Speak! Our Pet Blog
Adopting a Rescue Dog – Karen Phillips
It’s an amazing thing to give a rescue dog a home. Most of us find it impossible to resist the lure of a cute puppy so to make the decision to adopt an adult dog that is looking for a ‘forever home’ is something quite special. Of course, the bonus is that you get to […]
Fearful Dogs – Karen Phillips
Recently the hot question on my Facebook night is how to manage dogs who are frightened of people and/or other dogs. This fear can be displayed by the dog as either aggression or anxiety but both have the same root cause but dogs just deal with it in different ways depending on their personality. One […]
Get Going with Agility – Karen Phillips
The beginning of the year sees a new start to the agility season and there are a lot of fresh new faces, both human and dog, at my agility club which is so great to see. Agility is my passion and has been since my first two wonderful border collies Murphy and Soda-Pop came into […]
Introducing a new cat or dog to the family – Karen Phillips
Every Monday night I answer questions on the Better Pets and Gardens Facebook page and an interesting one that I received recently was how to teach dogs to accept a new cat in the house and have them co-exist happily. I have had to introduce cats to my household of dogs in the past and, […]
Taking the fear out of the dog wash – Karen Phillips
One of my favourite things in a Better Pets and Gardens store is the “do it yourself” dog wash facilities. It’s easy to use and I don’t get soaked while washing my dogs! Plus, it only costs $10 for 10 minutes! Unfortunately some dogs aren’t quite as thrilled about using the dog wash as my […]
Stop your dog jumping on everyone – Karen Phillips
Over the last few weeks I’ve been receiving regular Facebook posts from people asking how to stop their dogs from jumping up on everybody, including visitors. The good news is that stopping this is fairly straight forward but it does require the help of some tasty treats and some planning. In a nutshell, dogs jump […]
Is your dog a guts? Karen Phillips
Recently I’ve had lots of questions on Facebook about how to stop dogs from eating their food too quickly. For some dogs, eating too fast makes them to vomit their meals back up. But far worse is the possibility of bloat, a serious condition caused by the dog swallowing too much air when eating. This […]
Barking up the right tree
One of the regular dog training questions we receive on Facebook is how to prevent excessive barking. Dogs bark for lots of reasons and it’s a perfectly normal and natural thing for them to do. Barking has a lot of positives including protection of us and our homes but when it becomes excessive it can […]
Sit! Good dog! Karen Phillips
A really useful behaviour to teach your dog is a ‘sit’ or ‘down stay’. A stay can be used to teach your dog control and more importantly it can keep your dog safe when out and about. I use stays all the time especially when I’m taking the dogs to the beach or park. If […]
Keeping my old dogs active and stimulated – Karen Phillips
It can sometimes seem like our dogs age overnight. For my older border collies over 10 years of age, it felt like we went from normal behaviour with them running around chasing the younger dogs to seeing them sleeping a lot more, wanting to be inside and having trouble getting up in the mornings, especially […]
