with pets and dogs their whole lives. So with that information, it's about just finding out what's going to work for you, everybody's different, everybody is going to practice differently. So I would say that's another barrier that people overlook. Okay, the second one is definitely going to be price. And I mentioned earlier, a different way of looking at it, right, because it's all perspective. So if I have a rescue, and I've got some anxiety, or I've got, you know, maybe I just want some basic obedience, because the dog doesn't have too much direction, or I just want to have some boundaries in my home or boundaries in my lifestyle with my dog. Right? If you want some professional help, which is going to expedite the process of you learning it and making mistakes on your own, then it's going to cost you. Is you're paying for somebody else's time, you're paying for somebody else's expertise, right. So just for example, if I was to look at the average of the hundreds of dog trainers that I work with, that basic obedience package might range from $1000 to $1,500. A lot of money, right? A lot of money, not everybody just has $1,500 just sitting in their account where they can just, you know, give that away. But the way that I look at it is if you just got a rescue you're going to have this dog for the next 10 to 15 years of your life. If you break that $1,000 up over that span, it's less than $100 a year for you to learn, and to become fluent in a language where you can have this harmonious life with his dog. I think it's priceless. That's the way that I look at it. And it's an investment. It's an investment. Yeah, because guess what, not only are you gonna know how to communicate with this dog that you’ve brought into your family, into your life, over the next 10 to 15 years. But then the next dog that you have down the road, and maybe you have another dog down the road, you're going to have the tools and information to be able to create that language and that communication to bridge the gap that you're currently having with your pet. And you're going to be able to do that without having to spend money in the future. As long as you're locked in, you got to be locked in. You got to be willing to put the time in. I was a little crazy. I'm a little perfectionist sometimes. So with my dogs, I made sure I was on a schedule like they were like my kids, right, like I kind of schedule. I made sure I was consistent with the training, you know, three times a day, 15 minutes. And that's really all it was three times a day 15 minutes. Now I don't really do training sessions as much, it's more or less just making sure that I'm consistent on my walk with, you know how I'm handling my leash consistently, not letting my dog just run up to people, it doesn't turn into training, it just turns into a language. And now my dogs, I don't have to remind them as much on how I want them to behave because it's become our lifestyle. Regulation Well, just like everything in the pet industry, nothing is regulated. So there really is no state or federal certification needed to be a dog trainer, at least here in the United States. So when we are looking to choose a trainer, what do you recommend? What are some of the accreditations that maybe we should make sure that people do have? That is the word I was looking for before, regulation. Regulation, we have none. We have none in the space. And it's difficult to tell, it's difficult to tell, I've done a lot of research into different organizations. And I think it's important to be open minded. As much as you know, I mean, your main organization is your American Kennel Club. And then you have different ones based on research and different philosophies of training. That's where it can get a little bit biased. And that's where you have to trial and error a little bit and figure out what's best for you and figure out how you want to communicate with your dog and what you are and what you are not willing to do. But the one thing that I have seen is, it's extremely important to be open minded, because every single dog is different, because every owner has a different lifestyle and has a different commitment that they're able to give. So what I look for first is I'm going to look at content. So hopefully this person is posting on social media. If they're not, that's a red flag for me. Why aren't they posting on there? Maybe something has happened in the past, you know, unfortunately, there are situations where people do things that they shouldn't be doing. And you know, that unfortunately, they get a bad rap. And they're not going to be posting content. So that's the first thing I look for, I look for content, I look for results. Within that content, maybe I can find a dog that started out similarly to mine, and maybe they can share a journey. And I can actually see how a dog was reacting to their particular training program or protocol. I'm going to look at some reviews, I'm going to make sure that that they have reviews and that people are raving about them and, and the ones that are negative, I'm going to look at them with a grain of salt, again, I want to be able to be open minded and understand and really look at the content that's out there. Maybe someone didn't have, maybe someone had a bad experience because they didn't put the work in because as I mentioned earlier, it's 85% the human, 15% the dog. So just because someone had a bad experience with this trainer, I'm not going to immediately disqualify them knowing that most of the time, it's the human that wasn't following up on their end. So that's where I'm going to get started as far as organization. Now, there's a number of different organizations out there. IACP, you've got the American Kennel Club. I mean, you're looking at CCPDT, you know, but like I said, I look at those with a grain of salt, because all you have to do is sign up pay, take a test, you don't actually have to be practicing those things, right. So I just make sure that I look for content, right? Lastly, I'm going to really take a take advantage of my evaluation. Most dog training businesses will provide a free evaluation, not all of them, but most of them. Some do a paid evaluation, and sometimes it is worth paying that evaluation, right? I've seen different business models, I'm not here to say one's better over the other from business perspective. I'm looking at it from the consumer standpoint, I like free evaluations, because there is so much information on the internet. And because every client’s different I want to lead with service. And I want to make sure not only that I'm providing them information to see if I'm going to be a good fit for the client. But I want to make sure that the client’s a good fit for me, right, because that's the only way that I'm going to be able to know as a dog trainer, that this person is going to feel comfortable with my programs. They're going to follow through and we're going to get the best results for that dog. And if that's not the case. And that's okay. They're better off working with someone else. So that's why I love free evaluations. It gives you an opportunity to meet and also an opportunity to meet the dog. And I look at it from this perspective. If you go to a doctor and you have some symptoms, right, the doctor is not just going to prescribe you a drug. The doctor is going to do a consultation. They're going to learn about your health history. They're going to learn if you're allergic to any medicines. They're going to do all your vitals, they're going to do some sort of exam. And then given that process, after they've done all those steps, then they would prescribe you medicine. So that's why I don't like just doing like a phone consultation with a trainer over the phone and then buying into a program. I need to make sure that I meet them, I need to make sure that they're seeing how my dogs interact with myself, with them. And whatever that situation is, I want them to actually take a look at it first. And I think that's really important when finding a trainer, someone that goes the extra mile to make sure that they're actually giving you the right prescription. And they're not just there to make a sale. Louie, this has been amazing advice. I can't believe that we are about to wrap up here. But the only thing I would probably add is, in addition to understanding what that trainer’s philosophy is, you can always call references, you know, preferably, Do you have anybody that had a dog, you know, with a similar situation? And could I ask them what their experience was working with you? So that's a great idea. I love that. I think this was amazing, and hopefully gave a lot of our listeners something to think about. So I know that you have two offers that you would like to give us before we wrap up here. So you have one for pet service businesses and one for the dog owners. So why don't you share with us what those are? OFFERS Absolutely, Krista. Thank you for the opportunity. So if you are a pet service business, and you're looking for some consulting, advice, marketing advice, technologies to help you automate some of this stuff, please go to unleashedconsulting.com. And you can book a free strategy call with a member of my team. And if you are a dog owner, we also do virtual training. So you don't have to be in the Virginia Beach or the Charlotte area, but you can get that free evaluation where we'll meet you will meet your dog through Obedient K9, https://www.obedientk9va.com/. And you can get a free evaluation through the website. Social Media URLs or Tags          Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/unleashedconsulting/, https://www.instagram.com/obedient_k9_training/          Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/unleashedconsultingco, https://www.facebook.com/obk9charlotte          LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/louie-torres-7a203b1a0/ Nice. Alright, so everybody gets to get something. The thing that we do differently with that evaluation, is not only are we going to evaluate your dog, but really take a step back, really put your dog into the situation so that we can take that second look and see what could possibly be the underlying cause. But the thing that we believe in is leading with value. So we're actually going to do your first training lesson during that session, right. And we're going to do a couple of different things to see how your dogs interacts with, with us and with our communication system. Because like I said, it's not just one system, we want to figure out what would be the best way for your dog to go. So again, thank you so much for your time, Krista. And yeah, those are the ways that I can help you guys out. Awesome. Well, of course, all of these links will be in the show notes. And so Louie, if anybody just wants to find out more information about you and the company, is it just the unleashedconsulting.com Correct. Okay. Awesome. All right. Well, Louie, thank you so much. And thank you to our listeners for wanting to do better for your dog. And hopefully this gave you some new insights. Thanks, everybody. Thanks again to our friends at Tail Chasers, makers of the Spleash leash handle.  Spleash your leash and Hydrate, Protect and Walk Your dog With Ease, but don’t forget to use the code WOL for 15% off of your order at www.SPLEASH.com  Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

 Paw and Order! Therapy Dogs for Kids Testifying in Court | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:32:30

Hello everyone this is Krista with episode #149 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Here's a cool thing that I just came across. Nominate your dog to be a part of the Dog Aging Project. This initiative brings together a community of dogs, owners, veterinarians, researchers, and volunteers to carry out the most ambitious canine health study in the world, and your dog can be a part of history. The Dog Aging Project will follow 10s of 1000s of companion dogs for 10 years in order to identify the biological and the environmental factors that maximize healthy longevity. How cool is that? All dogs, young, old, mixed purebred male, female, healthy, and even those with chronic illnesses are considered. So just go to https://dogagingproject.org/ to nominate your dog today to be a part of an unprecedented research platform, examining how genes lifestyle and environment influence aging. I enrolled Winston and yes, your dog can also help uncover what factors are associated with better health and a longer life. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Kerry Cooke and her daughter are dog lovers. They’ve both found comfort and solace in dogs through their individual journeys to deal with trauma and adore going for long strolls with their pups. But they found carrying around water and a bowl to keep their canines hydrated burdensome. Carlsbad, California-based Cooke, who had always dreamed of being an entrepreneur, suddenly had her lightbulb moment – and thus SPLEASH was born. Her invention is a handle that attaches to a leash and holds 12 ounces of water along with a mini bowl, so any leash is immediately converted into a dog-friendly hydrating station. Today Cooke and her daughter are relishing running this new venture together, and are giving a portion of the proceeds to organizations that support domestic violence survivors. Hi there dog lovers! Ready for another informative episode? Well, we are about to chat with Kerry Cooke about Paw and Order! Therapy Dogs for Kids Testifying in Court. And Kerry, I have been looking forward to this interview for quite some time. I think we set this up almost a year ago. So could you please introduce yourself and share why are you so passionate about having therapy dogs allowed in the courtroom? Paw And Order Hi, yeah, thanks, Krista. Thank you for having me on the Wag Out Loud. We're really excited to talk about Paw and Order. So I recently started a company called Tail Chasers. I invented a product. And we wanted to really sort of pay homage and honor somebody who was impacted by domestic violence in the most profound way. And my daughter and I both had to testify in court in the trial. And we wanted to make sure that no other child to have to go and testify has to do it without the support of a therapy dog. Because we were lucky enough to have a therapy dog sit in the court waiting area with my daughter before she had to testify. You know, it was very, very emotional, emotionally charged situation. And to have that loving, beautiful dog sit with her and have her focus go to that animal was just…it meant everything to me, as her mother to see her, you know, coping with everything that she was going through, and then doing so with the aid of this therapy animal. So as we started setting up the company and started thinking about, you know, really what our mission is, and really what we want to do, we wanted to have something positive come out of such a negative situation and raise awareness and raise funds to help support others who have to go through a similar situation. So we've partnered with PetPartners.org to help certify therapy dogs for court. And we're trying to raise money for them every year through the sales of our products, but also through doing you know, the largest dog walk and things like that to again raise awareness and raise funds to help certify more dogs to help more kids. That is fantastic. Well, I love that you're giving back and the focus of this because before I chatted with you about this, I never knew that this was even a thing that you know dogs are more and more available in courtroom situations, so I can't imagine the whole experience of testifying in court, you know, it has to be stressful, as you said emotional, and especially for children, who are asked to probably recall traumatic experiences or memories. And I think we all know that the studies are out that they show that interacting with a dog lowers stress, puts us at ease. So having dogs in the courtroom to actually comfort victims just makes sense. So can you walk us through? How did you actually get to have a therapy dog with you and your daughter, when you went through this experience? Kerry’s Story Um, you know, that was very, very interesting and sort of slightly convoluted way that it came about. But I'm so thankful for all of the different things that had to fall into place for it to work out for us. I believe, you know, we live in in San Diego County, and this case was at the San Diego court. And they had just started allowing dogs to accompany victims who had to testify. And, and we were in a unique situation, we were being called to testify for the murder trial. And as you can imagine, again, very emotionally charged, and my daughter was, was going to testify, we went back and forth. So much about whether or not it you know, would be too much emotionally for her to testify. And a lot of the courtroom sort of experiences that you engage with are determined by what the the actual accused person wants, because it's their right to face their accusers. And we wanted to actually have her testify in what's called “in camera”, which means in a different room, so that she wouldn't have to be in the same room with the person that, you know, was the accused, and we, unfortunately, it was their right to, you know, say yes or no to that, and they wanted to see her testify. So the next step was okay, if we can't, if we still feel it's important enough for her to testify, and we can't do it in a different room on a camera, then, you know, what else can we do to help make her more comfortable, so they floated this new idea of having a dog accompany her. And, you know, right away, I was like, Oh, that would be amazing. She loves dogs so much. We at the time had three dogs at home, one of which was her, like her own very own emotional support dog who had helped her through some of the earlier stages before it got to trial. Because she cried into every night, this yellow lab named Leila, who was her heart dog. And I knew that as much as she loved Leila, and you know the other dogs too, but Leila really was her special understanding, emotional support. And they said, you know, we can offer a therapy dog for her, it's most likely going to be a yellow lab and her eyes just lit up on like, I knew that would be the right thing to do to help take her her mind off things. So they arranged for the dog to come wait with us. We had a special meeting/greeting room where we met the dog where she got to be more engaged with the dog and familiar with the dog. And then on the day of the testimony, we waited in the hallway with the dog, which was just I can't even put into words how much it meant to me to have that distraction for her. So she was 11 years old at the time, and, and being able to focus again on this amazing dog when there was, you know, just so much happening in the hallway of the court. It was yeah, it just meant everything to me. Again, unfortunately, the accused gets to dictate many times what happens with the people who are going into the court to testify. And the defense team actually refused to let the dog go in and sit in the courtroom with her. That was just another example of what a horrible person, he was to not allow this young child to utilize the therapy dog in the actual jury, you know, in the box, testimony box, witness box. And we were, you know, fairly distraught about that development when it happened. And we just decided, okay, well put all that love and affection into the dog before you have to go in. And then we had a stuffed animal that she got to hold in the witness box. But sitting there in the court watching her testify the little giraffe that she was holding, you could just see the neck of the giraffe shaking as she sat there recounting some very, you know, troubling, traumatic things. But I think having the therapy dog, I could see the difference in her demeanor in her confidence when we were in the hallway versus in the box to testify. I just want to make more, more parents, more children more comfortable if they have to go through something similar by making more therapy dogs available to help support families who are going through their gut wrenching emotional situation. Absolutely. And I didn't even know that this existed. And when I dug a little deeper, I learned about the Courtroom Dogs Act. Do you want to shed any light on that where we are with that? And do all states allow therapy dogs in the courtroom? Right now, to my knowledge, they're still working on it for federal courts, Dianne Feinstein and Corwin introduced a bill to allow therapy dogs in federal courts just this past June. I know, individual states have different regulations and are starting to really embrace this. I think it was Pennsylvania, who is the most recent state to allow dogs to accompany folks in court in and that was in like late September. So not every state allows it in their their state courtrooms. And they are working on a bill to pass for a federal courtroom. Good. And does the dog have to be accompanied by the handler? Or are they just they're in the courtroom. And the dog is actually most of the time in the box? In the hallway and the handler’s really nearby. I know. As I mentioned, unfortunately, we weren't allowed to have the dog sit while she testified with her. But what would normally happen is they would sit at the feet of whoever who's testifying, so they can reach down and pet the head and feel that comfort and support. The handler would be most likely in the in the courtroom somewhere in sort of the gallery. But they do they're such well trained dogs. They are so calm, and they have to go through a you know, a big certification process, which is what Pet Partners actually does. They help work with and train and do the certification for the therapy dogs that sit with kids in court. Okay, well, I want to dig a little deeper into that, but we're just gonna take a quick break right now for a sponsor ad. So we'll be right back. We so appreciate our friends at Tail Chasers, makers of SPLEASH for being this month’s sponsor.  How do you conveniently carry the water your dog needs while making your routine walks safer AND more enjoyable?  The answer is SPLEASH! This is a handle that easily attaches to your existing leash (whether that be made out of leather, rope or nylon) and is designed to hold up to 12 oz. of water.   SPLEASH is a patent-pending spray leash handle available in two color options and is perfect for: Hydrating your dog on-the-go with its flip-open cup. As well as Protecting yourself, your dog, and potential off leash animals, with a 14-foot protective spray radius of water…it’s like a super cool water gun built into the handle of your leash! You can also use the spray to clean off paws or cool your dog down on hot/long walks. SPLEASH is a brilliant product that gives me an added sense of safety when I’m out on walks with Winston.  Order your SPLEASH today and walk YOUR dog with confidence and ease.  Check them out at www.SPLEASH.com and as a Wag Out Loud pawdcast listener, you get a 15% discount by using the code WOL at checkout We are back, and we are having an amazing chat with Kerry Cooke, talking about Paw and Order. And I am just so thrilled that there is this program to allow therapy dogs in the courtroom. So Kerry, we were just talking about, that these dogs do have special training, and they have to be good at reading people and reading the stress of people. So are these dogs just like, you know, I had Winston as a therapy dog for assisted living centers when he was younger? Would it be the same certification? Or is it a little bit different? Therapy Dog Training I am not 100% positive, if it is different than the standard training that they that they take dogs through, but it's really, it's almost more of a handler and the dogs that are that are being trained. They obviously have to be very well behaved animals and follow all of the cues, they have to pass all the health standards and make sure that their their, you know, animals welfare is protected along with the people that they're there to help. So there's, you know, guidelines on the minimum age and a maximum length of visit to sort of prevent the animals from being over exhausted or overworked. You know, they make sure that they keep up with all the veterinary care and those types of things. So the animals that they do bring to support the kids are really very well trained. Very well. acclimatized to the courtroom setting, they go through numerous loud banging noises, disruptive arguing, because all of those kinds of things are in that courtroom environment that they could be exposed to, and they need to not react. So, you know, the, as I mentioned, just, you know, our emotional state in being in the courtroom, the animals pick up on those types of things. So they do have to have that extra intensive training to deal with this high anxiety group of people that they're thrown in with when they're accompanying somebody to testify. Sure. I mean, if you can imagine, not only is the person that they're accompanying to testify in court anxious, and setting off all of those anxious signals to the dog that's so so are, you know, the defendants and the families that are there, and sometimes the courtroom can get very heated. So they do have to be very, very calm animals. Yes, absolutely. And are there certain breeds that are most often used in courtroom cases? I've just been experiencing, you know, educating myself as we started this company, and started to really want to, say pay it forward, but but endorse and work with and try and fund more therapy dogs. It seems to me that there's not any one specific type of dog that's used all the time. I mean, the yellow lab is obviously a very loving kind of type of dog. And that's the dog that we had, but I've seen, you know, German Shepherds, and little Pappilon dogs. They've, they have other therapy animals to the support, like rabbits and birds, even not for court rooms, but for, you know, other therapy related support. So, I think it's, you know, obviously, way more about the temperament and the capabilities of the individual animals. That has to be right, than any one breed. Some argue that the fact that let's say a child needs a therapy dog in the courtroom already signals to the jury that there's something that they need therapy for, you know, a child is already sympathetic. So give a child a dog and they're much more sympathetic. What do you say to that? Well, I think that was the exact reason why the defendant in the case that we were involved in didn't want to, you know, the dog to come in to it, they were already dealing with this child to, you know, was a witness and saw, you know, saw some things that that they wanted to communicate felt it was important to, to be known. And sitting, you know, this cute little blonde 11 year old down for the jury to talk about what she saw with the company of a dog would have just been too much. So it is within the defendant’s right to be able to, you know, refuse certain things that happen in their case, because it is their, you know, their life on the line, so to speak. But overall, what they found is that the therapy animals really helped to lower the stress level enough, but also open the witness up to almost sort of that comfort level where you feel like you're talking with the dog, and you can tell the dog anything, so they're able to be more free with their memories, and more open with what they're experiencing, because they are bringing the animal with them and having that extra support. Right. As I mentioned, you know, I feel like I saw the courage and the strength that she got from the therapy dog we sat with in the hallway. And we were out there for quite some time. So she had a really long time to enjoy that dog, and she loved on its neck so much and was talking to it. And I I feel like that distraction for her helped get her to a point where we could, you know, walk in and she could face the, you know, this daunting task that she was about to embark on. Right. Well, I did find a study by Wolford College in South Carolina. they did a study on they had mock jurors and reviewed real cases and had the dogs present. And what they found was surprising to them, that having a dog in the courtroom did not make any difference to the way that the jurors saw the case. So as I mentioned before, you would think that having a therapy dog there with a victim already elicits sympathy, that it would make the victim seem well more like a victim. And people would feel sorry for them. But this study showed no impact with a dog present. So I thought that was really interesting and just supports this program even more. Let's talk about Spleash. So that is your product that you have come up with under your company tail chasers. And you're using the sales of Spleash to support this organization that you chose called Pet Partners that has this therapy dog program supporting victims in court. First talk about Spleash. We'd love to learn I know about this product. I love this product. I think it's genius. And then tell us why did you choose Pet Partners out of all of the different organizations? Spleash Yeah, thank you. And thanks for the opportunity to spread the word about Spleash and about, you know, our our mission in supporting Pet Partners. We really appreciate it. As a bootstrapped startup, you know, you have to get out there and raise awareness and do it on a shoestring budget. So it's been a fun ride and a big learning experience and it's been really great because I do you know, now my daughter is grown and I do get to work with her. She's our creative director. She's my inspiration for for really all things and our dogs and they're a huge inspiration for us. And Lola, who is our biggest dog right now she's 91 pounds. She's a black lab/Weimaraner mix and we live in Southern California and it's always hot. Not always but right now it's a little bit chilly outside but it still is generally warm and sunny most days and walking with a black dog in Southern California you have to really monitor the time of day that you're walking the heat and make sure you bring your water. And I was always leaving without the water and get a couple blocks away and go, I have to go back and get it. Like there's got to be a better way to do this. And not keep forgetting the water. And I had one of those squeezy water bottles, you know, things that I would hang off my pant loop thing or off the leash itself, but it was always just a bit clumsy. And one day I was filling it up and sort of throwing it over at Lola like trying to cool her down. And I thought that a squirt gun would be great to, you know, to use on a walk. So I went home and duct taped a squirt gun to the end of my leash. And I started discovering all the great ways that you can use water. By squirting it on a walk with a dog, cleaning their paws, cleaning up messes on the sidewalk, spraying away any off leash animals that happened to you know, charge up at you you're not ready for. And you know, I Googled it and nothing like it existed yet. So I started on a great journey of researching and developing and launching a new product, which is Spleash. It’s a spray leash handle that you attach to your leash is it fits any regular sized rope, leather or nylon leash and holds 14 ounces of water and can spray at least 14 feet. And so we're hoping everybody will Spleash their leash. And the portion of all of our sales are going towards supporting this great organization, which I chose because it is national, it covers certifying dogs in all states and trying to work with organizations to help foster that and improve the situation for therapy animals in all areas that are used. They don't just focus focus on the kids in the courtroom. They focus on all in therapy, animal certification, but they specialize in working with kids in court as well. So I just wanted to choose an organization as we grow that could support hopefully, and they could support more therapy animal certifications every year. That sounds amazing. Well, I've tried the Spleash product. And I encourage everyone listening to check it out, because it does make life so much easier when you're out for a walk for your dog. And it's just genius to bring the water with you not only to spray on your dog, but it has a little flip in the handle so that the dog can actually drink right from the handle as well. And as you mentioned, Kerry, you know, there are those irresponsible dog owners that have their dogs off leash. What do you do when you're there with your dog, at least spraying the other dog will hopefully deter them and give you a chance to protect your dog. So again, so many reasons why I love this product. And Kerry is offering a very generous offer to our listeners. If you would like to try out the Spleash, listeners get a 15% discount, just use the code WOL2022. And you can get that just by going to Spleash.com. And ordering there. And of course, all of this information, including the Pet Partners link, all the links are going to be here in the show notes. So you know people definitely should share this episode. I didn't know about courthouse therapy dogs, so I'm sure a lot of other people don't either. And as we are wrapping up, there is one statistic that I found, you know, I asked you how many states are doing this. And I found that as of October of last year of 2021, there were at least 272 courthouse facility dogs working in 41 states. So that's great. But I think this program needs to go even further. I'm excited to hear that hopefully the legislation will be accepted on the federal level as well. So I can't thank you enough, Kerry for bringing this information to us for creating an amazing product and also supporting the Pet Partners Program. Do you have any parting words for us? Other than to just say thank you so much, Krista. We enjoy the Wag Out Loud pawdcast and are really excited to help again bring awareness to the great service that Pet Partners is, is providing and supporting other people and trying to bring that the memory and keep the memory alive of a beautiful woman who lost her life to domestic violence, named Jennifer Stark. And to make sure that we can make comfortable other children who are going through a traumatic event in their life, you know, summon up the courage to do the right thing and testify. Yep. And once again, dogs are amazing. They touch every part of our lives. So Kerry, thank you for sharing your story. Again, where can everyone find out more information about you and Spleash? www.spleash.com https://www.facebook.com/TailChasersLLC/ https://twitter.com/TailChasersLLC https://www.instagram.com/spleash_your_leash/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/tail-chasers-llc https://www.tiktok.com/@spleash_your_leash Okay, thank you, Kerry. Appreciate you. Thanks, Krista. Thanks again to our friends at Tail Chasers, makers of the Spleash leash handle.  Spleash your leash and Hydrate, Protect and Walk Your dog With Ease, but don’t forget to use the code WOL for 15% off of your order at www.SPLEASH.com  Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

 Prevention: Your Dog's Life Depends on It | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:32:53

Hi there! This is Krista with Episode #148 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. It's common knowledge that a dog's sense of smell is legendary. But did you know that his nose has as many as 300 million receptors? In comparison, our human noses have only about 5 million. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Judy Baker is the driving force behind Dr Baker's System Saver... the safe, natural, anti-inflammatory phenomenon that is changing the lives of pets with pain. For 20 years, Judy has made it her mission to make this amazing formulation, created by her husband Dr. Don Baker, available to animal lovers all over the world. To date she has received literally thousands of testimonials from delighted pet owners who have been overjoyed to shake off the worry of using harmful anti-inflammatories, while delivering results that have been truly life changing. Prevention: Your Dog's Life Depends on It Hi there dog lovers. Thank you so much for tuning in to another Wag Out Loud pawdcast episode. And today we are chatting with Judy Baker, who is here to cover Prevention: Your Dog's Life Depends on It. Judy, I want to welcome you to the show, and ask you to please introduce yourself and tell us why you think it's so important to think about prevention early on with our dogs. Well, first, thank you so much for having me on Krista. I truly appreciate the opportunity to speak to everybody. And I am the co founder of Dr. Baker's Canine System Saver, which has been around for almost 23 years. That's pretty amazing. And why do you take the stance about prevention? Why are you so passionate about it? I think because I've learned so much from the people that I've dealt with over the last 23 years. And from what I've seen in my own dogs. And what's reported back to me. So many things get taken for granted, because they're simple. They're things you wouldn't ordinarily think of. And it can make such a big difference in the quality of the dog's life, and the longevity and how they spend that time living their life from something as simple as having blood work done. So you have a baseline of what you're looking at whether you start with a very young dog, or you start with an older dog that you rescue, or you happen to be in a senior rescue, like my friend, Penny Miller, from Frankie and Andy's Place, who deals with tons of seniors. You have to know what you're dealing with, so you can make the best decisions possible. Yep. And that's what this show is all about, how to be the best advocate for our dog's health and wellness. And, Judy, you probably agree, we've all heard the old adage, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. And I think it really holds true when it comes to the health of our dogs. So tell me if you agree. I absolutely agree. Okay. And, Judy, do you also think that the cost of prevention upfront is usually a fraction of the cost of treating a disease or problem once it's become more advanced? Absolutely, if you can stay ahead of something. And sometimes you can’t, an injury can happen that you never would have thought would be something that would be put in your path. And then you have to juggle a little bit and do the best you can with it. But it's going to save you time and angst over many years, if you can avoid things. I have so many people come to me all the time and say I wish I had thought of that sooner. I wish I had known that sooner. Even if it's something as simple as having hardwood floors, with a dog that's newly injured. You want to get something down on those floors so that your dog has traction, be it a yoga mat or be it anything that they have traction on. It's simple little things that you can add in. We all know about diet or I should say we're learning about it. We learn as we grow and I think that our dogs are some of our greatest teachers. Absolutely and Judy, you hit it on the head that it's all about education. We can't beat ourselves up you know once an issue does arise. Oh, I shoulda, coulda, woulda. That's what this show is all about. And that's why speaking to people like you, that educate people, what can we do for preventative measures, and we have a crisis going on, over 50% of our dogs, especially over the age of 10, are going to get cancer. And that is just awful statistics. And we should be thinking more, how do we prevent the cancer and the other diseases that we're seeing so much of? So I am so excited about this topic. And I wanted to ask you, Judy, what does dog preventative care mean to you? Knowledge is Key It means a scope of things. It's not just one thing, environment, environment plays into it, feeding your dog plays into it. And when you talk about feeding your dog, I never want people to feel like there's guilt involved in that. I think people who are becoming aware, are doing the very best they can. And sometimes you can't make a total change in a diet. But you can make small incremental changes. And I think everything you do even if it is tiny steps toward the ultimate goal of having quality of life. Because everybody strives for longevity. But without quality of life, it means nothing. And I think that everybody has that goal. But knowledge comes to people differently. And I think a lot of people in your audience are looking for options, they're looking for alternatives. And there are a lot of them out there. Some are better than others. And it's about doing a little bit of research. Well, to your point, Judy, nothing in the pet industry is regulated. So we do have to educate ourselves, we have to do the research. And as we said, we have to be the advocates for our dogs, you know, they can't talk. So on this show, our listeners know that we look at integrative or even holistic approaches to wellness. So things like as you mentioned, you know, a high quality diet is a great foundation to start with when it comes to prevention. And we're going to talk about this in a little while, but exercise for your dog, promoting a healthy gut, keeping your dog's teeth and gums healthy. So it's really a whole body approach when it comes to health and wellness and prevention. And that also includes diet, and exercise. And making sure that emotionally your pets feel safe, that you spend time with them. And you give them quality time. Taking the dog on a walk and spending that walk, unless it's an emergency, on your phone, isn't giving them the time that they deeply require. Because they're very emotional beings just like we are. And they know the difference. If you're paying attention to them, or if you're not. It's funny you say that. That is one of my pet peeves is going out for a walk and seeing people with their dogs and they're on the phone. Yeah, me too. I don't know about you, Judy. But my best thinking happens when I'm out for a walk with my dog out in nature, when my mind is free, and I'm breathing fresh air, and I am bonding with my dog. it's such an opportune moment to do that. And I wish more people would realize it. It's so true and one of my dogs loves to run. She ended up with an injury this summer that caused her to have to be on a leash and not run the way she loves to. And I felt guilty that I couldn't just let her go the way she wanted to. And I had to fight myself, to say to myself, No, you have to be very present with her and make sure that she doesn't reinjure something and that I can be her advocate give her the time she needs to heal and be very protective of her. When all I wanted to do was let her run and be happy. But I knew in the long run she'd be happier if I did what I was doing at the time. The Importance of a Baseline You're so right. And we also have to think about others. You know, it's another pet peeve of mine people think that letting their dog off leash when they do not have control over the dog, you know, that puts you and your dog in jeopardy. So I just I encourage people to be more respectful and cognizant, and I know our listeners are the good guys. So why don't we get into prevention. And you said this early on, and I love how you worded it that it's great to get a baseline early on. So whether you have a puppy or you adopt an adult dog, it's so important that during their wellness examinations, that you get the baseline of a urinalysis and a stool sample and the blood work. Do you agree? Absolutely. Because you can't know if something's changed. And you can't ever go back and wonder, well, is this normal for my dog, even if it looks off, it might not be off for your dog, it might be something that dog’s had all its life. So getting a baseline and knowing what you're dealing with, from whatever stage you start out with your dog is, a really good way of staying ahead of something. Yep, I agree. And to that point, a few episodes ago, #142, we talked about this amazing program called Pet Health 5, which is FREE. And it's monthly emails, just as a reminder to do a body scan, temperature check, weight check, dental exam, and a check on heart rate. So simple to just take a few minutes every month. So if anybody's interested again, that's free, it's just a monthly reminder, check out episode number 142. On the Pet Health 5. I actually just listened to that over the weekend. And I think it's a wonderful program and a wonderful idea. Because it takes such a short time to check in. And when a dog looks healthy and happy, you never think about them not being that way. But dogs are very stoic beings. And they don't show a lot of times when something doesn't feel quite right to them. They'll see a raccoon or a rabbit or a chipmunk, and they'll go after it anyway, just for fun, right? But if you have a baseline, and you can follow the progress of something, or know if whatever you're seeing is just the way your dog is because they're all individuals. It's just a safe way to check in. Absolutely. And I know a lot of people go as far as journaling, that in addition to visits to the vet and all of the records that they keep that a lot of dog parents journal, you know, okay, Winston has a lipoma on his chest. And then a month later, oh, there's another lipoma. I'm going to write that down, you know, has the other one grown.? So it's just a great way to keep your own records, in addition to the veterinary records. It's funny you said that because the other thing is measuring them. Because it's so easy for us. Because we love them so deeply. To kind of not want to know if they've changed. We want to know, and we don't want to know. So a little bit of denial plays in. So if you journal and you chart, you know what you were looking at a month before, and if something has changed a month later, and if it's down there in writing, you can't give yourself that little bit of denial that you want, even though in the big picture, you wouldn't want that at all. Great, great advice. Well, Judy, this is a great place for us to take a short commercial break, so hold on everybody. Thanks so much to the team at System Saver for being this month’s feature sponsor. Dr. Baker’s Canine System Saver is an outstanding all-natural supplement that promotes healthy aging.  Originally created by a veterinarian to help restore health and soundness to dogs suffering from chronic inflammatory and degenerative conditions, this is one product that does so much! Perfect for: arthritis, hip dysplasia & joint support, chronic dermatitis, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, and geriatric support for successful aging and quality of life extension. At 13 yrs old,my dog Winston has a better quality of life and has found so much more energy being on this amazing product!” Now with the start of allergy season, System Saver works wonders on canine allergies as well. Learn more by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ to relieve your dog’s discomfort naturally.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! Hello, everyone, we are back speaking with Judy Baker about the importance of prevention. And Judy, does it all boil down to simply preventing inflammation? I think so many diseases start with inflammation. And I think so many issues with joints, start with the degradation of the tissue around cartilage. And that can cost a dog long term, even if it starts out very slowly. And if you have a dog that is very active, does agility, you're putting more stress on the body on the joints. It's something you want to try and take into consideration that maybe as the dog gets to a certain point or certain age, there's a way to intervene and get in front of it, rather than walking behind it. Because when you walk in behind it, it's a lot harder to get control of it. Right. Well, in a nutshell, you're you're telling us about how we can be proactive, to hold off the inevitable. Of course, we all want our dogs to live forever. And unfortunately, that is not the case. So for as long as we have them in our lives, we can make sure that they are happy and healthy. And when you and I chatted just a little while ago, you said such a great thing that yes, we go to the vet to address a certain issue, but that we need to go with our guts. Do you want to expand on that? You Know Your Dog the Best Sure. I think that there are a lot of wonderful veterinarians out there, my husband being one of them. But he's a large animal vet. And he comes from a very, very different frame of mind, he's open, always been very open minded. But a lot of vets are not. They’re old school, even if they've just graduated. And they're very cut and dry about the way they practice medicine. And a lot of people feel very intimidated by their vets laying out a plan, and then not feeling right to them. And when people come to me, it's usually in crisis. And their vet has told them this, that and the other thing and they don't want their dogs on Rimadyl, or Apoquel or things that can cause damage and makes things even worse than what they already went in for. And I don't know if the vets don’t have enough time to do the research to find out or it’s just the way they were trained in school. But I do know that nobody knows your dog better than yourself. Because you're with them every day. You watch them every day. You know, you look at them. And there's a connection that they might like your vet, but they don't have that connection with your vet. And if something doesn't feel right to you, go get another opinion. That doesn't mean go to Dr. Google, necessarily. But get another opinion. Try and find somebody else. Try and find a friend who knows somebody, who knows somebody and talk to people. Great, great advice. Well, when it comes to prevention, there's a balance, you know how much is too much because prevention could actually go in the wrong direction of paranoia. And we become overly protective. And we have our dogs on every supplement that we've heard about. And, you know, we give them all the vaccines and flea and tick medications and heartworm all for prevention. When we have to take a step back, are we giving toxic substances to our dogs for the what ifs. And you and I've talked about this at great length. There's other options and natural alternatives. So Judy, I would love for you to share your story about Pepsi and how System Saver came to be. The History of System Saver Thank you. Pepsi is really the reason that System Saver was formulated. He was a beautiful, beautiful Akita that we were lucky enough to take home as a “very healthy puppy”, who by the time he was six months old started losing his hair. And to make a very long and horrible story short, we took him to everywhere. And doors were open to us because Don was a vet and very well respected. We went to the University he went to, which was Cornell, we took him to all kinds of specialists. And the best advice we got was to euthanize him. And this was when he was less than a year old. It started when he was about six months old. And because Don had always been alternative, he was a certified acupuncturist for horses. Over 30, some odd years ago, he had started doing research on a number of different things that he felt would help Pepsi. And he really targeted in on reducing inflammation, and slowing down the degenerative process, and trying to cut into the overdrive, that Pepsi’s system had gone into. And this magnificent dog lost every piece of hair on his body. And he was very close to death. And for whatever reason, I remember looking at him at one point and saying, if we can save this dog, I want to be able to help one person. And I documented a lot of this. And it was horribly visual. And when we started System Saver, he was on more supplements than you could imagine. I could fill my own store with them. And everything had to stop. Because we had to know if this was going to work or not. Because we were not going to keep this dog alive for us. But if he was willing to fight, so were we. We started him on System Saver and Don and I actually started taking it along with him. And slowly, very slowly, it took about three weeks. And he started eating again. The light came back into his eyes. All his hair grew back over time. And I'll never say he was cured. But his health was restored and he was maintained on System Saver for the rest of his life. And he lived until he was almost 13 years old. And people would come to me and say that's not the same dog. And I would be like, it is the same dog. And I was hand making capsules for people 23 years ago. And you never got a diagnosis as to what was going on with Pepsi, right? Vaccinosis We never got a diagnosis back then. My belief is that it was Vaccinosis because I had asked the breeder not to vaccinate