Bobby's first trip to the beach - Crystal Crescent today

I cannot believe that my life has deteriorated to the point where I can say that I've had Bobby for more than a month and a half and today is the first time that he's been to the beach.
That it's been that long since I've been to the beach. It was a great day to go though, and we had a really good time - Bobby had a fantastic time.
It was also the first time that I've let Bobby go off-leash and he did really well - although at the end he didn't seem like he really wanted to be leashed back up - so I think I'll be careful next time and surprise him a bit more about when it's time to go back on leash - but overall he did really well.
He certainly had a great time running around the beach, and tonight he's completely passed out from being tired, which is super.
Charlie and Daisy had a good time too - which was nice to see.
And they both were being very photogenic, which was good for me. Charlie never has a bad day as far as the camera is concerned.
And Bobby proved that he not only likes to dig in my backyard - he also likes to dig at the beach too - I am going to have a bed full of sand tonight - you'll see later in this post that there was also some rolling action too.


All the time we were there I only saw this 1/2 of a buoy - so the buoy booty was very bad, nothing at all to take home with us.
And I guess I must have felt like taking pictures of flowers today -
Because I took photos of these different flowers that we came upon
I think the purple ones were the prettiest of course
This is Bobby sitting for a treat - even at the beach we were working on our sit

And this is Daisy saying - "I don't have to sit for a treat because I am perfect in every way!"
This is Charlie and Daisy sharing a quiet moment - except for the fact that I'm taking a photo of it
This is a shot of our own private beach - on a beautiful, warm, sunny day - only in Nova Scotia would you be able to find a barren white sand sunny beach 15 minutes outside of the capital city for the province - it really is shangri-la here isn't it?
Daisy was being so cute today, I could feel her nose on the back of my leg almost the whole time we were at the beach for some reason - although she's always been like that - she's always been a dog who's stayed close by when we're out on hikes, and maybe it's just because I was wearing shorts today that I could actually feel her nose making contact with the back of my leg - or maybe it was because I had my treat pouch attached to my belt today? Who really knows!


These next photos are the rolling that I was talking about at the beginning of the post - and this sand was extremely stinky for some reason - very sodiumy.... the dogs loved it.
Charlie looks like - "I've fallen and I can't get up!"



Charlie being perfect, once again

Here's a slideshow of all 94 photos from today...

At least Paul McCartney seemed to like dogs

Paul McCartney played his only Canadian show here in Halifax this past weekend - to a crowd of about 50,000 paying customers, and probably that many non-paying on the streets outside. Me and the dogs stayed well away and did a lot of sleeping this weekend instead of indulging in all that fuss and bother. The thing I like most about the Beatles and Paul McCartney is Oasis - and they weren't anywhere near the Halifax Commons - so there wasn't much for me to see.

But one of my friends today sent me a link to a Paul McCartney song that I thought was neat - it's called "Martha my dear" - and it was orignally thought to be about an old english sheep-dog that Paul and his family had a long time ago - but when his biography came out in 2005 it was discovered that "Martha" is actually the inner muse inside his head - and that he'd named his dog after the muse - so the muse came first - so six of one, half dozen of the other I'd say - it's still a cute song. You can hear it below and also see pictures of the man himself with the aforementioned doggie-wogg. From what I hear the concert here in Halifax was a brilliant success.

Cesar Millan being debated on about.com

My friend Adina forwarded me a debate that's going on at a Veterinary Medicine blog on "About.com" because she and I share an - I wouldn't call it an obsession, but it's a "special interest" in the training methods used by Cesar Millan - and the article and comments being left on the post at this blog have been really interesting - it's at http://vetmedicine.about.com/b/2009/07/07/veterinary-behaviorists-take-a-stand-against-cesar-millan.htm - so you can go read it.

The author is taking the stand that "In February 2009, the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior (AVSAB) issued a "position statement" about the use of punishment for behavior modification in animals, detailing 9 possible adverse effects of negative reinforcement (punishment) training. While not naming any trainers by name, the statement was written to counter Millan's techniques featured on his National Geographic channel show, The Dog Whisperer."

She gives a link to a video clip that shows Cesar "hanging" a dog in order to get him to submit to him and ends the post with - "If a "professional trainer" such as Millan can be bit several times in a few minutes, so can you. Or worse. What are your thoughts on dog training methods? Are you more or less likely to buy products that feature a celebrity spokesperson? Please add your comments below. " - and tons of people have added their comments, that's for sure - including the owner of the absolutely huge "Dog Whisperer fan Yahoo Group" that has over 3,000 members - she is a pretty smart lady and I've read her stuff before and she can give some compelling arguments.

Both Adina and I also left comments amongst the over 70 comments so far, and I'm sure that Adina won't mind if I paste her comment here - she said -

Instead of listening to Cesar as he talks the good talk about his love for dogs etc., try watching the dogs’ body language when they are interacting with him. They are often SCARED! look for tucked tails, slinking bodies that are close to the floor, lip licking, whale eyes (where you can see the whites). These are all signs of fearful dogs and given that 90% of dog aggression stems from fear, it is no wonder that the man so frequently gets bit on his show. I have watched many episodes of the DW and I continue to be amazed that people accept this as a humane way to train their dogs. If I was just in the business of dog training for the money, trust me I would want Cesar to stay on the air because the vast majority of the money I make comes from repairing the relationships between people and their dogs who have been mis-led by National Geographic. I have been in this business for over six years and have worked for the local animal shelter where we see worse case scenarios and I have never been bitten because I respect the dogs and don’t push them past their limits. I can tell you about four dogs in the past year who were PTS after biting their owners. What were the owners doing when they got bit? Alpha rolls! Cesar’s techniques may work with 75% of dogs without negative long-term consequences but his fan club doesn’t seem to care about the 25% of dogs that won’t tolerate this type of training.

Cesar fans please learn the truth about pack theory and dominance before you believe everything the Dog Whisperer has to offer. Look to scientific journals for facts. The articles may be more boring to digest than a well-edited episode of the Dog Whisperer but you need to EDUCATE yourselves and not accept everything that a celebrity is spoon feeding you.

In my comment I said - I’ve been watching his show everyday for about the last year, so I’ve seen a lot of Cesar Millan – and I’ve been following his training for philosophy since I first heard about him because his idea of “discipline, exercise, affection” in that order has seemed so foreign to the way that I’ve personally found has made my own multi-dog – rescued, many issued, multi-layered and very interesting canine household home a happy one. Cesar has gone so far as to say that love is not required to make a dog a balanced dog – his exact words are “Many clients I work with are surprised to learn that dogs don’t need love and affection to lead healthy, balanced lives.” ( http://www.dogchannel.com/dog-information/cesar-millan-dog-whisperer/article_let_dog.aspx )
That is such a shock to North American people who are so used to giving love to their animals – I know that’s why I personally have dogs – because I have a lot of love to give. and that’s why I just can’t give myself to Cesar Millan’s training methods.

As well – I wanted to comment about something that Harry Nguyen said – “For those who think Cesar is a cruel person or his methods too harsh. I challenge anyone to find me a pack 30-40 formally troubled dogs, of different breed, size, and temperament, that are more balanced and happily living together than the ones living at his center.”

I’ve had this same problem myself in my own home – I’ve had fosters that could live in my multi-dog household really well, and they’d get adopted out to seemingly really great homes – but they’d get returned for fighting with the other dogs in their new homes – and there was always this question – “why can they live with no fights in my home – yet in someone else’s home they become aggressive?”

If you notice on Cesar’s show – a lot of dogs come to the “Centre” for training for a couple months, and then go home – and start their old bad habits again – and at the end of the show what happens is that Cesar keeps the dog and gives the people a new, easier to manage dog – and their original dog stays at the Centre with Cesar as a permanent resident.
Maybe it’s not because Cesar has been able to “rehabilitate” the dogs at his Centre, maybe – could it be – he’s able to “manage” the dogs at his Centre?

As a person who is just a dog owner – I’m just going to throw that out there for all of you – dog whisper fans, and professional behaviourists, alike – to chew on.

Cesar is a trainer who appears to want to control every aspect about a dog’s life – and want the dog to ask before he can do everything – including when he can take a pee. That’s a lot of responsibility for the average dog owner. Some of us are up to it, and some of us aren’t.

If you’re interested in a couple more links of Cesar like the one that sparked this article – you can check them out at http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=CA&hl=en&v=9TRE7Zv7xdE&NR=1 and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUeD4oxGLs&feature=channel

There was another really interesting post from Theresa DePorter, DVM who said - "The training methods I would recommend for a dog like this,(the one in the 30 second video that the blog owner posted) and yes, I have treated dogs like the one in the video, require safety, prevention of aggression, prevention of arousal, teaching coping skills and rewarding appropriate behaviors. Devices like basket muzzles and head halters can be wonderful for a dog like this when used properly. There are a great ways to work with a dog like this one that real people can employ with their dogs and obviously, despite the “don’t try this at home” warnings, a lot of people do indeed try this at home. Severely anxious or fearful dogs may seem to improve in the short term but constant vigilance is required by the ‘dominant’ training methods and after time people grow weary or guilty, the dogs habituate and require more assertive owner responses and then someone is bitten either when the dog isn’t controlled or during efforts to control it."

What she said is basically the same thing as what I said, which I thought was pretty neat.

On another - but related note - at the same time I am reading the current issue of "Best Friends magazine" - and there's an article in there called "The Science of Kindness - Why Compassion matters in our interactions with animals" - and it's a super article. Best Friends Magazine is a great magazine and you get if FREE when you become a member of the organization - you should go and join up! Older copies are available free on their website, so I thought it wouldn't be too bad if I scanned the article and put it on my server for awhile since it will be available on their website in a couple months anyway, because it's such a good article - you can click - here - and read it now. But you should definitely also think about getting the magazine too, because it's awesome. But the lady Susan Friedman has got some great things to say about the way that Cesar tends to train dogs.


There's a section about "flooding vs shaping" - she says "many animal caregivers and trainers simply take it for granted nowadays that the best way to train an animal is through positive reinforcement. But at the time of Brinker and Friedman's initial email exchange, the previaling animal training strategy was to dominate, to make animals know who was the boss. It meant using some kind of intimidating stimulus from which the animal cannot escape, thereby scaring the animal into submission and making him easier to handle (think of the whip used by the lion tamer). In parrot training, flooding involves strking a caged bird with two wooden dowels until the bird stops lunging an dbiting. This technique of "breaking" animals is not just morally and eithically bereft, but according to fifty years' worth of studies, it produces short lived results. Also, it all but ensures that the animal will eventually lash out at the trainer or simply shut down completely.

The article ends with talking about moving these teaching methods over to humans - "Friedman confesses that, though she devotes so much of her time and energy to the behaviour and training of animals, her main objective all long has been to change the way we interact with our hman loved ones - our partners, children and friends". Previously in the article she had said - Every time someone has yanked the choke collar around his dog's neck, or forrced a bird inside a cage, or hobbled a horse, there may have been some pang, some moment of doubt that it was the right thing to do - in spite of what the so-called experts were saying to the contrary. Many people have asked themselves, I wouldn't dream of doing this to my child, so why am I doing this to my animal? What Friedman helps them realize is that dominating behaviour can be just as damaging to the animal as it is to the child. Sadly, there are some people who might treat their children or spouse in a dominating manner, but not their animals. As for them, Friedman's teaching are just as life-changing.

I personally have to attest to this - everything that I have learned about positive dog training and am continuing to learn have leaked over into my work life, and it's showing in a better work atmosphere where I work - I am on my policy and procedure committee for my department and I am working towards making our policies not something that our employees have to "live with" and that makes their jobs harder - but something that is positive for them and is in their best interests - and just a change in mindset - turning things around from a negative to a positive - can make all the difference - even with humans. From making animals and humans must do something into something that they want to do - into "win-win" situations - is good for everyone.

It's like the by-line of the Best Friend's magazine - "all the good news"!

Snakes, bums, bad knees, and Bobby

I don't know about where you live, but here in Halifax Nova Scotia the weather has been completely shitty for quite awhile.
We haven't had a sunny day from beginning to end since June 18th - and today is July 9th - so today being a beautiful day was a big thing, and I'm sure a lot of people got out and enjoyed it - I know me and the dogs did - although Jackie seems to have spent the better part of the afternoon in the well ventilated comfort of the darkened living room. He's not really the outdoorsy type. I guess spending the better part of 8 months completely indoors at one point in his life, letting the pads of his feet go baby soft and then having his nails embed into those baby soft pads sort of spoiled him for being an outdoorsy get his feet wet and dirty kind of dog.
Charlie was very happy to just lolligag wherever the lawnmower was NOT - haha!
I love this photo - and the next closeup of Bobby - I don't know if he was about to sneeze, or what, isn't it cute! He has such a beautiful face.
We went to the vet today because he's been having problems with his bum - brown stuff leaking out, so we thought his anal glands might be impacted, but the vet "expressed them" - and she said they weren't too bad - the contents were just a bit "chunky" - as it were. So that was good news.

I also had her check him over to see whether he might have a micro-chip implanted in him - but lucky for me he didn't - so he really is mine - finders keepers, losers weepers. And I also had the vet give him a good feel over because I hadn't had him in to get just a general health check - and wouldn't you know it - both of his back knees have got bad luxating patella. On a scale of 1 to 4 he's a 3 - both back knees pop out really easily - so he's going to be just like Buttercup and at some point in his life I'll be dealing with his knees. Currently she said his muscle mass in his back legs isn't that greaqt either - which isn't good - the way I kept Buttercup healthy for most of the time I've had her is that she led a "big dog lifestyle" - she got tons of exercise - and that'll be the way to keep Bobby healthy too and hold off surgery on his knees. I knew something was up because I had seen him hop-skipping down the back steps when he went out to the back yard - so I figured he had something wrong with his knees. I also had him weighed - and he's a big 10 pounds!

This picture is a photo of Daisy when she's looking at a snake that was in the backyard this afternoon who came out to say hello when I was mowing the lawn!
And this is a shot of Daisy just looking beautiful - that's not hard for her to do.
Here's a couple shots of the snake - it was almost exactly a year ago that I found another snake in the backyard and took a couple shots of him/her - isn't that weird? Maybe next July I'll find another snake again. That would be pretty neat.


Daisy was actually pretty freaked out by the snake. She was really cute.

Last night at obedience class Jack and Bobby did really well - my Dad thought that Jack was the best dog there of course.
This is Jack looking over at me saying - "why is Bobby getting all your treats and I'm getting none?" He has completely forgotten about the fact that he's getting a ton of treats from the man who's sitting in front of him - he still wants all the treats be given out in the room!
Bobby came very close to learning how to sit - which was amazing because up until last night he totally did not know how to sit. So that was a big step forward for us.
Another shot of Jack giving us the hairy eyeball - and in the background is George - one of Amy's dogs - giving my Dad the hairy eyeball because I had inserted a squeaky toy in my Dad's treat pouch - and it turns out that George is really turned on by the sound of a squeaker - so my Dad had 2 dogs very tuned into him last night - it's lucky my Dad likes a lot of attention!
Bobby is pretty good at staying focused on me when there's a hint of liver on my body.


Earlier in the week we took a trip out to my Dad's cottage - and everyone got to go for a dip in the lake - everyone likes to get their feet wet, but no one likes to swim - but whatever makes them happy makes me happy - Charlie likes to just walk around in the water and drink and drink
Buttercup likes to do the same thing, and eat the grasses
And it turns out that Bobby is not a water dog, which is strange - I thought that poodles were a water dog - but Bobby does NOT like the water. He wouldn't even come down the steps to the beach. He was having no part of the lake. That was too bad.
Daisy really likes to eat the grasses that grow along the beach - they must take like ham or something.



Me and Bobby had a really nice walk in Clayton Park this week - I'm going to make a new page on the Charlie loves Halifax site about it - Clayton Park is just such an awesome spot for people who own dogs - there are so many places for super on-leash walks - nice wide sidewalks, great little parks - the Mainland North Linear Parkway - if I was rich I would definitely live in Clayton Park

This is Bobby trying to figure out how to get at the ducks without having to get in that nasty water!

Stuff to do on Canada Day with your dogs!

There's going to be a dog walk sponsored by they Terry Fox community - this is the 3rd one that's been held so far this summer, and I think there's still a couple more planned for this summer.

The event is being held at Point Pleasant Park from 9am to 11am and people are meeting up at the Tower Road entrance and the first 100 donations will get a free bandana. There will be free doggy treats from Bark & Fitz.

Also at Point Pleasant Park - Shakespeare by the Sea is starting up tomorrow - July 1st, and I don't know how many people know that the productions are dog friendly!! So if you're up to the Bard, the Bard is up for dogs. Go to their website at http://www.shakespearebythesea.ca/ to find out which productions they're doing up this year - you can also go to my Point Pleasant Park page to find out the dog rules for the park and a little more information about the Shakespeare by the Sea productions and dogs.

There are a BUNCH of events listed on the Canada Day events listings at hrmcanadaday.ca - too numerous to mention here - and a lot of them sound like there's no reason why they would not be dog friendly - parades, picnics, and event is even featuring an act called the "Cool Canines" - that's The Great Canadian Family Picnic on the Commons Jul 1, 2009 12:00 PM - 3:00 PM - so go to their website at http://www.hrmcanadaday.ca/events.php to check everything out.

Healing Animal SCARS is having a Car Wash on Canada Day, at the Irving Blue Canoe in Eastern Passage on Cow Bay Road. It will be held from 10am to 4pm so please bring your vehicle to get washed to fundraise for the kitties!

Nathan Winograd is now following me on Twitter

This is one of the neatest things about Twitter - the "tit for tat" aspect of Twitter. I'm one of the kajillion people who subscribes to Nathan Winograd's newsletter, and today's edition said that he's now on Twitter, so I clicked on it to follow him - and minutes later - I get an email back saying that "Nathan Winograd is now following you on Twitter"

Probably by the end of the week he'll be following about 2,000 people - but still, it's pretty neat - today he clicked on and started following "dogkisser".

Something to do Sunday (tomorrow), some photos, a place to walk in Spryfield & a new doggy daycare for Hammonds Plains?

I've been under the weather this week, so I haven't been posting, so I thought I'd post a bunch of stuff at once.

First off is something to do tomorrow (Sunday) if you feel like going out - the Chewed Slipper out in Lower Sackville is having a backyard social if you want to go have some dog on dog fun - in aid of the Animal Rescue Coalition - they're going to have prizes, food (hot dogs & treats), live music (Tom Bedell's Band of Bros)

It's going to be from 1pm to 4pm - Humans get in free and it costs $10 per dog - for the Animal Rescue Coalition - and all the fun you can have - it includes: Barkyard Off Leash Play, Dog Wash & Towel Dry, Hot Dogs, Pop& Treats, plus chance to win Doggone Sweet Prizes from Three Dog Bakery and TCS.

The location is - The Chewed Slipper at 937 Sackville Drive, Lower Sackville - their phone number is 902-252-3294 if you get lost.

I noticed in today's Municipal notices that Hammond's Plains might be getting a new dog kennel/doggy day care, or maybe they already have one that's been operating illegally that's trying to become legal - if anyone knows, maybe they can send in a comment saying which it is so that we can share the love - but at any rate, it appears that a dog kennel is coming to Hammonds Plains. I say we can't have too many dog kennels/doggy day cares locally - so if you're so moved to go to this public information meeting - you should go!


For the last couple years there's been a new development being built on the William's Lake Road in Spryfield. When it was first started there was a much lauded newspaper article about how part of the development was going to include an off-leash dog park as part of the "park" aspect of the development. It doesn't seem like that's going to happen - even though in the last month I've emailed two city councillors and they said that maybe it still might happen.

A couple weeks ago I went and had a walk through the development and the "park" that they've plotted out - and there's no way that it could be used as an "off leash" park - it starts good - in the parking lot, but it doesn't loop around and end back in the parking lot - it has 2 exits - both of which end in streets within the development - which is completely shitty.One thing though is that the development has made this huge soccer field that's completely fenced in on 3 sides - so it might make a good off leash space as a sports field that's given over to dog owners - so we might want to talk to the city about that - but it is a nice little park for an on leash walk if you're interested - it's a great little spot for an on-leash walk actually - and you can also walk through the neighbourhood - the sidewalks are nice and there's hardly anyone around because not all the houses have been built. And the park even has some lady slipper orchids in it! So it's near the corner of Herring Cove Road and Williams Lake Road - and there's a nice parking lot to park in too. You should check it out.

This is a position that I'm finding Bobby in quite often....

Here's some photos of the backyard after I mowed the lawn this week - the dogs like it when I mow the lawn.
At the end is a slide show of other photos I took at the same time - especially nice is a section of Bobby digging a hole
He really likes digging holes

NS SPCA seizes 88 animals in Guysborough Nova Scotia

The NS SPCA were down in the district of the Municipality of Guysborough today seizing almost 90 animals from 2 ladies who said that they started out with 2 animals who just kept mating together and now they've ended up with almost 90.

On the news report the Chief Provincial Cruelty Officer said that they've been to the property before and the family have always refused help - which is very much unlike the case in the Valley where the woman who killed the kittens said that she was refused help for the kittens she drowned - even though on the news report tonight the woman said that "if you drown the cats they say that's illegal too" - like as if "you're damned if you do, and damned if you don't" - like it's illegal to hoard and it's illegal to kill them.

The SPCA at this point are saying that they are not going to lay charges - we all realize that hoarding is a medical illness and needs to be dealt with through the medical profession. I hope these ladies get the help that they need - but I don't know how they're going to get it if they aren't charged with something so that there is some follow-up by some governmental department. Otherwise the SPCA is going to be there again in 2 years seizing another 90 animals. Because hoarding - like any other medical condition - doesn't go away without treatment.

Maybe they can move their hoarding over to something inaminate though - like lighters and newspapers and matches, or dolls clothes. That would be much easier from an animal care point of view. Maybe someone should suggest that to them.

Probably Lloyd Hines is back home in the district of the Municipality of Guysborough - he should go have a visit to his constituents, see how he can help them - I wonder how his enlightened dog bylaws relate to this case - certainly doesn't seem to have had much effect.....

Below is tonights news coverage on CTV and CBC

Me and Bobby are going to be obedient

Tonight I went to my first class that Bobby and I are going to be taken at "Fur my Friends" - run by Amy Slaunwhite - she's one of the best dog trainers in the HRM, and I'm very happy to say - also a friend of mine.

Tonight was a "human only" class where she talked about what we're going to learn, and why it's so great that we're taking classes, and all the great things that we're going to be able to do and benefit from spending this time with our canine life companions.


It was also a great chance for her to give us these great free goodies too - free treats, a clicker, and a thick bunch of handouts that Amy has written herself!

Next week is going to be VERY interesting because not only will Bobby be coming with me, but my (80 year old) Dad has also agreed to come - and he's going to be bringing Jack with him! Now that's going to be neat to see Jack go to an obedience class and be taught by an 80 year old man - 2 crotchety old men learning clicker training! haha!

So Interesting! Do as I say, not as I do!

In my post yesterday about Celtic Pets, I talked about another blog that is apologizing for Zonda and Alice MacIsaac for some unknown reason - and for some other unknown reason attacks me, and Netta Armitage and uses personal emails that we exchanged between Zonda MacIsaac after the raid last year to somehow prove that - either Zonda is not all that bad of a person, or that Netta and I are as bad as Zonda - who knows what the author of this blog is trying to prove.

The funny thing is that the author of this blog is guilty of doing the things that they chide me for of on my own blog - removing and changing things on blog posts - because they've done quite a bit of that on the post where they publish these private emails! But luckily for all of us - I copied the post when it first came out - so we can all share the love of what they originally published - and we can scratch our collective heads as to why they would feel the need to change it up.

So here we go -

The post is at "random email between a convicted animal abuser and two animal advocates in Nova Scotia" in case you want to follow along - I like the title, because at least they got that fact right.

The first hint you get that things may be a bit skewed is when you read the sentence - "About two months later, the shelter put down a handful of dogs that were being rehabilitated at Celtic Pets before they could be adopted." They're talking about after the raid and when Pam Keddy put down 5 dogs for being "aggressive" towards staff and the SPCA had no choice but to do it, supposedly - I find this sentence interesting, because they say that the dogs were being "rehabilitated at Celtic Pets" - just about anyone else on this planet would call those dogs "being tortured", or being "abused" - not "rehabilitated". I think you can get my drift.


It's interesting that the next sentence talks about the dog "Bre" - a big beautiful malamute. It says - "One of them was a big beautiful malamute named Bre. She probably have suffered a lot from being so confined for two months or more - the shelter is not meant for long-term care. The rumor is she became aggressive, but so far it's only rumor."

I say it's interesting - because this blog post doesn't have EVERY email that animal abuser Zonda MacIsaac and myself exchanged - one of those email exchanges was about Bre particularly.

Zonda emailed me a question after Bre was killed - she asked -

Sun, Jun 22, 2008 at 5:56 PM
Please tell me something Joan...was Bre in pain and do you feel they were justified in euthanizing her (they legally weren't)but as an animal lover and not wanting to see a dog in physical pain, what are your thoughts.

My thoughts about this email are - why would Zonda be asking me if Bre was in pain? Maybe - did she know that Bre had been in pain for a long time and should have been put down a lot sooner - but didn't do it herself - and left it to the SPCA to do the dirty work for her? So I would say that she didn't suffer from being confined for 2 months - she suffered from being confined for 2 months - PLUS however long Zonda kept her confined in the living hell of the Celtic Pets kennel.

Now HERE'S something very interesting - a paragraph has been removed from the edition that Ms. Real Pooper originally published of this post - and the post you see today. Here is the paragraph that Ms. Real Pooper removed -

Because Zonda pled guilty to two counts of abuse (or was it neglect?)as part of a deal to get two of her own dogs back, there was no actual trial. But she can't have anything to do with dogs for 20 years.

Why would Ms. Real Pooper feel it necessary to remove that parapraph - I don't know - does anybody out there in readerland have any ideas?

I'm pasting the whole next paragpraph here, because it's full of gold nuggets -

After the raid a few people like Joan Sinden and Annette Armitage tried to support Zonda Macisaac. They soon changed their positions after getting a lot of flak. Joan then became a harsh critic of Zonda and to this day faults her with the ill-health and aggressive behavior of a dog named Jack that she adopted. Here's some examples of her recent opinion, an endorsement of Zonda that Joan posted in 2006, and what she had to say about the SPCA in September 2008. In many posts - some may have been deleted by now - she gives the distinct impression that Zonda was mistreating Jack, a dog that went through about a dozen foster homes that Zonda was actually trying desperately to keep from being put down. There is an email about Jack from one of these foster families.

"After the raid, a few people like Joan Sinden and Annette Armitage tried to support Zonda MacIsaac" - Zonda WISHES! We continued to support Zonda for about 12-18 hours after the raid - like everybody else did - until the animals started arriving back at the Dartmouth shelter, and reality started settling in and we knew that everything that Zonda had been telling everyone was absolute lies. The only support we gave after that was on a humanitarian level - hoping that she received the mental help that she needed - I even went on Global television and said that as a human being I could understand that she was in great pain and needed to get help and I hoped she would get the psychological help that she needed and people would have compassion for her as a human being. Only a person who is evil would want anything other than that - but to define that as support for Zonda as a rescuer, is definitely incorrect.

"They soon changed their positions after getting a lot of flak." See above - "getting a lot of flak" - can you imagine.

"to this day faults her (Zonda) with the ill-health and aggressive behavior of a dog named Jack that she adopted." I don't fault Zonda - I fault her Mother - Alice - with Jack's missing eye, his curled toe-nails, and his food aggression to Alice. How many times do I have to say that Jack went down to Cape Breton with TWO eyes and came back with one? And that he was living in a house with at least 37 other dogs that never went outside and he was living in a house full of shit and piss? There's no doubt that he's always had an attitude problem - he's had a ton of homes and foster homes and he's got some problems - but he's now 13 years old, and he was supposed to be going to a home that was "safe" and "healthy" and where he was going to be treated "well" and have "good healthcare" - and he got none of those things. He's got that now, anyway. So thanks a lot Zonda for placing him in a great home with your Mom - I'm sure Jack really appreciated it.

"an endorsement of Zonda that Joan posted in 2006" - that is a letter that is posted in the comments section of someone else's blog (it's actually a blog post from an American dog blog about the 2006 election when the NDP were saying that "personally I believe in breed specific legislation", and it's fallout) - my support letter of Zonda that she asked me to write - one of 170 other letters that people wrote before the raid - and mine is the only one being singled out? Where are the 169 other people's letters? And it wasn't posted in 2006 - that's when that blog post was written on the dogpolitics.com blog - but the letter was written in 2007 - the same time as the other 169 letters were written by people who were supporting Zonda at the time. That is very disingenuous of Ms. Real Pooper, don't you think? Maybe like the rest of the post?

"what she had to say about the SPCA in September 2008" - the NS SPCA is an organization that continues to grow and get better. They are continuing to work on their problems and are learning from their mistakes on an almost daily basis. The people who are volunteering at the provincial board level currently are sincere and willing to change things for the good of the animals and I think they're moving in the right direction - for a long time I didn't think that, and my blog posts at that time reflected that. I don't go back and change my posts to change my opinions to match my current opinions - unlike maybe Ms. Real Pooper.

The next couple paragraphs are very interesting once again - they are completely changed from Ms. Real Poopers original post - I'll post the original so you can compare the 2 versions -

the original -
In this email you can read other things that Joan wrote to Zonda about Jack, or Jackie, and other matters. Who knows for sure whether what she wrote then is the truth, or what's on her blog now? What is true is that she wrote both. The emails came from people who received copies. They are not responsible for this blog, nor are
any of the emailers. The content is unchanged; names and addresses of most third parties deleted, with some exceptions. Oops. We are not here to explain, accuse, or defend anybody, just to offer raw material. For answers, ask the authors, preferably in person.
The Real Pooper

And here is the current version -
In this email however it's clear that while Joan was bashing Zonda online, for some time she was very friendly with her and asked her for help in saving some of the dogs that were seized. She also shows a very different attitude to the SPCA than she does today. Who knows for sure whether what she wrote then is the truth, or what's on her blog now? What is true is that she wrote both. She claims now that she always writes the truth, but the question of personal integrity remains.

The emails came from people who received copies. They are not responsible for this blog, nor are any of the emailers. The content is unchanged; names and addresses of most third parties deleted, with some exceptions. Oops.

We are not here to explain, accuse, or defend anybody, just to offer raw material. For answers, ask the authors, preferably in person.

The Real Pooper

In the "new" version - Ms. Real Pooper questions my "personal integrity". That's interesting - why she would decide to add that idea into the mix.

In the blog post I'm talking about here, there are 58 private emails - 14 of them are from me to Zonda - and none of them do I regret. They were a means to an end, which I got. I got information, photos, and a dog named Jack. Ms. Real Pooper thinks she got something too - but she got nothing. This blogger thinks that they can have their cake and eat it too - apologizing for the animal abusers, and then titling the post - "animal abuser talks to animal advocates" - you can't have it both ways, Ms. Real Pooper, sorry.

The reason why I am able to write my blog posts is because I have little care for people like the "Real Pooper", or animal abuser Zonda MacIsaac - as long as what I say is the truth - it's writable. And I don't care about my "reputation" - because as far as I'm concerned, I don't have one - good or bad. When people see me on the street - they don't recognize me - I am just one of the masses moving through society - the interweb and the real are 2 very different places and they don't intersect - so there are no worries.

Lastly - I'll quote from an email I received last October - it's from Francesca Rogier when she gave her opinion about me which may give you, the reader, some insight into why I don't worry about such clap-trap when I read it (because I know it's untrue and not worth extra heart beats) -

October 28th, 2008 Francesca Rogier wrote in an email to me -
When you look at them from afar, you can see that behavior of these people - S, O, even the M - is all based on fear. They fear for themselves far more and far more often than they ought to. You don't have that kind of fear, Joan, and it shows, to your credit. It is a different way to be in the world, isn't it? Everybody has fear of some kind, but some people let it shape decisions too much. Anything can be perceived as a threat to their existence/ego/reputation. It's such a challenge to work things out and communicate clearly with people like that, because I can't help responding to the actions their fear manifests, rather than the fear itself.

News report of a pampered kennel from the other side of the world

You Tube is so neat - I stumbled upon this video from Mumbai (I think it's New Delhi Television which would make it in India)? I couldn't really figure out where this kennel is, but it's somewhere very far from Nova Scotia and North America for sure - just watch it - it's pretty neat -

I'm glad people want to keep talking about Celtic Pets

I had this comment left on my blog post - "Animal Abusers - Celtic Pets - Court Decision is online now", and it's a beauty - read, and enjoy -

Joan, you are obviously very emotional about anything to do with Celtic Pets. It's understandable, you are very angry about the dogs you talk about and based on what you say about them, they do seem to have had a hard time. Please remember though that court documents are not necessarily factual in the sense that they are unassailable. OFten these "accounts" are restatements of police reports, or in this case, It seems, reports by the SPCA constables. This is one account, to the best of their abilities but it is written for their purposes, and sorry to say, not necessarily factual. If the judge was not presented with an alternate account (and that could be the case here, since no trial took place - they pled guilty at the arraignment, right?) - then he can use only what he was given. But he will cite the origins as well. It's too bad there was no full trial because I for one think while there were problems for sure, I also think there is a lot more to the story, and it might have been very helpful to bring it all out.

I just wonder who could have written something like that. I don't think it's written by either of the MacIsaac's. They are both quite arrogant, but one of them writes all her correspondence IN ALL CAPS ALL THE TIME, and the other one is too busy figuring out who she's going to sue to spend any time writing comments on silly little blogs like mine. So I wonder who it could've been. It does sound unbelievably like something from another blog that I've read recently though - check this out -

"In the end, Zonda Macisaac pled guilty to a single count of abuse (a "strict liability charge" because unintentional), as part of a deal to get some her own dogs back - only two of many dogs she had adopted herself, which should not have been seized. Her lawyer filed the guilty plea at the arraignment. This means no trial was ever held and no evidence presented by either side, so the full story has yet to be told.

And the verdict was harsh: Zonda had to pay a fine of a thousand dollars (or two), and is prohibited from having anything to do with dogs for 20 years, and the SPCA can show up at her house at any time to inspect he animals! Compare this outcome to the $5 fine levied on a Halifax woman who drowned cats in a bag (note that she claimed she had to because the SPCA would not take them)."

What a crock of shit, eh? At the beginning of May as part of a post I wrote about the apologists writing stuff on "other blogs" - and this is the vitriole I was talking about - and I posted a couple of these photos as proof in case anybody was starting to forget what actually what went on down at Port Hastings Cape Breton.

Obviously the apologists are counting on our memories starting to fade - so tonight I rewatched the news videos from the time around the raids, and thought I'd post some text from the stories - to give you some lines of what was said - to refresh our memories - and so the apologists will know it's not just me who thinks and knows the abuse and neglect that went on at animal abuser Zonda MacIsaac's building next to the Scharfenburg's house - and at Alice MacIsaac's house where my Jack came from.

So - here we go - with some photos to go along -




(remember Zeus the bulldog kept in a cage for 3 years because Zonda wouldn't accept any help from the rescue community and actually lied to people - telling people he was out in a foster home when he was actually in a cage rotting in Port Hastings?) - before the news piece the news reader says - "just a warning - some of these pictures may be disturbing to some viewers"

Do you remember Sean Kelly - who at the time was the SPCA Special Constable who went into the house and shelter and rescued all the animals? This is what he had to say on the video - (and it's because of his experience at Celtic Pets that he decided to go for Board positions to revolutionize the NS SPCA) - "this is by far the worst case I've ever seen, I've been doing this for 4 years and I haven't even heard of a case that is this horrific" - the smell on the premises was enough to make me physically sick as well as some of the - a dog with puppies that had no food or water, 2 dead dogs - an incredible amount of feces built up in the kennels - it was quite obvious that no one had been there for days - cats with broken limbs that have fused - they've never been to a vet and repaired -

"there was a kitten in the front of a kennel and a kitten in the rear of the kennel and it was discovered that the kitten in the front of the kennel was dead, and the kitten in the rear was staying as far as to the rear as he could".

Do you remember the dog "Chinchilla Charlie" - also known as Scupper? This is him knocked out so he could be shaved down - locked in a cage at Celtic Pets - gone completely cage crazy

Remember seeing this image on the news? This is the above dog - Scupper - living life to the fullest - at Celtic Pets - you can certainly say that this dog is a "victim" of Celtic Pets success!!!!This is the same dog that is in the above 3 photos - Scupper


"Nova Scotia's Premier says he is disgusted at images seen this week of dirty encrusted animals at a Cape Breton animal shelter - and he's not alone in his disgust over what happened - Rodney MacDonald said - "this is a situation which is unacceptable. Be it in a shelter, be it on a farm, bet it in a household - they deserve to be respected, they deserve to ensured that their safety, their health is looked after and maintained - and as province - we'll make sure that happens."

Leah Cross, the reporter in the video says "the conditions are evident in this video taken Saturday at Celtic Pets"

Steve Murphy said on his news piece - "they think of themselves as the best kind of animal lovers" - having a dead dog rotting in a box in your kennel - I would certainly love to hear how Zonda "accounts" for that - what is her "side of the story" about that?


When the SPCA arrived for their seizure - these puppies had no food or water - how does Zonda "account" for that?

In one of the news videos, the news reader says Zonda MacIsaac "has just lost all of her influence and credibility, and all of her animals" - and the story is described as one of the worst cases of animal abuse that officials have ever seen, and some of these pictures reflect that" - a house of inhumane horrors.

I do not buy the garbage this anonymous commenter is giving us. In a guilty plea there is an agreed statement of facts on both sides - the person who is PLEADING GUILTY TO THE CHARGES - agrees with the statements being made by the judge - and that includes the statements that the special constables and the judge is making - if they don't like those statements - they don't have to plead guilty and they can go ahead with the trial.

If you aren't guilty - then don't plead guilty.

And the news footage taken right after the seizure gives pretty irrefutable evidence of the animal abusers guilt I'd say.

Anyone who was at the shelter as the animals were being brought in can also attest to the shape that the animals were in - and I'm sure a couple of them will post comments to this blog post - and they probably will not do it anonymously - because there's no need for them to hide in shame like the rest of the apologists and bullshitters.

And there you have it - so of course I'm emotional about anything to do with Celtic Pets - animal abuse and neglect is very serious - especially when it's done so willfully and with such glea - and the people who do it are so arrogant and feel like they have some sort of entitlement about it - that THEY are the victims.

THEY are victims of their success in rescue so that animals had to suffer a "bit" - it had nothing to do with the animals - it was THEM who were suffering when things started to get out of control - "the numbers involved were greater than she (Alice) could handle and the situation became too difficult to manage."

The only victims here are the animals - especially the dead ones.

Today's SPCA Metro Dog Jog

It was a rainy day, that's for sure - but a lot of people showed up anyway, which was good.

I think I decided today that Buttercup is officially too old to represent the Dogkisser dogs at public functions because I don't think she enjoyed herself for one second - well actually -
she did enjoy herself after we left the function and I put her down on the ground and she walked back to the car - but the whole time we were at the dog jog she was up in my arms shivering and acting like she was a 13 year old dog who felt like she was 91 years old in human years, and really should not have been forced to come out in the rain.

I was originally going to bring Bobby - but Buttercup was squealing really badly to come, and Bobby got to go to Janet's house last night, so I thought it was only fair that she got some one on one time today - but once she got there I think she was regretting the squealing. Bobby also has impacted anal glands - we think, anyway - which is kind of gross, but his asshole is huge and he seems to have liquid brown stuff sort of oozing out of his bum hole. So I am going to let a professional deal with that - and maybe he might appreciate not having strange dogs smell his arsehole if he's got some anal leakage going on....


But anwyay - the dogs who were there - other than Buttercup seemed to be having a good time - I've got a slideshow at the end of this post with the photos I took today - and if you're on Facebook I posted the photos there as well. My friend Lisa was also there and posted the photos she took - You can check them out here

Talking about Facebook - did you know you can use usernames there now? I of course grabbed the "dogkisser" handle - so to find me on Facebook you can search "Joan Sinden" - but you could also search "dogkisser" - my profile can be found at http://www.facebook.com/dogkisser - I don't know why Facebook didn't do that from the very beginning.

Here is Maximo being cute. That's not too hard for him to do, though.
Wasn't this cute? The person selling 50/50 tickets was going around using her dog as the advertisement - I thought that was very inventive.

This great guy was a husky who was at the Dog Jog representing "Nova Scotia Husky Rescue" - which is one that I've never heard about - but I'm glad it exists because Nova Scotia definitely needs it. They have a website at http://nshuskyrescue.com/


Today's event also had some working dog's there - this is a smelling detection dog - and I had some liver in my hand - and him and the dog next to him cued right away that I had something on me - and they very much liked me! But alas, I could give them no treats.

And this is Cody, who I've talked about before, his Dad Don has given great tips on places to go for my Charlie loves Halifax site - Cody is also part of the "Therapeutic Paws of Canada" and has children read to him. Today was the first time I've met him in person, and he's a great dog.

These were treats from 3 Dogs Bakery - I think I was a bit hungry, because I wanted to eat one myself they looked so good - I don't know how they can make all those cookies and treats look so appetizing and still make money - they are amazing!

I had my eye on this irish wolfhound and he (or she) didn't seem to mind the weather one little bit - he had this same smile on their face the whole day - like as if they were pretty used to misty, damp weather - I wonder why? haha!

These 4 photos are of a dog named Rory - he came into the Dartmouth shelter a few months ago - and I met him very briefly a little while after he came in, and he was in unbelieveable shape -
He really should have been dead he was so thin - staff were having to feed him really small bits of food every hour in order to keep him alive and not over-tax his system - I can't remember what his story was, and it's probably better to forget it anyway - because look at him now - he's amazing and beautiful and fully recovered.


He went from the edge of death to being in a loving, forever home - thanks to the gentle care of the Dartmouth SPCA - and he gets to go to great things like the dog jog - and smell other dogs butts and just be a normal dog - isn't that super? I think it is.

He is a beautiful dog - and he's no different than any dog at the dog jog today - even though he was horribly abused - he's just happy to be alive, and he's deeply in love with his Mom. Although he definitely had something to say about the flash on my camera!

I've been going to the Dog Jog's now for 9 years - it was 9 years ago that I went for the 1st time with Charlie - at Shubie park - and it poured rain that year too - I didn't have a blog or website back them, though - so I didn't take any photos back then.

In 2007 I wrote a post where I posted photos starting in 2003 that went up to 2007 - that post is here if you want to check it out - that's the first year it was at Point Pleasant Park in many years - and in 2008 I didn't make it to the dog jog - but Snap Halifax did - and their article about it is still online if you wanted to check that out.

These 2 photos were taken after I left the dog jog - and good news for us dog owners - the canteen keeps dog treats on their counter! So if you want to get an ice cream cone for yourself - grab a dog treat for the dog!

And when I was in the parking lot I saw the intrepid Clicker Leash Queen Adina and her trusty sidekick the owner of Fur My Friends Amy with their retinue of collies George, Gracie, Seven, and - Jesus - I can never remember the name of their 8th dog - is it Muli? I've got a mental block about that puppy I'm sorry to say. Someone's going to have to correct me and I'll edit the post. Sorry about that.

Good news for dogs on the peninsula

Today's Chronicle Herald ran an ad that announced the "Canine Casbah" is now a legal occupation on the peninsula - so we now have a legal in home doggy day care on the peninsula in Halifax - isn't that fabulous? Finally - after all these years of fighting with the city - they did the right thing - and listened to the people. I think I'll make a separate post about the subject when it's not 1:19am and I don't have such bad jimmy leg - but it's a great leap forward for dog politics in the HRM.
To celebrate - we converged on Oak Street - and Janet and I had a duelling off to see who had the cuter dog - Maximo or Bobby.
Definitely Janet gets the award for being more glamorous than me.

Maximo is very cute though - and tonight we put a top knot in his hair because his hair is getting really long, which really upped his beautiful quotient.
But Bobby is very cute too - and he doesn't need any adornment to help him - he just IS beautiful, so really - I think they're really at a dead heat.

Pickle was out for awhile looking for some love - while Janet was doing the dishes and filling the dishwasher - I don't know, she might have been hungry - but I've never noticed bull-terriers being food motivated at all - has anybody else noticed that? haha!

I was also over picking up Janet's donation for tomorrow's dog jog - she has sponsored me $130 for the dog jog - which brought me up to $250 in pledges! So tomorrow should be a good day for me and Buttercup - I hope the weather holds up!

Perhaps the most disturbing video I've ever seen

This is maybe the most disturbing video I've ever almost watched. I couldn't watch the whole thing - it's a video from North Carolina that shows not just one, two, three, or four - but a whole bunch of dogs being put into a box tobe gassed to death. It's completely crazy. It shows them opening the box top to put more dogs in and the dogs inside trying to get out. And once they've killed the first batch of dogs - they come out with a litter of puppies - they look like lab puppies - and put them ON TOP OF - the dead dogs that they've just killed, and then gas those dogs - and I guess - regass the original dogs - maybe they're doing that for good measure.

I've never seen anything like it - we've all heard about it - but until you've seen it - you never understand what it's like. For anyone to say that this is in any way humane - has never actually experienced it. If you're going to be a kill facility - you've got to provide a good and peaceful death - and using a gas machine definitely does not provide that.

I'm very happy that the Cape Breton SPCA has said that they aren't using their gas box anymore. I really hope they aren't

Clayton Ruby seems to be helping a pit bull - Ginger

I got sent the story of "Ginger" - a pit bull who's been on death row up in Ontario for the past 4 years today.

It was after the pit bull ban came into effect - so Ginger was leashed and muzzled when Philip Huggins mother took her out for a walk at 6am, and another dog ran up to her and bit her and tore her muzzle off - and Ginger retaliated and bit the dog back, and also bit the dog's owner. The question is - was she just defending herself - or was she the aggressor.

At the time - obviously they made the choice that she was the aggressor and she was sentenced to death. Since 2005 her owner has been fighting in the courts to keep her alive and "two months ago, Ontario Court Justice Mary Hogan set the destruction order aside, stating her "concern ... that such a dog would be ordered destroyed in circumstances where the dog had no culpability whatsoever." "

Clayton Ruby, and the Banned Aide Coalition became involved with Ginger and her owner's case two weeks ago - after her owner's been fighting with Toronto Animal Services since 2005 - and somehow, Clayton Ruby has got what he termed an "illegal order" changed so the dog could be released to Huggins. The 2005 custody order, he said, was "beyond the jurisdiction of the city."

So after 4 years - while Ginger awaits her fate - she's finally at home with her owner. It seems that Mr. Ruby does have some legal smarts to effect some positive change for at least one pit bull type dog and her owner. That is fabulous.

You can read about the story in an article at "Death Row Dog learns fate today"

I hope the case has a positive outcome for all involved.

Animal Abusers - Celtic Pets - Court Decision is online now

The very dismal court decision from the animal abusers Zonda MacIsaac and Alice MacIsaac is now available online for us all to go look at and feel very sad about. It's at http://www.courts.ns.ca/decisions_recent/documents/2008nspc81.pdf - did you also know that animal abuser Zonda is also on Twitter? I guess everybody's on Twitter now - her profile is at http://explore.twitter.com/jbloake - she's also on Facebook if you want to add her as a friend or send her a message.

The document is pretty awful. It is basically the sentencing of the MacIsaac's and it gives no justice whatsoever to the animals that were abused by Alice and Zonda. It gives no acknowledgement to the suffering that went on - there is no deterrent factor at all to anyone else who does what they did to dogs and cats.

And it puts it all off on to the fact that Zonda and Alice were "so successful at rescue" that it just became too much for them - so they had no choice but to not show up at the kennel for days and days at a time to feed or water the animals or give any of them any attention. Can you imagine?

Here is what it actually says -


[22] Counsel for Zonda MacIsaac advised the court that her client cared very much for animals and had taken extensive efforts, including utilizing her personal resources to rescue and save animals and then place them for adoption.

[23] As a result of prior mental health issues and marital problems, Zonda MacIsaac developed persistent symptoms of depression, anxiety, inability to concentrate and short term memory loss. These pressures, and other general pressures in the community, resulted in her having a major depressive disorder over the last two years. While Defence counsel acknowledges that the animals in the care of her client were “distressed” as defined by the Animal Cruelty Prevention Act, this was not done intentionally. Defence Counsel describes Zonda MacIsaac as a sensible, caring and good person, especially when it comes to the treatment of animals in her care.

[24] Defence counsel acknowledged that her client became overwhelmed by the number of animals that she was attempting to care for, and in a sense became a victim of her own success by taking in many more animals than she could properly care for, especially given the mental health condition in which she found herself over the last two years.

[25] As for Alice MacIsaac, Defence Counsel indicates that his client is 64 years old and also comes before the court with no prior involvement in the courts. In essence, Defence Counsel points out that Alice MacIsaac, as the mother of Zonda MacIsaac, got involved in these matters to assist her daughter and to relieve the stresses associated with the financial, marital and mental health issues that her daughter was facing.

[26] Defence Counsel indicated that SPCA Officers conducted their search at a certain point in time, but there may have been explanations other than neglect to explain why there was no food or water visible when the officers arrived. Defence Counsel acknowledges that the charge facing Alice MacIsaac is one of strict liability and that she did not exercise due diligence with respect to each and every one of the animals found on her property when the SPCA Officers arrived. Like her daughter, Alice MacIsaac was a victim of her own success and the more animals that she rescued, the more she felt the need to take in and rescue even more animals. At a certain point, the numbers involved were greater than she could handle and the situation became too difficult to manage.

So in other words - because she was so successful - she was a VICTIM of her own success. The animals weren't victims - the HUMANS were victims - and there were explanations OTHER THAN NEGLECT for what was going on.


My dog Jack went up to Alice MacIsaac's house with TWO EYES and came back to Halifax with one eye because while he was at Alice's house he got an ulcer on the eye - it exploded - and the eye receded and disappeared back into the eye socket. His nails were so long that they had grown all the way around and had become EMBEDDED in the pads of his feet. A year and half later his nails are still round instead of straight. What explanation other than willful neglect could there be for that?


That is disgusting and inexcusable.

Zeus the dog was in the kennels at Cenotaph Road for THREE YEARS because animal abuser Zonda MacIsaac refused all help from the rescue community - and people offered and wanted to help her. He suffered in silence in that cage for day after day - 100's of days turned into THOUSANDS OF DAYS because of what animal abuser Zonda MacIsaac did to him.


In the court documents it says about the raid on Alice MacIsaac's house -

Factual Background - Alice MacIsaac:
[12] On February 6th, 2008, SPCA Officers acting on a complaint attended at the residence of Alice MacIsaac. As they approached the house they indicated that there was a strong smell of faeces and urine that they noticed from the steps. After obtaining the search warrant the SPCA officers entered Alice MacIsaac’s residence on February 6th, 2008.

[13] As they entered the backdoor of the residence there was a strong ammonia smell and loud barking from the dogs. Some dogs were kept in wire kennels in the livingroom while other dogs and cats were running loose. In one bedroom was a beige dog who could not walk and that dog was lying in his own faeces. SPCA Officers indicated that there was no water available for the animals. Several dogs’ hair and fur was matted with urine and faeces. In total 24 dogs were loaded onto trucks and removed from the property. Three dogs were taken to an animal emergency hospital and the dog who could not walk was euthanised on site. It was the SPCA Officer’s opinion that the dogs were filthy and that they were in need of adequate care, food, water and shelter.

There is a dog in this report we've never heard about before - there was a dog so sick at Alice's house that as soon as he received medical treatment - he was put down. So Alice was keeping a dog at her house who was in so much physical anguish - he should have been put out of his misery - and she was keeping him alive for some reason - why? We'll never know - maybe she just likes to watch animals writhe in pain. I guess that's what animal abusers like to do.

At least for the next 19 or so years - they'll only get to do it to one animal at a time.

To see all my posts on this debacle - you can click on my category - "Celtic Pets"

Terry Fox Community Dog Walk Sunday June 14th

There's going to be a dog walk sponsored by they Terry Fox community - this is the 2nd one that's been held so far this summer, and I think there's still a couple more planned for this summer.

The event is being held at Point Pleasant Park from 11am to 1pm and people are meeting up at the Tower Road entrance and the first 100 donations will get a free bandana. There will be free doggy treats from Bark & