WATCHUNG MOUNTAINS YORKSHIRE TERRIER CLUB, INC.

The N E W S L E T T E R of the
WATCHUNG MOUNTAINS
YORKSHIRE TERRIER CLUB, INC.
JUNE–JULY
2016
Visit us at our website-http://WMYTC.org
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Editor: Terri Cuchiaro
1803 Middlebrook Rd.
Cell (732) 718-4024
Bound Brook, NJ 08805
[email protected]
In God We Trust
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SHOW AND TELL…
June 4 Huntingdon KC, Congratulations to Terri Cuchiaro and Carasel’s Isabella (pictured in donut bed) on her first 3
point major win! Going WB/BOS under Judge Rodney Herner.
June 25 Mid-Hudson KC, Roniks KC won WB for her first points, and it was a 3 point major! Judged by Keke Kahn.
KC is bred and owned by Dr Nick Valenti DVM. Dam is his beloved CH Roniks Moritza and sire is GCHG Carasel’s
Valentino CGC.
MEMBER NEWS…
Looking for the softest doggie donut bed ever? Your dog will
choose this over all the others! Many designs and colors are
available. Contact Rita Piko at [email protected] .
SAVE THE DATEs . . .
Sept 25 – Meeting at Terri’s
Oct 1 - We will be supporting Morris & Essex on
October 1, 2016 at their Match show with an RDO
(Responsible Dog Ownership) Meet the Breed
where our club members and their dogs will be on
hand to answer questions and invite interested spectators to learn more about their breeds, clubs, and programs.
This year it will be held at Dodge Field in Madison, New Jersey during the annual Bottle Hill Festival on Saturday. The
town festival and street fair is held yearly to commemorate the official naming of the Morris County settlement to
“Madison" in 1834. Last year there were five stages with live entertainment, the Madison Area Antique Car Show, a
Beer Garden, amusement areas, 200+ exhibitors, including not-for-profit groups, craftspeople, local businesses and
food establishments. The average attendance each year is 10,000 to 20,000. The festival spans nearly six blocks of
street vendors and Madison merchant sidewalk sales, including the Historic Madison Downtown District.
Along with the five Match show rings, they are planning other attractions for all dogs and their owners, such as an
AKC ‘My Dog Can Do That’ agility course (introduction for you and your dog to try out, no prior registration), a barn
hunt site, Schutzhund demonstrations and possibly a Flyball run, and Canine Good Citizen testing.
Read more about M&E’s event… http://www.morrisandessexkennelclub.org/2016-match-show.html You can enter the
day of show.
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When Someone You Love Leaves You and Your Pet
JUNE 16, 2016 by TAILS MAGAZINE
Sometimes just having each other isn’t so bad.
By Tracy Ahrens
Several months after the man I love broke up with me, I had a moment of vivid realization as I looked at my dog,
Trucker curled up on my bed. Trucker’s eyes were slightly open, he looked sad and all morning he had periodically
looked out the front windows of my home as if he was waiting for someone. It was a Saturday, a day my ex often
came over to visit us.
His visits were not only treasured by me, but Trucker loved him. When his SUV pulled into my driveway, Trucker
seemed to sense his presence. He’d burst into a flurry of excitement, whimpering with joy to greet him outside or at
the back door. Trucker would stop dead in his tracks and sit up on his hind legs, placing his front paws on my ex’s legs
to receive and give a hug.
My ex had three dogs and he started sharing dog biscuits with Trucker. Trucker loved the biscuits so much that my ex
started carrying a small bag of them in his vehicle. Trucker would climb into the vehicle and find them. But first,
Trucker’s nose would go quickly to my ex’s pants pockets or sweatshirt pocket where a couple of biscuits were
waiting.
Trucker loved the biscuits, but most importantly he loved to “perform” for my ex. He loved pleasing my ex by sitting up,
giving a high five, speaking or rolling over for a treat. That day as Trucker was lifeless on my bed, it hit me. I asked
him, “Do you miss daddy?” I always referred to my ex as “daddy” to Trucker. I told Trucker, “I do too, but I’m sorry,
he’s not coming back.”
At that moment I collapsed over Trucker and cried while holding him.
I’d been through this type of loss before. Nearly 20 years prior when I was married and my husband left me and our
Brittany Spaniel, Speckles. He was only supposed to be gone three weeks for work, but it grew to three months and a
divorce. I remember then sitting with Speckles on a cedar chest in front of a picture window in our home. We’d sit
there at night watching cars pass by. I knew Speckles was waiting for daddy’s car to pull into the driveway. I comforted
Speckles while sitting there. I became the sole pet parent to “our” dog.
Now it was happening with Trucker.
My ex took Trucker jogging, walking and for rides in his vehicle to his home to play with his dogs. Now it was all gone.
I never wanted Trucker to experience abandonment again. He came into my life when he was 5 years old. He will turn
12 this year. Many people walked out of his life before he met me.
As a puppy Trucker was tossed out of a semi cab. Someone rescued him and then sold him at a garage sale. The
couple that purchased him divorced and Trucker moved into a new residence with the man. The man’s roommate
threatened to hurt Trucker because he tore things up during bouts of separation anxiety. The man surrendered
Trucker to a shelter. His ex-wife reclaimed Trucker when she spotted him at a pet adoption fair; however, she returned
him to the shelter when he tore up her home due to anxiety.
Trucker spent five months at the shelter before he met me. He had to be placed on two medications – Prozac and a
sedative – just to help him stay calm and not injure himself trying to escape cages while workers were away. So many
people gave up on Trucker in his life, causing him sadness and anxiety, until he met me. I had to prove to him that I
would always “come back home,” and many dog-loving neighbors have chipped in to help him as comforting pet
sitters.
Trucker allowed my ex to enter our lives, accepting and loving him, only to be left behind.
Dogs and cats mourn when a close animal pal or their owner dies.
Children grieve when a parent abandons them. I’ve seen the same thing happen twice with my pets when a partner
has left my life. Single parents become more sensitive to who they let meet their children, and when. They want to
protect their children from getting “too close” and facing possible heartache from abandonment again.
I have seen my dog and cats mourn and will be careful to protect their gentle hearts from abandonment again. While I
miss my ex’s dogs, I didn’t initiate breaking ties. I sent them toys for Christmas and think of them often. An adult can
say that they no longer love and turn away from another adult, but abandoning the innocence of a pet (or a child) is
something inconceivable to me.
When my first dog, Speckles died, I held him as he took his last breath. I did not know if my ex-husband would care to
know, but I called him and shared that Speckles was gone. As with Speckles, I carry on to be a strong pet parent for
Trucker, trying to fill the void my ex left in his life. I will always return home to Trucker. I will be with him and hold him
until he takes his last breath.
That is love.
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What to Feed a Dog Prone to Weight Gain
The best food for your dog: a nutritionally balanced fresh-food diet, preferably homemade. If your dog were a wild dog,
she would catch and consume whole prey as well as scavenge carrion (dead animals). Her diet would be
supplemented with berries, grass, seeds, nuts, poop and a variety of other plants, which could comprise up to 30
percent of her overall diet, depending on lots of factors (weather, health, food scarcity, location, etc.).
You can mimic this diet by creating homemade dog food, just be sure you use healthy, nutritionally appropriate
recipes. If your dog needs to lose weight, don't just cut down his portions and add in some bulk, like green beans. This
may fill her up, but it won't give her the complex nutrition she needs to be nourished.
One of the worst foods to feed a dog prone to weight gain is grain-heavy kibble. Dogs that need to lose weight should
be fed a grain-free, fresh-food diet (and this means no potato, corn, rice, soy or tapioca, either).
Once you switch to healthier food, you'll need to carefully measure out an appropriate portion and be sure to account
for any healthy treats, like berries, that you feed her.
Daily exercise, at least 20 minutes but preferably 60 minutes, is equally important and, of course, you'll need to learn
to resist your dog's charms when she's begging for a piece of your pizza.
When Deciding What to Feed Your Pet, Remember: Your Dog or Cat Is a Carnivore
First and foremost, when you're deciding what to feed your dog or cat, it's important to remember that your pet is a
carnivore. His genetic makeup and internal workings remain essentially the same as his wild carnivorous ancestors.
Your dog or cat can't move his jaws from side-to-side, only up and down. That's because carnivores grab their prey,
tear it into chunks with their sharp, interlocking teeth, and gulp it down without chewing.
Omnivorous mammals (for example, humans) have sharp teeth plus wide flat molars designed for chewing.