him, because he was way too young. And that was our feeling at the time that he. was just too young. And you vaccinate when you need to vaccinate when you have to or you titer. But he was such a young baby, he was coming home with us. We could deal with it a little bit later on let his body and his own immune system kick in. We found out much later that the breeder had vaccinated him and it destroyed his immune system. Yep, we've talked about that on the show many times. And Pepsi taught me an invaluable lesson. He really did. And, you know, all of my dogs have, you know, I'm gonna jump to Amber only because I never even thought to put this Rhodesian Ridgeback who was magnificent, athletic, two years old. She broke a digit in her paw. And the best advice we got from small animal vets was to take the digit off. And Dan said no. To resettling and cast it. He paid for that dearly because she chewed that cast off every single night. And he was up at two o'clock in the morning recasting her but as she healed, which took about four months, I was so paranoid about anything happening to her that I kept her on it. And I realized that it changed the way she lived her life, the quality of her life in the way she aged, and I just lost her last March, at the end of March today actually would have been her 15th birthday. And Rhodesian Ridgebacks don't live that long. And until the very end, she lived a very good life. So as heart sick as I am to have lost her, she taught me another piece of prevention. And I am grateful to her for that. And I pass that on to every dog that's out there. Because they're never with us long enough. And quality of life is everything. Absolutely. Well, Judy, can you tell us what is in System Saver and what issues besides joint problems does it address? System Saver is a proprietary blend of very special ingredients that Don chose. And he chose them because of what they could do. And inflammation was at the head of it. And degeneration of tissue was the other because he wanted to prevent whatever was going on with Pepsi at the time. And he also wanted to intervene in the overreaction of his immune system. And System Saver is all natural. It has human grade ingredients in it. It has the most bioavailable form of turmeric in it. It has mandarin orange in it, frankincense, green tea and Boswellia. And I have to let our listeners know that Winston is on System Saver. And I like to think that he is the healthiest dog on earth because of what I do. But I do have to say after I'd say about a week and a half, I noticed that he was playing with his toys again, that he had much more energy during the day. You know, he's almost 13 And he sleeps usually during the day while I'm working. And now he's up, he wants to go on more walks, longer walks. So just the energy that he has gained is amazing to me. I can only imagine if he did have other issues which System Saver is known to address. You know, not only inflammatory issues, but dermatitis and inflammatory issues with autoimmune diseases. And just joint Yep, the joints that you mentioned. So arthritis, hip dysplasia, and a perfect supplement for a dog that is just aging and to improve their quality of life, in your words, quality of life extension. I love that. So I love this product. Well, thank you. I was gonna say I so appreciate that, and I never get tired of hearing it. And if you really want to learn about seniors, as a group, look at Frankie and Andy's Place in Winder, Georgia. It's a sanctuary for senior dogs. Winston has had a good life, he's had a great life with you. The dogs at Frankie and Andy's Place have been badly abused. A lot of them were taken from kill shelters, and System Saver has brought them around. And whether they have a month left or it extends their life, which has happened more times than not, their quality of life changes. And Winston will continue on with his quality of life being good. And it really fills my heart to hear that. And thank you for sharing that. You bet. And just a reminder for everybody. System Saver comes in formulations for dogs, for horses, and for us humans. So Judy and her team are making an amazing offer that I wanted to share with all of you. If you go to caninesystemsaver.com and use the code WOL10, you get 10% off of your order. Whether you order for your dog, your horse or yourself, I highly encourage you to check out this amazing product that will change the lives of you and your animals. So Judy, as we wrap up, and I want to thank you so much. Prevention is so important. And we can start preventing at an early age. So where can everyone find out more information about you and System Saver? System Saver, the best place to go was the website, which is CanineSystemSaver.com Is anybody who wants to get in touch with me directly, is more than welcome to use my cell phone to contact me 516-860-5096. I've talked to people seven days a week. And if you want to put that up on your website, as well, you're more than welcome to. Because the truth is I pretty much live, eat and breathe this. I've been an animal lover my whole life. And I'm just like everybody in your audience. I love my animals, and I want to do whatever I can for them. And I feel the same way about the people's pets that come to me. Cell: 516.860.5096 https://caninesystemsaver.com https://www.facebook.com/DrBSystemSaver/ https://twitter.com/DrBSystemSaver https://www.instagram.com/DrBSystemSaver/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkK2RYgjzmYp9biq39lBwaw Well, I want to thank you and Don, for being so passionate and for making an amazing product. And I just want to thank you for your time today and all the information that you shared. Well, I thank you so much, Krista. And I'm so glad you're doing well. Winston, thank you for so much for giving me this opportunity to share my story. Thanks, Judy. Thanks again to our friends at System Saver for sponsoring this month’s episodes .  Check out this fantastic all-natural formula by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

 Canine Cannabinoids for Dummies | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:36:10

Hello everyone this is Krista with Episode #147 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Do you know why dogs curl up in a ball when they sleep? Well, it's actually to protect their organs. It's a holdover from their days in the wild when they were vulnerable to predator attacks. Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Canine Cannabinoids for Dummies Alex Kozushin started Genie's Therapeutics with his wife and co-founder, Christi Webb, when their Airedale Terrier, Genie, was diagnosed with a fast-growing nasal cancer.  With few options available, they developed a  cannabinoid-containing tincture to help Genie. Genie lived two more healthy years after starting with cannabinoids. After fours years of research and development, Genie's released their first product, "Hemp Signature Blend," this past September.  Hello dog lovers and welcome to another fascinating Wag Out Loud episode. And today I am joined by Alex Kozushin, and he is here to dumb down all of the confusion and overwhelm around CBD for our dogs. So Alex, first of all, I want to thank you for being with us today. Could you please introduce yourself and tell us why are you so passionate about the science of cannabinoids for canines? Sure, and thanks for the question. My name is Alex Kozushin. And I am the CEO of Genie’s Therapeutics, and we're a canine wellness company. And our signature product is a CBD product. So we first got involved or I first got involved in CBD when our Airedale Terrier, our beloved Airedale Terrier, was diagnosed with the fast growing sarcoma in his nasal passage, and he had to go through a bunch of different surgeries. And there were no real positive options. And we were basically given a very poor prognosis of three to four months, or six to eight months with radiation and side effects that came along with it. And we wanted to give Genie something to make him feel better, because we weren't sure how long he was going to be around. And so we formulated our first tincture, back in 2016. And the results were amazing. And from that point on, we spoke to our veterinarian after Genie was diagnosed in remission. And she said that we had an obligation to move over to this. This was the first organized formulation that she had seen. And she had many anecdotal stories about CBD, and cannabis helping other dogs. And that was our motivation, we got started, we actually took our formulation and we went out to social media and we said, We'll give it to you for free if you can, if you can demonstrate to us that would potentially benefit your dog. And three years later, the results were amazing. And we move forward. So I see so many amazing stories and results. With even the most basic CBD products, even the basic CBD isolates that I can't help but be passionate because I know that our wellness is directly correlated to the wellness of our fur babies. So I know the difference it makes and I'm really looking forward to discussing it. Well, I am so happy that you're here to share your expertise. And thanks to Genie, for being the dog that started all of this to help other dogs. And I think our listeners know that we've had many episodes in the past focusing on CBD, how it's made, how to read a certificate of analysis, how to speak to your vet about it, the studies showing how it treats cancer and even recently we had one on how it benefits dogs with Cushing's. So Alex, before we dive in, can you quickly summarize what is the difference between hemp and cannabis? Difference between hemp and cannabis Well, from a scientific perspective, there is no difference. It's the same exact plant so the only difference is regulatory difference. So there's often you hear hemp and marijuana, two different things. Really they’re the exact same plant. What the regulatory difference is that THC. So the FDA considers anything point 3% of THC or less to be hemp. Anything that has point 3% more of THC is considered cannabis. They're all cannabis. It's all cannabis. The reason why they use this kind of regulatory distinction is because the one cannabinoid THC can be intoxicating to humans and dogs. So therefore, that's why the regulatory difference. Otherwise there is no difference from the scientific perspective. What is the endocannabinoid system? Okay, great explanation. Well, the science of cannabis, you know, we've realized I didn't know before I got into this field that we have an endocannabinoid system and our dogs do as well. Can you briefly tell us, what does that system actually do? How does it work? You're exactly right, we actually have an endocannabinoid system. And as well as dogs do. In fact, dogs actually have a larger system, more receptors in their brainstem than actually humans do. And this endocannabinoid system actually affects all parts of our wellness, from neurological, the physiological to gut health, and everything in between. So our endocannabinoid system has an effect on every part of our wellness. And that's the same goes for dogs. Wow, that's amazing. So in your mind, we as well as our dogs, should be taking some sort of CBD as a preventative. As a wellness measure, absolutely. And it's all about dosing. But the reality is that when we tested over the course of three years, we've done at once there was a therapeutic dose achieved, that the parents of the dogs did not want to stop utilizing CBD because there was a wellness factor associated. Their dog had a little bit more energy, they can have more pep in the step. Their tails are wagging a little bit more. So overall, there is no negative in taking CBD. There's almost no side effects. And the positives, way outweigh the negatives. Okay. And is CBD the only cannabinoid that we should care about? Or are there others? Oh, yes, so CBD is an important major cannabinoid. But there are plenty of others. And research is really just beginning. So far, we know that there's over 300 chemical compounds in the cannabis plant, and that includes cannabinoids, terpenes, which is a smell, and flavonoids. And we're just tipping the iceberg. And what we know is we've done studies on how CBD affects mammals. We've done studies on how THC affects mammals. But we haven't even started to research all these other cannabinoids, let alone when these cannabinoids are combined together, what's known as an entourage effect and the effect that they have when they're combined together. So we're just beginning the research really on the potential of our endocannabinoid system and cannabinoids. That's amazing. Well, I've heard some people say I don't know if you agree that cannabis is the single most significant new development in veterinary medicine to emerge in the last 20 years. Do you agree with that? Yes, I do agree with that. There is really CBD and cannabinoids affect all part of dogs’ wellness, all parts of their physiology. So and the early results have been so tremendous in testing that really there is really nothing that compares so far in the latest research. There's been no medication. In the last 20 years veterinary medicine and Veterinary Health there haven't been too many new medications. There hasn't been too many new research that has shown as promising as cannabinoids. So I do genuinely believe that. This is that cannabinoids are the best prospects for canine wellness. Acidic forms of cannabinoids Okay, well, before I got into this, I never knew about the acidic forms of cannabinoids. So can you break that down because this is for dummies. And I feel like I'm a dummy when it comes to acidic forms. So talk about it. What what do those look like and what do they do? Sure, so the acidic forms of cannabinoids show incredible potential. And really, there's been we're just starting to research there. What the acidic oral cannabinoid just for example, CBDA and then is the acidic form of CBD. THCA is the acidic form of THC. These cannabinoids are extracted when the plant is still wet before the plant is decarboxylated. Decarboxylated means when the plant starts to degrade and dry. Then that THCA, that CBDA turns into THC and CBD. There's new research that really indicates that CBDA, THCA, these acidic forms react in different ways on dogs, than they're decarboxylated cousins like CBD and THC. And the new research really out of Cornell University even indicates that when these the acidic form, and the regular form is combined together, the results are even more efficacious, even more promising. So the interesting thing about these acidic forms, for example, with THCA, THC is intoxicating to humans and to dogs. And that is one of the side effects. What's interesting is the acidic form of THC, THCA is not intoxicating. So there's an awful lot of research on the human and canine side that shows that these acidic forms could be even more promising medicinally, then even their decarboxylated cousins. That's amazing. Well, you mentioned the Cornell study. And they proved that the one to one ratio of CBD and CBDA, shows even stronger anti inflammatory benefits. And we know inflammation is the root cause of all disease. So that's really exciting to me. Oh, yeah, that's potentially the most exciting part. And that study showed that when you combine CBD and CBDA, you actually can use less, and it lasts longer. And it's more consistent in the bloodstream. I mean, the results are so promising and so exciting for these acidic forms. Is the acid actually extracted from the plant or how is the acid itself made? So the acidic forms are in the plant before when the plant is still living, when the plant is still whole, before it's cut down. And the trick, they have to be handled very carefully in order to be able to extract these acidic forms before the plant starts to dry, and degrade. So the extraction process has to happen without heat. And it has to happen very quickly. So often, it's more expensive and more challenging to extract. So hopefully in the future, we'll find ways to lower the cost of extracting these acidic forms, but it's challenging and it has to happen very quickly before the plant starts to degrade. Fascinating. Well, I think this is a great time for us to take a quick commercial break, so we will be right back. SPONSOR AD Thanks so much to the team at System Saver for being this month’s feature sponsor. Dr. Baker’s Canine System Saver is an outstanding all-natural supplement that promotes healthy aging.  Originally created by a veterinarian to help restore health and soundness to dogs suffering from chronic inflammatory and degenerative conditions, this is one product that does so much! Perfect for: arthritis, hip dysplasia & joint support, chronic dermatitis, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, and geriatric support for successful aging and quality of life extension. At 13 yrs old, my dog Winston has a better quality of life and has found so much more energy being on this amazing product! Now with the start of allergy season, System Saver works wonders on canine allergies as well. Learn more by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ to relieve your dog’s discomfort naturally.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! And we are back with this fascinating talk about CBD for dogs and Alex is dumbing it down for us, which we really appreciate. But so much stuff I didn't know before. Alex, we're now going to get into we've heard about carrier oils. Tell us why we need to care about the carrier oil with different CBD products. Importance of Carrier Oils You know, Krista in that earlier question you had about the Cornell University study, there was also some really interesting information that came out of that study. And basically, there's a couple of different points to make. First of all, there is some research that indicates that coconut oil, which is a medium chain, triglyceride or often known as MCT oil, can be inflammatory in dogs. It's beginning research, but there is showing that that is that potential. And therefore, when Cornell did the study, they actually utilized what's called long chain triglycerides. Long chain triglycerides are different than medium chain triglycerides. So some examples of long chain triglycerides are sesame oil, olive oil, fish oil. And some examples of medium chain triglycerides are hemp seed oil, coconut oil, palm oil. So this new research really indicates that when using besides the potential for inflammation with coconut oil, besides that, there's also potential to increase efficacy of cannabinoids using long chain triglycerides. So LCT oils tend to be a little bit more expensive. They're not as easily stable, but they are more efficacious. And they do allow for ,at least preliminary research is. showing that they allow for CBD to stay in the bloodstream longer and more consistently, than it would with a medium chain triglyceride. So this research is just beginning. But it's really, really important to understand that this potential is really large. And really, the takeaway is, we need to be careful with coconut oil, because we're not potentially it could be fine. But early research indicates that it could be inflammatory. So if we're using cannabinoids to be anti inflammatory, it's counterproductive to be using a carrier oil with those cannabinoids that causes inflammation. Makes sense. Well, just a reminder to everybody this industry is not regulated, and therefore we see so many products out there. You know, we don't know which ones to choose, which are good, which are bad. So I wanted to ask you about, we see some products such as yours, with a USDA organic certification. Can you tell us about that and why it's so important? USDA Organic Oh, absolutely. Yes, it's critical. You know, Krista, just as you pointed out, our industry is a little bit like the Wild Wild West, there is no regulation, very little. So the USDA organic certification is really important, because there's an awful lot of products out there. And right now where the consumer or the pet parent is just becoming starting to become educated. So how do they figure out what's what? Because really, you could see a package on the shelf, generic package, and they could say this has 900 milligrams of CBD. In reality, there's no one checking that. There's no one assuring that that's accurate. Unless you have a certification body like USDA certifying the product. And basically, when you get that USDA organic certification, that tells you that the products are at least 95% organic, number one, and number two, what they say is in the bottle is in the bottle. And that's what's really important because otherwise you don't know. The USDA organic certification process requires third party testing. Not only that, they also evaluate your packaging. They make sure that you say the right things on the box. They they make sure that you don't say the wrong things. And they reject you until you get it right. So what does that mean? That means when you see that USDA organic certification, you can relax and know that's what's on the box is actually in the bottle. And that it doesn't contain all the harmful pesticides that so many of our crops have, you know, we've had experts on the show talk about glyphosate for one. So this is just a reassurance that we are not giving our dogs a toxic contaminated product, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, there's an awful lot of testing labs out there. So just a third party testing, which you often see isn't always a reassurance. You don't know the relationship between the brand and laboratory. You don't know how reliable that laboratory is. So with the USDA, they verify everything, they check everything. And as you pointed out, all these contaminants, including different ways that these cannabinoids are extracted, are potentially in the product. And until you get that USDA organic certification that tells you they're not in there, you cannot know that for sure unless you do your own testing. Right. Well, I know one of the biggest topics when it comes to CBD for our dogs is dosing. Can you unpack that for us? How do we figure out dosing? Proper Dosing So really dosing is the most important thing when it comes to CBD. Because really, if you dose too little, then there's no therapeutic benefit. If you dose too high. There's also potential for no therapeutic benefit and there's also some potential for GI issues with too much carrier oil. So what's important is really that dosing. Science has shown us, including Cornell University, and plenty of other studies on canines and on humans that show us how important dosing is. So often you see on CBD products, you'll see something like a dog that weighs 3 to 25 pounds has one dose, a dog that weighs 26 to 50 pounds has a second dose, 51 to 75 pounds as a third dose. And really, there's no way that a three pound dog is going to have the same dose as a 25 pound dog. That's just not based on science. So what's really important is to get that proper dose. And the proper dose seems to be the target dose, two milligrams per kilogram of bodyweight. That's where often is the target dose. But what's important is titration up to start low, go slow, because really, you know, especially with CBD nowadays, once you reach your therapeutic benefit, there's no reason to go higher, you're wasting money, and you're increasing the potential for GI side effects. So once you get that therapeutic dose, you stop, and then you wait until the body adjusts, and you possibly move up or you don't. So dosing can't be based on 25 pound increments of bodyweight. It has to be based on every single pound of body weight. So unless you get dosing right, you might not see that therapeutic benefit on your dog, you may think it's not working while the potential is absolutely there to help your dog. Make sense. So speaking of dosing, what are your thoughts on the products that we see such as treats with CBD? How can you even figure out what your dog is really getting? Since you're not administering via a tincture? Treats with CBD You know, that's a great, great question. And great point, Krista. And I'm still, I'm still concerned about treats for a couple different reasons. First of all, with treats you also have all these, you have the ingredient that makes the ingredients that make the treats themselves. So there's possibilities for allergic reaction, not sure how the dogs digest them. And then these treats have a certain set amount of cannabinoids in them. A certain set amount of CBD. So for example, if there's two milligrams of CBD in a treat, you have to give your larger dog 20 treats in order to get that therapeutic dose every 12 hours. So it's much easier to control dosing, it's much easier to titrate up. And it's substantially easier to get that therapeutic benefit using tinctures rather than treats. I am somewhat concerned about treats. Well, and I hear for the future. That was my next question, that we're gonna see inhalers and transdermals beadlets and more topicals. Oh, absolutely. There's so much potential and we know that we have cannabinoid receptors on our skin. And we know that dogs have cannabinoid receptors on their skin. So there's so much potential there for topicals. We know there's all types of different administration methods, but all you need to be tested in controlled dose by dose by dose by small increments, which treats often can't do. Yeah. Do you think we're gonna see veterinary cannabis being taught in vet school? Veterinary Education in CBD It already is. I think you already see programs out there with in and they're just beginning you already see veterinary cannabis certification programs out there for veterinary technicians, for veterinarians. And they’re getting this done because the reality is veterinarians are asked every single day about CBD, about cannabinoids, and they're in a difficult situation. First of all, they're not particularly educated in it yet. And they also have these regulatory challenges. So considering the potential on canine wellness with cannabinoids, I think that we are just tipping the iceberg. And I I really think that there's going to be increased training, there’s going to be increased certification, including at these excellent veterinary programs all over the country. That's so exciting. Is there anything else that you see as far as this science of CBD emerging in the near future? CBGA What I'm particularly watching is a cannabinoid called CBG. CBGA, the acidic form of CBG is considered the mother of all cannabinoids because everything starts from CBGA. Even CBDA and THCA. They come from CBGA. So what I'm particularly interested in I'm really interested in finding science and research that shows how this CBGA is extracted. And what potential therapeutic benefit there is on canines and on humans. I really think that the acidic forms, kind of circling back to acidic forms offer incredible potential and they also work scientifically different than cannabinoids do. They work with different receptors, or they work in different ways. So CBGA is really exciting for me. We'll have to keep an eye on that. There's so many acronyms. How do you keep track? Oh, gosh, you can and I still get lost but really just the focus is, you know, CBD, CBDA, and THC, THCA. Those are really the major cannabinoids right now that we're seeing in plants. Once we get that science down once we have an understanding, I think we'll move forward. But the potential is so exciting. So overwhelmingly exciting on the you know, for the medical and therapeutic benefits on dogs. And even on humans, that I'm overwhelmed with excitement about what the future holds for cannabinoids in canines. Me, too. I think we're just scratching the surface. So Alex, do you agree that higher quality and purity are usually associated with a higher cost when we're looking at products? CBD Quality In general? Yeah, absolutely. I think it's not always 100% the case, because really, there isn't really a set pricing mechanism in our industry. As I mentioned earlier, it's a little bit of a wild wild west. And CBD is a consumer product good just like any consumer product goods. So things like packaging, advertising, marketing, all that affect the pricing. So it's not always the case, that price means better quality. But you have to research the product you’re giving to your dog. Take the time to do that. I know it's not easy. I know it takes time. I know it requires science. But it's going to make a difference in the life of your dog. In the quality of life for your dog, which in essence is going to make a difference in the quality of life for you and the quality of life for your family. So take the time to research it. Higher price doesn't always mean higher quality, but it's a place to start. Great advice. And I know, the cheaper options, you know, those are the ones that can potentially have more toxic substances, like the pesticides, the herbicides, heavy metals. So as you said, you really have to do your homework when you're looking at these different brands. Because again, this is an unregulated industry. Yeah, it's actually you know, it's more expensive for us to go through the USDA organic certification process,. It's more expensive for us to extract CBDA as opposed to just CBD. It's more expensive for us to use full spectrum extracts than it would be an isolate. So it's clearly more expensive to develop a high quality product. So it's important to understand that. Well, Alex, that brings us to Genies Therapeutics. How does your product differ from all of those others in the market? What made you decide we are going to do things differently? The Genie’s Therapeutics Difference Research science, and I couldn't find we couldn't find a product that met all our needs. Again, most of the companies in the CBD industry are in it for the right reasons. They want to improve the quality of life for dogs. But I couldn't find a product that really met our needs. With a long chain triglycerides, LCT carrier oil, and really CBD, CBDA and USDA organic certification. I couldn't find out that out there. So that really was what makes us different. So often you see with products that do have CBD or other have cannabinoids in it, they'll say something, what's on the bottle. But it's really hard to distinguish what. I couldn't even understand there's products out there that are excellent products that have great efficacy, but you have no idea what's in the bottle. And that bothered me. How is a pet parent supposed to understand how are they supposed to pick the right product. So that got me fired up. That got us excited about putting a product that people can understand what's exactly inside. And the other thing is we use, we use CBD, we use CBDA and we use CBG in our hemp signature blend. And what's interesting there is often when you see a product of multiple cannabinoids, such as ours, they'll use one full spectrum extract and they’ll use isolates for the other cannabinoids to add in there. And that really limits that entourage effect that potential for all those cannabinoids working together. We use three full spectrum extracts and we combine them together to get that cannabinoid content and I just haven't seen anything like that available in the marketplace and I still don’t. Yep. Well as we are wrapping up, there are other things that make you guys stand out. I know you've got a concierge program that is free, so that anybody that's interested can speak with a certified veterinary cannabis counselor. If you have any questions or concerns, I know you have an amazing advanced dosing calculator that makes things so easy to customize the dosing for your own dog, which is really cool. You have a 30 day money back guarantee. And I just have to highlight again, there are not many companies that have that USDA organic certification. So you guys stand out for so many reasons. And can you briefly tell us about Genie’s Dream? Oh, thank you, Krista. I really appreciate that. Especially Genie’s Dream. Genie’s Dream is our 501 C 3 nonprofit arm of Genie’s Therapeutics. And we're in this to improve the quality of life for dogs. You know, as we say, our goal is to improve the quality of life for every canine, one dog at a time. And there is nothing better than this. Our nonprofit organization that we give 1% of all our revenue, from Gene’s Therapeutics to Genie’s Dream. To help all types of canine wellness causes. Specifically, one cause that we're really trying to tackle is economic euthanasia. And we've done such a great job of tackling euthanasia in shelters in the last 20-25 years, we've lowered the incidence rate. But at that same time, the incidence rates of economic euthanasia, which is when you have to euthanize your pet, because you can't potentially afford the veterinary costs needed to improve the health of your pet. That has gone up 10-15% every year. And really, I don't see any, I don't see that stopping anytime in the future. That's a really important issue. And we want to tackle that. So we're not just in this for the money. We're not just in this just to sell a product, we really do want to improve the quality of life for dogs. And Genie’s Dream gives us an opportunity to do that, and really look forward as Genie’s Therapeutics expands. And as we grow, we really look forward to making Genie’s Dream a big deal, and putting more resources in there and tackling other causes. We also have a first responders program, which is, but there's so many. During this time, right now, during the last couple of years especially, first responders have been under so much stress, and they've been away from home, and this transfers over to their dogs. Their dogs become stressed. So we have a first responders program where we help them, we provide them our hemp signature blend, and we help guide them through the process of how to dose their dog and how to pay attention for therapeutic benefits. So we are in this for the right reasons. We want to make dog's lives better, we want to make humans lives better, and Genies Dream gives us an opportunity to do that. Wow, thank you for giving back. That's amazing. And hopefully our listeners have that we've piqued their interest that this is a special and standalone product. Offer And Alex and his team are going to make an amazing offer to our listeners. They're offering free shipping, which is a savings of just under $10 right there. So go to genies therapeutics.com. And that link, and all of the links on how to get to genies is going to be in the show notes. Go to https://www.geniestherapeutics.com/ and use the coupon code WOL at checkout for your free shipping. And I highly encourage you to try out this amazing product. So Alex, I just wanted to thank you for being on the show and sharing this information. I know that we have to have you on again, because as we mentioned, the science is constantly changing. So I just want to thank you for your passion and love for wanting to do better for our dogs. Social Media URLs or Tags          Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/geniestherapeutics/ Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/geniestherapeutics LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/geniestherapeutics website URL - https://geniestherapeutics.com Oh, thank you so much, Krista. That means so much to me. And I want to thank you for all the attention that you bring to canine wellness causes and you have over the last couple years and we pay attention. You do excellent podcasts and thank you so much for bringing these important issues to light. Well, we appreciate you. Thank you, Alex. Bye bye. Thank you. Thanks again to our friends at System Saver for sponsoring this month’s episodes .  Check out this fantastic all-natural formula by going to http://caninesystemsaver.com/ and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

 The Future of Fresh Nutrition | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:34:52

Hi there this is Krista with Episode #146 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Here are some tips on feeding fruit to your dog. So feeding your dog fruit is great, and you can either add it to their meal or as a snack. But please remember to only give fruit in very small quantities and try to rotate the fruits that you give. Too much and the natural sugar content will be too high and your dog's body just isn't designed to process that much sugar, natural or not. Fruit is rich in essential minerals and vitamins, including potassium and beta carotene. Of course fruit is high in fiber, low in fat, and fruit is a great source of natural antioxidants and phytochemicals needed for your dog's overall health. Just remember to avoid giving seeds, skins or rinds as these are the sections of the fruit that are likely to contain toxins for your dog. They can be given whole sliced, juiced and mixed with vegetables, or as an ice cube or a frozen treat. Winston enjoys getting a slice of banana, apple, melon, or a couple of blueberries. Delicious! Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. We believe in the power of a joyful life and home! Get Joy Founder ,Tom Arrix is building a company with purpose. Get Joy is a DTC lifestyle company that sits adjacent to where people live their lives. Every product Get Joy Creates is designed to impact the overall wellness of the animal. He built Facebook’s first $1billion business and applied all his social street cred to Get Joy’s mission to transform the fresh food segment.   Hello dog lovers! We are so glad that you've joined us for another informative Wag Out Loud pawdcast episode. And today I am joined by Tom Arrix. He's the founder of Get jJy. Tom, thank you so much for being on the Show. I know that we've had this on the calendar for quite some time. And it's finally here. Yay! I know. I'm so excited. It's been like six months in the making. So I'm so thrilled. Oh my gosh, this is gonna be great. So I would love it if you would please introduce yourself and tell us why you went from being a big wig at Facebook, to starting a company in the dog food space? Absolutely. Well, first and foremost, thank you for being so kind to have me and represent Get Joy on your podcast. So super thrilled to be here. I never thought in a million years that I’d ever be in this in the dog food/pet space. So I'll start right there. I spent a career in digital digital tech, spent seven years in the early days of Facebook 2006 to 2013 and was a part of this collaborative building of really a wonderful business in a really kind of a whole new segment of marketing. And one of the things I loved about that which translates to what I'm doing today is everything we did and thought about both internally and externally with big brands was all about community and all about collaboration all about, about innovation and not doing things the the old way, the legacy driven way. So fast forward, I left Facebook in 2013 and found myself doing more advising for early stage companies did some investing behind some of those companies I was involved in. And all along since I was a kid. I've always been a really, really big lover of animals and dogs in particular. I grew up in Connecticut. My mom and dad always had, we were a big black lab family. And we always had dogs from the first day I can remember. So now I have family of four, four kids, three in college, one freshman in high school. We have two dogs, my awesome wife Kathy. And I try to keep keep things calm. But it's these two creatures that really, that really make everybody smile. I think that's something that resonates with every you know, 65 plus million households in the United States. So when, sadly three years ago, almost to the almost to like the day the window. Our first dog Cooper came down with lymphoma. So after we heard the news, obviously it's pretty. It's a pretty stressing moment for any person who finds out that their animal is not well and like most, you try to do everything in your power to make to make things better to try and find a solution. So I went to Cornell, which is in Stamford, Connecticut, a few towns away. It has some wonderful service in an education from Dr. Lindsay Thalheim, who's an advisor for the company. Lindsay was wonderful because she actually referred me to a holistic oncologist in Red Bank, New Jersey, Dr. Kendra Pope. Oh, know her well. She's been on the Show. And she's an advisor for Get Joy. So I have two wonderful friends now, who were part of the early early stages of, of kind of the idea around Get Joy. So Kendra, after in our meeting, I'll never forget it, I brought our dog Cooper down to Red Bank. And for the first time, and I've been brought him to vets, you know, numerous times over the years, he's always stressed. And you could tell, It's just not a great environment. But for whatever reason, we walked into Kendra's office. And it was the sense of calm is was almost like going to a spa that was just a very calming environment. And Kendra spent probably about 45 minutes with us. And talking about everything from how I eat, how I live my life, and what's important to me from a nutrition standpoint. And then we started talking an awful lot about Cooper. And she basically said, kind of squared the conversation and she said, you know, you just said, you eat really well, Tom and your wife's a wonderful cook, which she is going forward, make sure you feed whatever you're going to have for dinner tonight and feed that to Cooper, and every single meal until you get your prescription. Feed that meal to Cooper. And I said, Okay, we can do that, she goes well, and let me square this even more. If you were ill, God forbid, and you went home and ate highly processed foods, like you had been doing your entire life, you don't have a chance to get healthy. So the whole notion of food is the medicine is really really resonates to me, really the first time in my life. And I felt that this is a this was kind of the crossing the passion and crossing of community, which I knew so well, because I built helped build something really fabulous at Facebook, you know, to have an opportunity to stitch those two together, really was the the early kind of building blocks of Get Joy. So that was that was really why I moved away from advising startups and put all my energy into, into building something that I felt was going to affect the lives of animals and have a sense of purpose. That was way more than just building a product and way more than just kind of being in business. And it was all about education and awareness. And that's kind of how we how we put a stake in the ground in early 2019. And that's something that we believe in every single day was inside the company. So here we are. Well, thank you for sharing that. That's it's an amazing story. And is Cooper still with us? Unfortunately, we lost Cooper about a year and a half ago. So we got in an extra we got over an extra year. The one piece in it that I thought was really fascinating and gave me such confidence to to really surge ahead. When we started feeding him fresh foods, simple foods, like broccoli and cauliflower. And a lot of the ingredients that we think about in our recipes today. His energy, the coat, just his whole sense of who he was as a dog came back almost immediately. So I felt so good about the fact that we gave him great nutrition, and gave him a chance to be around our family for a whole bunch of more months. And, and, you know, it's unfortunate to see him to have seen him go but you know, a lot of a lot of what we think about certainly what I think about is we're doing it for Cooper, we're doing it for every dog, you know, on the planet, hopefully someday. Right. Well, he was here to teach you something, obviously. So I love that you have a legacy for Cooper. Well, we're going to talk about the future of fresh nutrition. And I think you'll agree that now more than ever, dog parents are expecting more transparency around the pet food ingredients. And as you said, we are looking at better and cleaner food for ourselves. So it just makes sense that we do it for our dogs as well. And you know, you see more and more pet food recalls. So what trends do you see happening now or that are on the horizon as far as pet food? I think there's a great lens of fresh that's opening up for everybody. And I think about this Krista very similar to farm to table, back, let's say it was 20 years ago when it really started to accelerate. People learn on their own people, not everybody moves at the same time. And once a person, and in this case, a dog owner understands the importance of fresh nutrition for themselves, but really can understand the the benefit for their animal, it starts to resonate, and I and I see this lens opening up, more and more owners are thinking about how they can bring great nutrition to their animal as often as possible. Not everybody has the same economic kind of benchmarks. But I believe that fresh is something that that is that is really becoming prevalent throughout every home. And I think as time goes by, and education continues, as simplicity kind of owns the day, I believe more and more owners will be feeding their animals, just wonderful foods that are great for them, versus the kind of a legacy nutritional approach that has been with us for decades and decades. If you can afford it, there's it just, it makes too much sense to say, the importance of eating fresh versus processed food. Right, even for ourselves. 100% Yep, I totally agree. Well, I read this interesting stat, that all natural pet foods accounted for 9% of the global market in 2020. And with the number of pet food launches, increasing by 41%, between 2016 and 2020. So that blows my mind and tells me that there are people there are companies that want to do better, you know, all we've known is dry, processed kibble that you and I both know, do not bring nutritional balance to a dog, especially a species that has no need for carbohydrates, yet, they're being fed, in my mind cereal twice a day, every day for their entire life. Right. So I'm so glad that you've seen this call for better nutrition for our dogs, and more people are getting savvy, and realizing that kibble is not healthy that we are feeding a bowl of inflammation every day. And we're looking for fresh whole alternatives. So in your mind, with more and more people getting the education on fresh food, do you think they're willing to pay more for a better dog food? You know, I remember there's two companies that really come to mind when whenever economics comes into play or, or becomes a, a decision that someone has to make as it relates to kibble versus a shift to fresh. I remember Whole Foods when they came out a number of years ago, it was always deemed as very, very expensive market. And yes, it had way appreciably better ingredients and products inside the market versus kind of legacy grocery stores. Over time, and now obviously Whole Foods is a part of Amazon. But over time, the economics just kind of went away, the hurdles went away. And it wasn't about this huge disparity in cost. Starbucks has a very, very similar dynamic, it's more expensive coffee, but there's an experience. And some that further loved that coffee, even if it's going to cost them four or $5. And maybe up to a couple of dollars more than the coffee shop down the street. I think the same dynamic is happening in our space. I think the economics will start to dissipate and not be a reason for a family to shift from processed foods that are filled with garbage, as you said, Krista, into healthier foods that are that are going to drive all these wonderful aspects of health and wellness for your animal. I think it's going to become a lot more of a level playing field. I think innovation as we think about products, say like freeze dried raw. They're not terribly cheap today, but I think over time, I think they the economics will work in favor of of more of a of the market. That day is going to come it just may not be here today. But I think the constant education, the constant sense of Figuring out how fresh just start just start getting into fresh however you can. And if it's just a mixing into kibble, it's better than just kibble. And I think over time, if people can just commit to starting and starting how they can have they can either afford as a household or how they can, you know, not be you not have this disrupt their flow of how they run their home. I think it's just important to start, there's nothing wrong with starting and in addition to taking that first step, will eventually lead to a few more steps that the beneficiary is this awesome creature that doesn't have a voice. Well, Tom, we are going to take a quick commercial break and we will be right back. Let's take a minute to talk about the latest innovation from our friends at Get Joy. If you're a regular listener, then you already know about the importance of our dog's gut health, and Get Joy's new fresh freeze dried meals are changing the game currently available in beef with a chicken recipe coming soon. Their fresh freeze dried has all of the nutrition of feeding raw, but in an easy to store dry form. It was independently tested among its competitors and was shown to be easier to digest, which leads to improved gut and overall health for the dogs that we love. Have your dog begging for more by ordering at GetJoy.com and save money by using the code WAGOUTLOUD55 for 55% off your first two orders of fresh freeze dried. Also check out Get Joy's vet designed fresh cooked meals, natural treats and chews that make feeding and treating your pups so easy. One stop shopping has never been so convenient, and nutritious! And we are back with Tom Arrix from Get jJy. And we are having a great discussion about the future of fresh nutrition. So we talked about cost. And I agree with you, Tom, that people are realizing it's through education, that they're realizing that fresh food is good for them, and good for their dog, which is exciting for me. As far as the trends of the future, you know, novel proteins going away from the big box stores. Of course, now that we know about the good bacteria and the microbiome, I think a lot of companies are looking at better digestibility of their foods. What do you think about all this as far as what to look at? What are the consumers demanding? Right? I mean, first and foremost, it's so encouraging and inspiring to see all these amazing innovations that are happening. And you know, three years ago, they were barely happening now they're really accelerated. So I think it's amazing. And it's so great. Because it will help the our animals help our dogs live a healthier, better, better life is which is all all we collectively want. And I think as we can think of as foods evolve, say as you mentioned, digestion, microbiome, the more that we can help a say a dog's gut. And what I didn't realize until about a year and a half ago, was a dog's gut is identical to a human’s gut. And when people, myself included, started to think more about how do you treat your gut and have a great digestion and make sure that you have pre and probiotics and are eating the right foods etc. You are like hitting on all cylinders. You feel great your energy levels as high as it could be. You're able to do the things you love in life, whether it be walks or hikes or, or sit on a couch… whatever it might be. And I think that dynamic as people think about their animal and and as innovation continues in our industry, and if we design products that are really truly great to help people learn about the importance of say gut health, and we have products that are there to drive that. That they get we're truly giving our dogs the best potential to live their best day and best life. And it's, you know, some of the three pillars of genetics, environment and nutrition. I think we'll find ourselves in this place as a society, a region, country, planet, that we're actually controlling at least the The most controllable part of the three pillars, which is nutrition. Mm hmm. I agree. I think that's amazing. I love it. It's exciting, isn't it? Well, Tom, with so many new pet food companies coming on the market, what should people look out for? When it comes to choosing a brand? Right. You know, it's a, I think it's great validations that are so many companies coming onto the market, I believe it's no different than if you were thinking about an apparel company or, or brand that you that you kind of have a connection to. I think it's about trust, I think it's about community. And I think it's about those two things, giving you the confidence that this new relationship that you have with this brand is going to give you and your you know, the end the end, beneficiary, your dog, the best chance for wellness, or whatever is important to you. I do believe from the from the fundamentals of trust, and community, there's nothing there's nothing more powerful than then a strong community that's looking out for each other that helping each other. I saw that as my Facebook, early Facebook days, it's still very true at orders of magnitude today around the world. And, and when communities trust, have trust, and there's transparency, and and you know that the products that are being designed, are grounded with purpose. I think that that is probably the most magical dynamic you can create. And it's like, I think that we're running a certain kind of race versus others. And it doesn't make others bad, bad opportunities. They're all wonderful. I think it's all there's a lot of dogs out there. There's a lot of homes. But I think if we can ground, how we explore these brands with, do I trust the brand? Is this a community that I can connect with? And feel good? And learn from? And be educated by? I think that's how people should think about it. And are the products amazing, that are their products truly groundbreaking and going to drive, whatever pillar is important to that customer or that person? Right? Good information. And as you said, you have advisors with Get jJy that are in the industry that are amazing at what they do. So we have to, you know, because we know that the dog food industry really is not regulated. So we have to ask the questions. Where do you source your ingredients? Where's your food made? So I love what you said about community and trust. It's huge. And so many people I've talked to think cooking at home for your dog, you know, I'm doing really good by my dog because I'm cooking chicken and rice. And I have to say is that it? Because they are missing out on a complete and balanced diet. And that's right. That's why I love what you guys are doing. Tom, I am an affiliate with Get Joy. I've researched the company, I believe in the company. And the products. And you are one stop shopping, which is fantastic. So you have fresh food delivered to your door. You have the freeze dried, and you have the natural Chews. Brilliant, right. I just love it. Yeah, we have raw coming out in the Spring, too. And every single thing we we are doing is a signal that we get from our community is something that helps us complete the whole wellness equation, that that goes back to our purpose. Like, we want to affect the lives of these animals who have no voice. And we're committed to it and we're going to block and tackle until until it happens. That's fantastic. Well, what I like to tell people, you know, I encourage everybody to look into fresh food for your dog, whether it is a cooked or a freeze dried or a raw much better than kibble for so many reasons. But what I mention to people you are going to pay a little bit more. But what it boils down to is literally you pay now or you pay later in veterinary bills. Because inevitably, a poor diet is going to mean that your dog is going to experience leaky gut or possibly being overweight diabetes, health issues. I mean we could go on and on. So it's so important to invest in our dog’s nutrition is now. We have a chance to actually, we haven't even really talked about prevention we have in kind of a roundabout way, everyone has a chance to actually prevent that illness and prevent issues with their animal, just like you and I would if we eat well, if we're eating really well, yes, we can have a cheat day here and there. But if we're eating really well, we're not going to the doctors, as often we're not taking antibiotics because we're constantly sick. But for not doing the things that are bad for our bodies, the same premises are with our animals. if we're taking care of them. And we're leaning into how how we're all supposed to eat going back 1000s and 1000s of years, it's fresh ingredients. And we're just in some way, we're trying to just democratize how people can buy and connect with fresh products that are good for their animals. We have, you know, people who are just lightly touching our products with, say, our freeze dried organ treats, which are unbelievable. And we have others that are being that are all in on all of our products. And I think just that first step forward is is really just the most important step, because it's you're going to drive wellness. And you're going to create prevention, and save money in, you know, with vet bills, as you mentioned. And I really do believe that that dogs will live longer if we take care of them. The way we take care of our kids. People say oh, the dog is like my kid, that dog is your kid, it is your kid. So feed your child, you know, as well as you feed yourself. I agree. Feed them like their life depends on it. Well, Tom, as we are wrapping up, could you tell us what is the difference between a freeze dried and air dried and a dehydrated dog food? Right. So we have a freeze dried raw product. That is basically raw ingredients are cooked below freezing. It may not make sense for people but we're basically taking the moisture out of the raw ingredients and then making it in a dry form. So it's shelf stable. Our product that we created, actually was designed specifically to drive gut health/digestion. And they called gluttonous starch, which is just energy. So having, like sustainable energy throughout the day, and using pre and probiotics in the freeze dried raw product that are wonderful for your dog’s digestion, air dried just is this as a lighter weight process. I think it's a less a little less expensive. I think freeze drying is definitely a more involved process. But I think the end result of freeze drying is you lose maybe a point to, maybe three points of the nutritional percentage load. So in its current state of say 100% your products for the most part, I know ours is is 97%. intact, nutritionally. Okay. So there's basically no cook off. There's no processing, there's no harmful approaches, cooking approaches that take nutrients out of the food, which is the goal. And since the moisture is taken out, do you recommend that when we do feed freeze dried that we add water? The way I use our products for our dogs, we have two Goldens, I usually put about a quarter inch to a half inch of water in the bowl, feed them their appropriate portion. And then serve it. They will. They'll drink the water and eat the food and I’m assured that they're getting appropriate hydration. You can let it sit. But I don't think you can. The way my two dogs devour the food. The bowls are dry very quickly, which means both the water and then that often food is being consumed. All right, cool. Well, as I mentioned, Get Joy all of your products can be delivered right to anyone's door. I was really impressed with the application that I filled out on my dog Winston, you guys asked so many questions to pretty much customize the perfect meal for Winston. and because of the pandemic I think one of the things that has come out of that is that more and more of us like the convenience of having things delivered to our door. We aren't going to the big box and grocery stores to purchase for our dogs And right Packaged Facts, expects that the E commerce channel is going to grab 27% of the US market by the end of this year. And reach 35% by 2024. So you guys are riding the wave, you are right in the middle of it. You know, we have expectations Amazon delivers every day to our door. So why not? Yeah, mine too. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's right. I guess. Krista you're 100% right. The trend is growing. It's not even a trend. The shift is on. People are educated people are super confident in their ability to to find a brand, a product that they they feel really confident about feeding their their animal, that product. that convenience. if COVID gave us anything it gave us a sense of conveniences that you can have unbelievable things delivered to your front door with no hassles whatsoever. That part is is absolutely a game changer. And everybody's is slightly different. You know, the way we approach it, we've got fresh meals, we got fresh, freeze dried, we have fresh freeze dried organ treats, we're gonna have broth. We've been toying around with CBD pet sprinkle. We have some wonderful partners, we we hope to be in places like organic, healthy health food markets. Like we're just testing. I love the fact that people are confident people are seeing that, you know, the importance of feeding fresh. And hopefully, you know that that that shift accelerates. Yes. Oh, we are out of time. So Tom, where can everyone find out more information about you and Get Joy? Awesome. We would love for you to follow us at on Instagram, Facebook @getjoyfood. You can find us our website is  https://getjoyfood.com/ where you can learn all about what we do, how we do why we do it. And we'd love for you to join our community and join our journey of wellness for for dogs everywhere. Your Social Media URLs or Tags          Instagram: @getjoyfood          Facebook: @getjoyfood          LinkedIn: @getjoyfood Well, and for our listeners, because I am an affiliate I get to pass on the savings to you. So I encourage everyone to try out Get Joy. And for both their freeze dried and their fresh meals. Use the code WAGOUTLOUD40 to get 40% off your first two orders on either freeze dried or the fresh meals. That's an amazing deal. Gives you a chance to try it out. And your dog will really thank you. So yeah, we're thrilled. We'd love we'd love for you to try it and Thank you Krista. Well I appreciate you being here today. Thank you for all that you guys are doing. Keep doing what you're doing Tom and keep us posted. Thank you Krista. Great catching up. Thanks again to our dog loving friends at Get Joy. If you agree that your dog is an important member of the family, then why not order some fresh freeze dried today and save 55% at getjoy.com by entering the code WAGOUTLOUD55 That's all in caps, no spaces, WAGOUTLOUD55 for 55% off your first two orders. Your dog will thank you! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

 Holistic Alternatives for Proteins in Dog Food | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 00:33:39

Hello This is Krista with Episode #145 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Have you checked out all of the amazing partner products that I highly recommend? These are products that I have tried and can recommend to you that will help your dog to thrive. Just go to https://www.wagoutloud.com/ to check out the Partner Products section. And notice that I've negotiated discounts for most of the products, so why not see what can make a difference in your dog's life? Feeding your dog dry processed food like kibble is essentially like feeding your dog fast food. And here's why. Much like fast food for us humans. dry dog food can be filled with added chemicals, highly processed ingredients, and worse low grade ingredients. And again, just like fast foods for humans, this wreaks havoc on your dog's insides and even leads to things like leaky gut, achy feeling joints, bad breath, mushy poop, and even weight gain. Have you tried feeding your dog a fresh food diet? Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode. Chris Green started his journey with animals to be a voice for the voiceless. He has transitioned that to being not only a voice for the voices but shares others voices who are equally passionate about bringing only the best quality of life for our furry friends.  He started this February 2014 and has rescued hundreds of furry friends, fostered, transported, organized adoption events, and handed pet food to low income pet parents every month. He does this in the honor and inspiration of Katana, who passed last year, and he wears her pawprint in his tattoo proudly to remind him of why he started this. Hi there dog lovers, and welcome to another episode of the Wag Out Loid pawdcast. Joining me today is Chris Green and he is here to chat with us about holistic alternatives for proteins in dog food. Chris, I am so thrilled that you're here with us today. Could you please introduce yourself and tell us why are you so passionate about canine nutrition? Thank you, Krista for having me. I mean, this is kind of like I was saying before we started recording. It's so weird to be sitting on this side of the microphone instead of on your side. So yeah, I'm Chris Green. I have been a podcaster since 2014. Of course, that transitioned a little bit over the years, went from being a podcaster to doing a weekly radio show. And in that transition of those, oh gosh, what are we looking at going on almost eight years now, I have grown a great passion when it comes to our pets, pretty much their nutritional values. And so Krista and I were talking about this way back when and by the time this is on, it's been almost a year since we discussed this opportunity for me being on your show. And, you know, the whole idea is that we have to evolve when it comes to nutrition. We started off with canned dog food, way back when in the 50s. And it would have the good companies that had real meat and real ingredients in its food. And that has spiraled downhill over the last multi decades to what we now see. And I think it's time we all start looking at alternatives to what are we going to put in our dog’s and even our cat’s food bowl. I agree. Well, Chris, do you agree that there will be a shortage of traditional animal protein in the coming years? So you know, that's an interesting question. So with what they've been saying there has been a great deal of groups, not only just in the US, but all around the world. And they've been discussing that there will be a shortage of different animals to actually be consumed. Or, you know, there's a very interesting concept that commercial farms will be shrunk down because cows in some case, what they claim, emit a lot of pollution. So when we think about it, if even commercial farms are reduced to only so much beef might be almost scarce, may not be a product that we'll be able to have, which is probably very strange to a lot of people. And then of course, you know, you look at the conventional dog food and cat food that we see right now. It's really not made with what we think it is. The wheat, the grains, all of those have been well rendered and adulterated and there are so many different things that have made the ingredients just absolutely insufficient for our dogs and cats on its own. And it's also changed their DNA and their allergy structures astronomically. So we're going to be seeing probably in like next 10 years, something that's going to have to change if cows are not going to be something that we're going to be able to use or have for dogs and cats, alternatives will have to suffice. Well, why do you think in addition to lowering the carbon footprint of factory farming that we are seeing today? Why do you think there's this rising interest in incorporating non traditional proteins into our companion animals diets? That's a good question, Krista. So with when you think about it, the number one allergy for dogs and cats is poultry. So chicken is the leading allergy for dogs. So for all of these listening, they're saying my dog has a lot of scratching, fur is coming off in areas, there’s this dandruffy look, that's dry skin that's coming off the dogs. And that is possibly some kind of fungus that could be growing underneath the skin. That's a lot of the reasons why dogs are always scratching at one spot or chewing on a spot is because underneath the skin is an allergy reaction. And a lot of it is based on poultry. So you're giving your dogs chicken or you're giving your cats a chicken, turkey or any kind of poultry in itself. And that's becoming an issue. So what do we do, we have to find an alternative protein and some dogs are so allergic and cats, for that matter allergic to all kinds of protein, all kinds of things, even environmental. So we need to find out how are we going to be able to supplement this? And where are we going to supplement it from? And that's where this conversation will now mutate into something very interesting. So that's kind of in a nutshell how I see it. I agree with you. But from the science that I have read about, it's when people feed the same protein every single day. It's not so much of an allergy as a food or protein intolerance. So if we rotate our pets’ proteins, they have a better chance, I think of not having those intolerances. And it's actually good to have a variety just like us, because dogs need certain amino acids in their diet and rotating the protein sources will give them that better nutrition of amino acids. And that's my opinion. I can't disagree with that. You're completely right. Okay. Well, I think other reasons why we're seeing more novel proteins in specifically dog food is you know, the, the humanization of our pets, you know, people are realizing we want to eat better, and they should eat better as well. Functional nutrition. You know, people are hiring nutritionists, and it's all about food as medicine and people are getting smarter. And to your point earlier, we talked about sustainability. And that is huge. And one of the main reasons we're going to be seeing different proteins offered. So before we get into the different proteins that we're going to be seeing on the market. I have to ask you first, do you think dogs are carnivores or omnivores? Good question. So they are actually omnivores. Dogs are omnivores and having a plant base included into their meat based diet is very vital to their growth and their life. Okay, so can they thrive on a vegan diet? No. Okay, I agree with you there. I'm not even I'm not even gonna give an another alternative of why this won’t work. No. Vegan diet is completely not possible for a dog. I know that there is a lot of studies out there that stipulate that it could work. There is just too much within a dog’s mechanical structure that would actually need to have that meat base. The beginning part is that dogs they come from the wolf family, and you never found any wolves in the wild with a salad. Now, when you would see a wolf or even a dog or a cat, when they hunt their prey, a lot of times they're going to hunt rabbit, when they're eating that rabbit right in that stomach is going to be a plant base. And that right there is why dogs explicitly are omnivores. And even cats. If you look at a cat, there is still some areas of a cat where there would cat that minute amount of thriving off of a little bit of a kind of a plant based diet, but very small compared to what you'd want to put in your dog's bowl. Right. I agree. Why do dogs need protein? Why is it such an important nutrient? Well, I mean, the easiest part is, I guess I can break it up into multiple different things. Why does a car need oil? Why does a house need plumbing, it's what makes it work. Without you would have a car that wouldn't run, you would have a house that would have outdoor plumbing, it would not be really functional, which may have worked, you know, decades ago. It doesn't work these days. Dogs actually need it for multiple different reasons. You know, when you think about it, that meat has just so many different vitamins, minerals and proteins within it, these different things are going to help with the longevity of life, the blood flow, that would help with the muscular continued growth and not deterioration. Same thing with cerebral growth. So you want to see that your dog is continuously processing at a high function. So with diet, that is the biggest part of every dog, if your dog is lethargic, and isn't able to really function well does not take good commands. Even has any kind of behavioral problems. These could stem very much from a nutritional deficiency also could be part of a thyroid issue as well. But if your dog has different issues when it comes to processing, simple commands, it very well could just from the nutritional side. So to the point nutrition and the right part of being able to eat the right stuff is what will get them to go. That's why I use the analogy of why does the car need oil? That's a good one. And specifically protein, as you mentioned, it helps build and repair muscle tissue. But it also helps with so many other important roles like managing hormones and enzymes, and helping to keep the immune system strong. We've talked about that on the Show repeatedly that over 80% of our immune system is in the gut. So protein is a vital nutrient that dogs need. And back to those amino acids. There are 10 amino acids that are essential for dogs and essential means that their body is unable to produce it or can't produce enough of it to support normal function. So they have to get it through diet or supplementation. So, that is one of the reasons why protein is so important, but not only protein but high quality, high biological valued protein, bioavailable protein. So before we get into the alternative protein sources, we are going to take a quick commercial break. We'll be right back. We are so grateful to the Original Mine Pet Platter for sponsoring this episode. This has to be one of my favorite products ever!  The Mine Pet Platter is designed to benefit the health and well-being of your dog and promotes the ultimate natural feeding experience for both meals and treats.  What is it?  Well, it’s a patented, bone shaped platter designed for your dog’s feeding instincts.  It includes scoops and ridges that naturally slows your dog’s eating routine and makes mealtime fun.  After watching my dog Winston slow down instead of inhale his food from a bowl, we’ve never gone back.  Now he explores, sniffs, paces, walks around the platter and licks it clean!  Its BPA free, made in the USA, dishwasher safe, sustainable, recyclable and has a 100% money back guarantee.  There are too many benefits to fit into this ad, so I encourage you to learn more by going to https://minepetplatter.com/ and learn that how you feed your dog is just as important as what you feed them.  And as a bonus, Wag Out Loud listeners can take advantage of a 10% discount by using the code WOL10 at checkout! Welcome back, everybody, we are speaking with Chris Green about holistic alternative protein sources. Chris, this is just amazing. And we've only scratched the surface. So let's get right into what are some other proteins that are either on the market now, or that we're going to see as alternatives to animal proteins that we're used to? Well, you know, this is the interesting part is that I feel like the next alternative that we're gonna see, and we're starting to see a little bit of it, but just in a very minute amount, that I think we're gonna start to see an insect based diet that's going to be taking over pet food. Now, of course, raw feeding is is definitely the desired choice I would have when it comes to diet. But as you mentioned in the first part, what's going to happen if proteins are not available or vastly, you know, going to go away. So when we think about it, you know, in the US, we don't really look at bugs as anything besides a nuisance. And in other parts of the world, this is something that is their thriving grace, you think it's ethnic, it's part of their life. You think of places like Asia, you think of Africa, even just down in Mexico, it greatly used South America. And the next part of it is going to be what is going to be cost efficient, eco efficient, and sustainable? And that's where this is going to be where insects are going to probably work out as a cheap alternative with a demand. And when you think there's about 130 countries out there with over 2000 different species of insects people are consuming. That's gonna be the the next big thing that we're seeing now, which is crickets. Yep. And the good thing about insects is they reproduce in great numbers. They have high nutritional quality with very low water and land needs. And I was surprised when I looked this up that crickets have more protein than beef. They have great omegas and they even have fiber. So that's amazing. All right, so we have insects. What else? Well, actually, I want to go back on to the cricket one, because that's the big one right here. So did you know that crickets are actually a crustacean? I did not. So for anybody who actually has a shellfish allergy, like I do, I can't eat anything. That's shellfish. So therefore, if anything, and you'll see this actually, in different restaurants where people are doing this at home, they're making breads with cricket powder, which what it is, is that it's ground up cricket, and they put it in their bread, which, for humans actually has a great deal of benefits, as you had mentioned with all of their vitamins, minerals, and nutrients. But if you actually have an allergy to shellfish, you can't eat it. Now, I could put this in my dog's food, but I could never eat it myself. Yeah, I never knew they were crustaceans. So that's interesting. And in case anybody is wondering, you know, how do you kill the crickets? Well, it's actually very humane, because they live about 80% of their natural life. And then they go into hibernation, and that's when they are harvested when they're in hibernation. So it's not cruel, but a great nutritional source. So that's a good one. What else do we have? I've been really kicking the rock around really mostly on the fact of insects because of what we would actually be able to gain with them. That's, that's been my biggest thing for the longest time now. And it was kind of funny, few years ago. Dr. Coger, had been on the original podcast multiple times. And she would always kind of laugh at me over this because when you think about it, like another interesting And I find this to be a very interesting bug the black soldier fly. Their Larva is just astounding on how much protein, vitamins and minerals they have. We have flesh flies. You have and this is a weird one. And I don't even know how they are able to harvest this. But and bear with this, I know this is gonna sound strange. But the lactating cockroach, the actual lactation is very hot, it's off the chart as a superfood. So it's really strange on all these interesting insects that are being farmed in very small little areas, and all over the world, not not just you know, in Europe, but in Canada as well. These are become big things. And in our country, I've noticed that the black soldier fly that has become this mega star of additional protein. And you think to yourself, why are these becoming a thing? And that was where you and I started discussing this going, Why is there such a want for bugs? And why is this such a thing? Why are people wanting to actually farm. But when you think about it, one corporate office, you know, you think about a big city, you think about those days 30-40 story buildings, one just floor can have a farm that's going to literally feed 1000s and 1000s of humans, and think about how many dogs or cats that would be able to actually feed. So it's just astounding, and the water that they take for to actually work a farm of an insect farm does not take much at all. When you think about a regular farm takes up a lot of space, takes up a lot of water puts in a lot of different things into the ground. It does have the questionable is this sustainable and economical? And even big pet food is starting to look at this, which that alone scares me. Because I don't want to see them do that. Because if you cook it, like they do everything else and they render it. How much is there going to be of those mega high vitamins, minerals, and protein? How much is going to just go out the door by being super cooked? Yeah, good point. Well, in addition to insects, I know other alternative protein sources. I know yeast, that many pet food companies are looking at yeast because it does have a high source of protein. It has amino acids, the vitamins, the beta glucans. I recently did an interview with Bond Pet Foods. And they are actually coming up with a protein rich pet food without the slaughter. And it's amazing. They're using a fermentation process, just like beer or cheese making. And they're taking the DNA from one healthy chicken who's still alive and happy. And making this protein in a lab, which is identical to the original chicken protein. Another one is fungi. So Wild Earth is in California. And they are making dog food out of human grade Koji, which is a Asian protein member of the fungi Kingdom. It contains all 10 of the amino acids that are essential for dogs. And they also were using a fermentation process. So it's just amazing. You know, when we think about it, how we can save the planet and feed ourselves and our pets. You know, I was waiting, I was gonna see if you would actually bring it up because there was one other thought process as well. And it's more of a supplement. But it's also really good for our dogs, which is seaweed. Seaweed is really good and contains just so much nutrients that contain the proteins, the iron, the iodine, the magnesium, Omega three. And these are things that you just don't think about. I mean, obviously I live now in a landlocked state. So the word seaweed in this area is like we don't have an ocean, right? But there are seaweed farms out there that are just producing seaweed. I mean, it's a strange concept, But this is where we're going, we're going to see. And for me, I mean, I love the fact of coming up with things, you know, within labs and stuff like that. I also know that there's a lot of people out there that want to have that straight from the earth natural kind of thing, whether it's raised out of the womb of a calf and or cow to a calf, and then becomes, you know, beef, or it's some kind of plant based, rabbit, or whatever it is, people are going to still still want that earthy, real thing. And there is alternatives out there. Sometimes we have to do a lot of research, but there is a great deal that the earth is still making. And we're starting to realize it's good for us as humans, and really good for our pets. Absolutely. And I know Kangaroo is a sustainable protein, because in Australia, they are, you know, considered pests. They're everywhere. So there are companies using kangaroo meat, there's actually farm raised alligators that are being used in pet food. What are your thoughts on fish as a protein source? I mean, they’re so high and so many different vitamins, minerals, nutrients, but then again, you know, there's always going to be the question mark with fish. Because you have that, I want it I would love to not sound so hippie when I say it. But our oceans are contaminated and they are polluted. So we do have a lot of different areas. And that, that we have to kind of wonder about I mean, we we know as humans, there was mercury in some fish, and there was definitely some issues. But with a dog, or even a cat, you know, you think about how their stomachs are operating. And with those acids that they have, it does break it down a lot easier than you and I same thing is when you and I we could never induce anything that had salmonella, Listeria Ecoli , where a dog with a healthy immune system and a cat, they can. They're built for that the only way that they cannot, and there is no way that anybody can, can talk me off this one. If a dog or cat has a healthy stomach, they can induce it. The only way that they're ever going to be compromised any of the is if they have a compromised immune system. And that's the only way. Whenever I see these recalls for ecoli. Listeria, it just kind of makes me laugh because it's not for our dogs and cats. It's there. That recall. is for humans, saying that we're unable to just manage our own self, which is why raw feeding gets such a bad rap. It's not the dogs or cats. It's really just afraid that people can handle it. And I'll be honest, my daughter at the age of six was able to get our dog's food bowl. And we used raw food. She never once had listeria, Ecoli. she never had any of these because of proper hand washing and the right way of handling it and my dogs thrive. Yep, I agree. I'm a raw feeder as well. Well, Chris, as we are wrapping up, I think one of the protein sources that we have not mentioned, which I think has been toted the world's perfect protein, are eggs. Yeah, good for ourselves, great for our dogs. I mean, my dog loves raw, boiled, scrambled, fried, what have you. So don't forget about that everybody that eggs are a great protein source. And one more thing before we wrap up here. Do you agree, Chris, that senior dogs actually need more high quality protein, than you know what they ate in their younger years? Do you agree with that? I do. When you think about it, what do we do with our kids? We give them vitamins that are extra with calcium and different things so that their bones stay healthy, they're able to develop and the same thing goes as we get old, we end up taking some vitamins. So of course the nutrients, the vitamins, all that we're doing for older dogs is essential. So very much I very much agree that we need to be cognizant and aware that our senior dogs need more. Yep, I agree. Well, Chris, where can everyone find out more information about you? And Your radio show that you mentioned Pawsitive Variety Show? Well, that’s just it. So I do the Flea Circus every Friday right in mid Missouri. It's our local radio show that we do right here. Now all those episodes, I put them on the website that I created because as you know, Krista, I had a show called The Flea Circus is my current show, the Groomer Next Door. I'm so used to saying the Flea Circus, the Groomer Next Door podcast. So I put everything on Www.pawsitivevarietyshow.com. And that's pawsitive, as in PAW positive variety. show.com. And that's where you will be able to hear every episode. I hate to say it, but there's like 400 and something episodes all together over the years, I think 300 almost of the original over 100 of the new one. So yeah, there's a lot of content in there. And we've had everybody from Dr. Karen Becker and Rodney Habib to startup companies, and some of the most interesting people that you probably really love. And like the Two Crazy Cat Ladies before anybody knew they existed. So way, way back. Facebook (currently) @Pawsitivevarietyshow That is awesome. Well, I encourage everybody to check it out again, that Www.pawsitivevarietyshow.com. And I will put the link in the show notes as well. Chris, I am so excited that we finally had this interview. We've been talking about it for about a year now, as you mentioned. So we really appreciate your time. And it'll be interesting to see, you know what happens to protein sources here in the coming year to 10 years. I'm very excited to see where we go from here. Well, thank you for letting me be on your show. It's really cool to be on this side of the microphone. Thank you for letting me sit over here. Thank you for sharing, Chris, we appreciate you. Thank you. Thanks again to the team at The Original Mine Pet Platter for sponsoring this episode.  Check out the ultimate mealware for all dog foods by going to https://minepetplatter.com/and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off! Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time. Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?

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