Summer Update

Hi folks I hope you are all having a great summer.  As you may know my summer is being filled by travels and travails.  So far I have managed to get my son off to his summer adventure in Colorado and begin re-writing my training manual as well as visit friends I haven’t seen for a long time.  If you are interested in receiving an updated version of the manual, please let me know and as soon as it is done I will send it to you.  It is going to have some new games, video links and an expanded tricks section!

Just a few reminders for pet safety since we are now in the heat of summer;

-          Never leave your dog in the car even for a few minutes with the windows cracked!  Cars can heat up extremely quickly and our dog’s cooling systems don’t work like our making them extremely susceptible to heat stroke!

-          Make sure your dog has plenty of fresh cool water available when you are exercising them on a hot day.  The only way for a dog to cool down is through panting or drinking cool water.

-          Keep your dog off the hot pavement – it can burn the pads of their feed and cause them to overheat quickly.

-          Never shave your dog thinking that will help them to keep cool.  Actually, double coated dogs with a thick undercoat like Goldens, Shepards and Sheep dogs are kept cool by their thick undercoat and shaving them exposes them to sunburn, bug bites and overheating. 

-          Don’t soak your dog with water (especially their back) as the insulating properties of their dense undercoat will be rendered useless if you do. 

-          Ways to help keep your dog cool include:

o   Clipping the hair of their underbelly and underarms

o   Providing cool and/or wet items for the dog to lie on like towels soaked in cool water

o   Providing shallow wading pools for the dogs to walk/lie in

o   Providing plenty of shade for them when they are in the heat

o   Providing plenty of air circulation (fans) in warm areas

o   Give your dog an ice pop!  Add a bit of chicken broth to water and freeze into ice cubes, it makes a great treat when the dogs are hanging out in the heat!

For those of you who have been helping me test my new group class scheduler – a big thank you!  I believe it is very close to going live now.

For those that are looking forward to training again with me next fall there will be a few changes to my schedule.  Lesson appointments will extend from 8 am – 3pm next year, as I’m shifting my schedule up by half an hour and adding another appointment block from 2-3 pm.  I will also be offering a couple of new group classes in the fall – Puppy Kindergarten Group Class with the option to combine that class with 2 private sessions, a Beginner Obedience Class for people with older dogs, rescues and/or puppies over 6 months old who need the basics and Manners 1 which is a more advanced obedience class targeted toward those who’ve done Puppy K and Graduate Puppy who want to concentrate on taking those behaviors they’ve learned to a whole new level (lots of field trips in that class to public areas). 

The class schedule is already posted on my blog at http://properpaws.blogspot.com/p/group-class-schedule.html and I will soon have an all new on line scheduling program ready for you to reserve your spot in those classes – like me on Facebook for updates on schedule availability https://www.facebook.com/Proper.paws.dog.training .