Vegetarian animals have mouths full of wide, flat molars designed for excessive mastication (a lot of chewing). In fact
ruminants, for example, cows, actually chew their food twice.
All carnivores, including dogs and cats, have very short digestive tracts compared to vegetarian animals. This is
because nature designed carnivores to be able to eat foods that are heavily contaminated with pathogens. Wild dogs
and cats don't remove the colon or other bacteria-laden body parts from prey animals before they eat them.
So, their digestive tracts are designed to get food in and out very quickly to limit exposure to pathogens. A carnivore's
digestive system isn't designed to ferment foods like the GI tracts of vegetarian animals.
www.Healthypets.mercola.com
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Almost everything you have been told and taught
about heartworm is probably an exaggeration or
an outright lie, and this misinformation is probably
costing you more money than it needs to.
Here's the truth:
Heartworm is not a canine pandemic.
In fact, heartworm is pretty rare in much of the
country, and in very cold areas of the country a
veterinarian may go his or her entire career
without seeing a single case. Look at the map,
above, put out by a major vendor of heartworm
tests (Idexx) who has every reason in the world to
overstate (rather than to understate) the problem.
You will notice how low the baseline state numbers
are -- 500 cases is the top of the color scale -- and
that this map covers seven years of data collecting. You will also note that this map does not show adult heartworm
infestation in dogs, but simply the number of dogs that tested positive for heartworm. More on that important distinction
in a minute.
. . . . Data on heartworm incidence rates at the local level reinforces how rare heart worm really is. For example, on the map
above, California is coded red-hot with 500 cases. And yet, when a total of 4,350 dogs in 103 Los Angeles County cities
coming from 21 participating animal hospitals were tested, only 18 heartworm-positive tests turned up. And yet,
veterinarians are training their staffs not to talk about heartworm tests and medications as an option, but as a need, and
for this "needs to be given" message to be bombarded on the customer 3-5 times per office visit.
Heartworm infection is NOT rapid and will not kill your dog overnight.
It takes about three months for microfilaria (baby worms) to grow inside your dog to a larval stage, and even longer for
these larva to mature into adult heartworms. If your dog is dosed with a simple Ivermectin treatment at any time during
this period before adult worms are present (a period that lasts about three months long), the larvae will never develop
into adult worms, and will die. Read that statement again: a single dose of Ivermectin will stop heartworm dead up to 3
months after your dog is first infected.
In most of the country, only seasonal heartworm "prevention" is needed.
The short story here is that heartworm is a kind of nematode (dirofilaria immitis) spread by mosquitoes (and only by
mosquitoes). The lifecycle of the nematode involves six stages, and a dog can get infected with heartworm only if two of
these stages are fully completed inside the body of the mosquito, and those stages can only be completed inside the body of
the mosquito if the temperature stays above 57 degrees for at least 45 days straight, both day and night. If the temperature
drops below 57 degrees even once during that 45-day period, the lifecycle of the nematode is broken, and heartworm
cannot be transmitted to your dog. What this means, in simple terms, is that a year-round program of Heartgard
(sometimes spelled 'Heartguard") or some other "preventative" medicine is NOT needed in most of the country outside of
Florida, the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
. . . . . Look carefully at the maps below. These maps come from “Seasonal Timing of Heartworm Chemoprophylaxis in the
United States” by Dr. David Knight and James Lok of the American Heartworm Society. Find your area on the map, and
begin heartworm treatment on the first day of the month noted in Map A, and end treatment on the first day of the month
noted in Map B. In short, if you are living in Virginia, you would begin treating your dog June 1st and end treatment on
December 1st.
. . . . . This is a very aggressive treatment schedule -- more active than is really needed. After all, if heartworm larvae gets
into your dog on June 1st, they will have NO IMPACT on your dog for months and months. In fact, if you are in Virginia
simply treating your dog with Ivermectin (Heartgard) on September 1st and again on December 1st will give 100 percent
heartworm protection for your dog. Even in areas where heartworm is a year-round vexation (Florida and the Rio Grande
Valley of Texas), a once-every-three-months dose of Ivermectin will give your dog 100% protection.
Maps created by DH Knight and JB Lok
There is no "preventive" medicine for Heartworm.
Despite what your veterinarian may have told you, there is NO "prevention" for heartworm infection; there is only
heartworm treatment. ALL heartworm medicines work the same way -- they kill heartworm microfilaria present in the
body of the dog.
Heartworm "prevention" medicines are actually toxins.
The drugs used to kill heartworm microfilaria are Ivermectin (Heartgard, Heartgard Plus, Iverhart, Merial and Verbac) or
Milbemycin (Interceptor, Safeheart, Sentinal and Norvartis). Both drugs are nematode poisons, and in both cases a single
dose will kill all microfilarial infection that occurred up to 90 days earlier (i.e. all Stage 3, 4 and young Stage 5 heartworm
infections).
Humans cannot get heartworm.
Heartworm cannot be passed on to humans -- we are the wrong host animal. Very rarely a heartworm-positive mosquito
will bite a human and a small benign cyst may develop in the lung of a human, but this is NOT heartworm, and can be best
thought of as a tiny scar showing where a bit of microfilaria attached to the lung wall where it was killed off by the human
body.
Some breeds are more sensitive to Ivermectin.
Some lines of collies and collie-crosses have sometimes fatal reactions to ivermectin, the most common heartworm
preventative medicine. Though this is not common, and is even rarer today with low-dose Ivermectin such as Heartgard,
and seems to only hold true for collies, serious thought needed to be given to dosing any collie, collie-cross, or herding dog
with white feet. For these dogs, the safest heartworm medicine is Interceptor, though in fact the Heartgard box features a
Border Collie on it face, and many working Border Collie folks dose their own dogs with a low dose of sheep drench 0.08%
Ivermectin.
What about that wormy heart-in-a-jar at my vets office?
Most veterinarians have a "fear bottle" in their office which shows a canine heart riddled with spaghetti-like heartworms.
Nothing generates cash like a heartworm fear bottle -- a veterinarian will often place one prominently in his or her office
as a kind of cash-generating machine since one look will sell a heartworm test and a year's worth of Heartgard, no
questions asked. So where do these fear bottles come from? I've been told by a pharmaceutical sales representative that
most of these wormy hearts in these jars come from stray animals killed in Mexico, and that the heart specimens
themselves (often decades old) were given out by pharmaceutical company representatives when they first began selling
Heartgard back in 1986. One thing for sure: today, you can got to Maine and find a wormy heart in a jar even though the
local veterinarian has never even seen a dog with this problem in the last 20 years.
Do I have to go a veterinarian to get Ivermectin?
No. More on that in a second. Suffice it to say that it's not necessarily a bad thing to go to a vet for a prescription for
Heartgard, especially if you are going to see your vet on another matter anyway. I would not buy Heartgard from the vet,
however, without first checking prices online. Most vets price-gouge their customers by 100 percent or more for medicines
sold in their offices, and in most states a veterinarian cannot charge you more for writing a prescription for a medically
necessary medicine as part of an incidental visit. In addition, be aware that former executives from Merial, the maker of
Heartgard, are now making a generic version of this product, PetTrust, that is considerably cheaper.
. . . . . Another cash-saving tip is to get a prescription for Heartgard for a dog twice the size of your dog, and then split the
tablets in half. This trick results in considerable savings because the marginal cost between one Heartgard weight category
and the next is often very slight despite the fact that one pill contains twice as much active ingredient as the next.
. . . . . Finally, remember that, depending on outside temperature, you do not have to dose your dog all year long in large
parts of the U.S.
. . .Of course, if you want to dose your dog every month and do so cheaply and without going to a veterinarian for a
prescription, there's a trick here too. Here it is: Order Ivermectin in a pre-mixed solution from J.R. Enterprises. The cost is
$25 for a 65-cc bottle of .05% Ivermectin, which is enough to treat five 20-pound dogs for 26 months. J.R. Enterprises even
throws in a measuring spoon! Since this Ivomec and polypropelene gylcol solution is not FDA-approved for dogs, they sell
it for experimental purposes only. That said, it works fine, and this is exactly the kind of heartworm preventative medicine
used on all dogs all across this country prior to the advent of Heartgard and "the billion-dollar heartworm scam" in 1986. .
. . . . . .Finally, and if for no other reason than to explain how J.R. Enterprises does it, here's how you can treat a huge
number of dogs with non-prescription Ivermectin for a dirt-cheap price. Whether this is cost-effective or not (and whether
it is worth the trouble or not) really depends on how many dogs you have. In case you run a shelter, here's the scoop 1)
Buy a 0.08 percent sheep drench online or at a feed store. Sheep drench is sold in various sized containers, but the smallest
on Amazon is about $30 for 8 oz. This will be high-grade Ivermectin made by Merial, an established veterinary
pharmaceutical company. You will be giving only a very small dose of this sheep drench to your dog. You dose by weight,
and if you want to be very sure you have dosed enough, you can double the dose and the dog will be fine (but see the Collie
warning at point #7).
* up to 14 pounds: 1 drop (0.05 cc)
* 15 to 29 pounds: 0.1 cc
* 30 to 58 pounds: 0.2 cc
* 59 to 88 pounds: 0.3 cc
* 89 to 117 pounds: 0.4 cc
* 118 to 147 pounds: 0.5 cc.
Do I need to have my dog tested for heartworm before starting Ivermectin?
Generally, no. Unless your dog is an older dog loaded with years of untreated heartworm (which you will know from the
dog's long-term lethargy and chronic coughing), a dose of Ivermectin will not do your dog harm. A puppy, under six
months of age, of course, will always test negative for heartworm because the microfilaria have not yet had a chance to
develop and circulate. Testing a dog under age 6 months for heartworm is a common veterinary scam; do not fall for it!
Is curing heartworm expensive and difficult?
No it is not. Any veterinarian who tells you otherwise is not keeping up with the literature. It turns out that even if your
dog has adult heartworms, if the dog otherwise appears healthy (i.e. it is active, not lethargic, and does not have a chronic
cough), a monthly dosing of Ivermectin at a dosage normally used to kill roundworms (a dosage that is 3 times higher than
that used to simply prevent heartworm), plus a once-a-month 5-day dosing of Doxycycline (sold as Bird Biotic, and the
same antibiotic used to treat Lyme disease) will kill all the adult heartworms if it is sustained for a period of 18 months.
This treatment works better than previous Ivermectin-only treatments because the Doxycline wipes out the Wolbachia
microbe that grow in the gut of the adult heartworm, essentially sterilizing all of the female heartworms. A round-worm
strength dosing of monthly Ivermectin will not only prevent new heartworm microfilaria from taking hold in your dog, it
will also work to dramatically shorten the life of any existing adult worms in your dog. Bottom line: after 18 months of
treatment, your dog will be heartworm-free at very little cost compared to other remedies.
. . . . . A repeated caution, however: if you have border collies or herding dogs with white feet that also appear to have fullblown heartworm, consult a veterinarian, as some lines of collies are very susceptible to Ivermectin toxicity. This is very
rare, and the cause is unknown, but it is an area of concern among collies and collie-crosses.
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New Dog Training Technique That Rivals Clicker-Training
June 20, 2016 | 3,577 views
By Dr. Becker
Social learning, or the act of learning via observation, was long considered to be a uniquely human ability. Then
chimpanzees were found to possess the ability to learn by watching or imitating others, and soon it was revealed that
many non-human animals, including dogs, can learn socially as well.
Currently, many positive dog-training programs focus on clicker training, which uses individual learning (operant
conditioning) to teach dogs (when the dog does the desired behavior, a “click” sound is made, which lets the dog know
he’s on the right track).
A relatively new type of dog training, known as “Do As I Do” or DAID, uses social learning instead, and research
suggests it may be even more effective than clicker training in teaching dogs new tricks.
‘Do As I Do’ Training Method Outperforms Standard Clicker Training
Dogs are adept at imitating and observing humans, so it makes sense that social learning would be an effective
method for dog training. The DAID method involves first teaching dogs to perform a set of behaviors displayed by a
human when the command “Do it!” is said.
The command can then be used to direct dogs to perform novel behaviors learned by observation.
Claudia Fugazza, Ph.D., of Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary, who created the DAID method, and
colleague Ádám Miklósi, Ph.D., conducted a study to determine the effectiveness of DAID compared to clicker
training.1
Dogs were taught to open a sliding cabinet door (a novel behavior for all the dogs in the study) using either DAID or
clicker training methods. Dogs in the DAID group were more likely to learn the behavior within 30 minutes, and to learn
the behavior faster, than dogs in the clicker group.
Further, dogs taught using DAID were more likely to remember what they’d learned after 24 hours, including
performing it in response to a verbal cue as well as in a new context.
One caveat, pointed out by Karen B. London, Ph.D., a certified applied animal behaviorist and certified professional
dog trainer: the dogs also received reinforcement for their correct behaviors, which means they also received some
amount of operant conditioning.2
So it could be more accurate to conclude that DAID in combination with operant conditioning may be more effective
than operant conditioning alone. Still, the researchers concluded:3
“Our results show that the Do as I Do method is more effective than shaping/clicker training to teach dogs objectrelated actions within a relatively short time and suggest that this method might be also applied for training bodymovements.
Importantly, the use of social learning enhances dogs’ memory and generalization of the learned action and its verbal
cue.”
What Other Types of Training Methods Work for Dogs?
Your dog’s ability to learn is only limited by what you’re willing to teach him. And, in reality, you’ll probably use multiple
methods of teaching, and that’s ideal.
Like people, certain dogs may respond differently to different methods of learning, and you’ll likely find what works
best for you and your dog may be different from what works best for your friend or neighbor and their dogs.
In the video above, you can watch by interview with Dr. Sophia Yin, a veterinarian and world-renowned animal
behaviorist. She believes training your dog comes down to rewarding the behaviors you want and removing rewards
for unwanted behavior, all with the right timing.
Yin also teaches dog owners to learn how to read their dog’s body language and make training a fun, positive
experience. In teaching your dog to sit, for instance, you may use 30 positive reinforcements (i.e., treats) within a
couple of minutes. And this is just one example.
Yin also discusses how she helps owners train their dogs to control their impulses, and the importance of training not
just desirable behaviors but also teaching the dog that good behavior is a habit. You can find out more in the video
above.
Positive Reinforcement Is Key
No matter what type of training method you choose, remember that positive reinforcement is key. The use of choke
collars and other forms of punitive behavior training can harm your dog, physically and emotionally, and damage the
bond between you.
In addition, negative training methods primarily teach your dog what not to do to avoid getting punished. What they
miss is the important step of teaching your dogdesirable behaviors in their place.
Working with a positive dog trainer can be helpful, but you can also try the simplepositive-reinforcement training
method that follows. This method can be used along with Do As I Do training to teach your dog good behavior and
more using a fun, positive method.
If you’re interested in teaching your dog using Fugazza’s imitation DAID method, check out her book, “Do As I Do:
Using Social Learning to Train Dogs.” Following are the five steps to positive-reinforcement training that virtually
anyone can do:
1. Come up with short, preferably one-word commands for the behaviors you want to teach your pet. Examples
are Come, Sit, Stay, Down, Heel, Off, etc. Make sure all members of your family consistently use exactly the
same command for each behavior.
2. As soon as your dog performs the desired behavior, reward him immediately with a treat and verbal praise. Do
this every time he responds appropriately to a command. You want him to connect the behavior he performed
with the treat. This of course means you’ll need to have treats on you whenever you give your dog commands in
the beginning.
3. Keep training sessions short and fun. You want your dog to associate good things with obeying your
commands. You also want to use training time as an opportunity to deepen your bond with your pet.
4. Gradually back off the treats and use them only intermittently once your dog has learned a new behavior.
Eventually they’ll no longer be necessary, but you should always reward your dog with verbal praise whenever
he obeys a command.
5. Continue to use positive reinforcement to maintain the behaviors you desire. Reward-based training helps
create a range of desirable behaviors in your pet, which builds mutual feelings of trust and confidence.
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The Chicago Issue: The No-Kill Question
MAY 31, 2016 by TAILS MAGAZINE in CHICAGO, FEATURED, JUNE/JULY 2016, MAGAZINE, RESCUE
In March of this year, Aldermen Edward Burke and Raymond Lopez introduced a campaign to make Chicago a “nokill” city. Their “No-Kill Chicago” resolution supports policies that are both “a humane and fiscally responsible
alternative that can save local governments money while promoting an increase in pet adoptions.” The goal is for
shelters and rescues to euthanize only those animals who are terminally ill or pose a threat to the public in some way.
The good news is that everyone in the community can get behind saving more animals. The city, the aldermen,
numerous animal welfare groups, and the Chicago Animal Shelter Alliance (CASA) are working together to assess the
current infrastructure, revealing areas within the system that need to strengthen, change, or grow. From there, we can
build a successful model designed to address Chicago’s unique challenges.
We’ve always been a city that approaches animal problems with our own original ideas. When aggressive dogs
became a headline issue in 2003, many other cities enacted Breed Specific Legislation (BSL)—laws that discriminate
based solely on breed. Instead of jumping on the BSL bandwagon, we examined the dilemma and drew our own
conclusion. As a result, the historic “Animal Control Act” was signed into law, in which specific deeds, not breeds, are
punished. From Yorkie to Poodle to Rottweiler, all animals are held to the same standards, and consequences are
only enforced when a dog is deemed “dangerous” by their actions. It’s about promoting a positive result and taking the
time to do the right thing, rather than just signing on to what’s popular at the moment.
It may be a subtle ideological shift, but being for something sends a more positive message than being against
something. As Mother Theresa so famously stated, she would not attend an anti-war demonstration, but would happily
participate in a peace rally. She understood that promoting what you want, rather than what you don’t want, creates a
more powerful and motivating place to begin. Our language shapes our reality. And while the “no-kill” movement may
have the best intentions behind it, the term itself poses some issues.
If we use the word “no-kill” to describe shelters that euthanize 10 percent or less of the animals who enter their facility
(a common way to define the term), than “killshelter” is automatically used to describe the others.
These agencies prefer their more accurate
designation—“open- admission” shelters, so called
because they accept every single animal
who shows up at their door.
A “no-kill” shelter may never have to end an animal’s life within the walls of their facility because when they are at
capacity, the staff must start turning animals away. Overflow never becomes an issue, but those animals must go
somewhere. In Chicago, that often means they end up at Animal Care & Control (CACC) or other open-admission
shelters that take animals in regardless of how many others are in their care.
For most municipal shelters like CACC, open-admission is the law. They don’t have the opportunity (as “no-kill”
shelters do) to turn anyone away due to a lack of space. This policy generally means an open- admission shelter must
euthanize more than 10 percent of its population due to insufficient resources.
The debate within the animal welfare community is that having the term “no- kill” propagates the “kill-shelter” term,
which implies that some shelters out there prefer to kill animals rather than save them. However, nothing could be
further from the truth. Despite attempts to adopt out as many animals as they can, many open-admission shelters in
the Chicagoland area end up euthanizing due to a lack of space and resources. According to Diane Spryka of the
Animal Welfare League, an open-admission shelter, while she may have euthanized animals with love and
compassion, she has never killed an animal. She believes “killing” implies ending a life with malice or intent, which is
certainly not the case when you work in animal welfare.
Many animal welfare supporters propose that instead of calling the campaign “No- Kill Chicago,” the city instead
adopts another term—such as “Humane Chicago” or “A Home for Every Animal,” which encompasses the real actions
that need to take place.
In order for Chicago to start increasing the number of animals who get out of the shelter/rescue system alive, we need
an attitude shift that goes beyond the banning of open-admission shelters. Our mission is to find a home for every
animal. How can we get there? By supporting spay/neuter initiatives, making sure animals who must be re-homed are
done so quickly and efficiently, and getting every human looking for a new pet to think adoption first.
The community must realize the major role they play in this issue, and make some conscious changes in behavior.
When recycling began gaining popularity, people fought it. It seemed too hard and confusing. But as a result of
education and awareness, even my six year old now automatically seeks out the blue garbage cans and sorts his
trash. Same thing with the banning of plastic bags—carrying reusable ones is now the norm. By continuing to educate
and share the message that homeless animals are not damaged goods, the perception about shelters and rescue
groups shifts. More people begin to think of these animals as adorable future furry family members and choose to
adopt, rather than purchase, their next animal companion.
At the end of the day, despite the semantics, it is the work that gets done on behalf of the animals, and the intent and
spirit with which the laws are written, that matters. We, as a community, need to get involved and hold Chicago’s
leaders to task—moving forward together to serve and care for Chicago’s animals the very best we can.
--^*^--
BOOSTING PUPPY BRAINS FOR TRAINABILITY
WITH OMEGA-3 FATTY ACIDS
Sponsored Content: Stacey Oke, DVM, MSc, AMERICAN KENNEL CLUB
May 25, 2016
This Content is sponsored by Nutramax
Once the new puppy is home and settled, many of us feel at least a little apprehension underneath all the excitement
as we realize the next daunting step: training. Not just house training but also socialization, basic manners, obedience,
and even tricks or other skills such as agility. Resources describing the nitty-gritty details regarding your training goals
abound, with many suggesting consistency and positive reinforcement. But did you know that nutrition also plays an
important role in supporting your puppy’s ability to learn?
HOW FISH HELP PUPPIES
There are plenty of fish in the sea, and coldwater fish have high levels of long-chain omega-3
polyunsaturated fats (PUFAs) such as DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid).
Sardines, anchovies, salmon, mackerel, trout, and herring are all great sources of DHA and EPA.
DHA is especially important because it plays a vital role in brain and retinal development in young animals
(the retina is the light-sensitive tissue lining the back of the eye that converts light to impulses the optic
nerve transmits to the brain to generate the images we see).
The brain itself is composed of 50 percent fat, and DHA makes up 10-20 percent of all fats and more than
90 percent of the long-chain PUFAs found in the brain. This explains why DHA is widely believed to play an
integral role in the proper development and functioning of the brain, impacting attention, memory, and
trainability.
Fish oil supplements also help protect joints, enhance the immune system’s response to vaccination, and
promote the maintenance of a healthy coat and skin.
STUDIES SHOW OMEGA -3 FATTY ACIDS ARE ES SENTIAL FOR
LEARNING
Scores of scientific studies in a variety of species support the long-held hypothesis that DHA is essential for
learning and trainability. To date, there are two main studies in canines supporting DHA supplementation to
improve cognitive function.

Beagle puppies fed diets fortified with appropriate levels of DHA from weaning until 1 year of age had
statistically significantly better results in various learning, visual contrast discrimination, and psycho-motor
performance tasks than puppies that were offered diets containing only low or moderate levels of DHA. Such
tasks included using T-mazes with and without obstacles to find food rewards, displacing objects to receive a
food reward, and finding a food reward under one of two objects to test short-term memory function. (Journal
of the American Veterinary Medical Association)

Puppies fed a higher-DHA diet outperformed puppies that were fed a diet lower in DHA in trainability, using a
T-maze with a treat in only one arm of the maze. (The Iams Company)
HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH?
Perusing the array of pet nutritional supplements, you’ll notice a wide range of omega-3 fatty acid
supplements. Be aware that not all supplements contain long-chain omega-3 fatty acids. Instead, some
have short-chain PUFAs, such as alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) from flaxseed oil. Short-chain omega-3 fatty
acids can potentially be converted to the beneficial long-chain omega-3s in the body, but that conversion is
not very efficient. This is what makes direct supplementation with long-chain omega-3s desirable. Further,
the overall amount of DHA and EPA in supplements varies immensely. Current recommendations suggest
choosing supplements that provide approximately 25 mg/kg body weight of DHA and 40 mg/kg body weight
of EPA per day.
NOT ALL OMEGAS ARE A LPHAS
Not all pet nutritional supplements are quality products. Although generally recognized as safe, some
theoretical adverse effects of fish oil have been reported, such as altered platelet function,weight gain,
gastrointestinal disturbances (diarrhea), nutrient excess, heavy metal/toxin exposure, and drug-herbnutrient interactions. Always discuss your pet’s diet and use of nutritional supplements with your
veterinarian to minimize any adverse events. Finally, practice safe supplementation by choosing
products supported by scientific research rather than testimonials to maximize the benefits of your omega3. If you're interested in purchasing an omega-3 supplement for your dog, click here.
PUPPY NUTRITION Your puppy's lifelong health and happiness begins with you. Get
it right from the start. This e-book provides valuable information on how good and sound nutrition
habits will set your puppy on the right path.
Get Free Download Now
Terri Cuchiaro, Editor
1803 Middlebrook Rd.
Bound Brook, NJ 08805
Officers:
Terri Cuchiaro, President
st
Claudia Pierro, 1 Vice-Pres.
nd
Diane Stanley, 2 Vice-Pres.
Gary Vega, Treasurer
606 Washington Drive
Ramsey, NJ 07446-1579
[email protected]
Lizeth Medina, Secretary
1296 Millstone River Rd
Hillsborough, NJ 08844-4729
[email protected]
Board of Directors:
Tom Pierro, Class of 2017
Anthony Pollio, Class of 2017
Elaine Pollio, Class of 2017
Keith Turpin, Class of 2019
Jim Stanley, Class of 2019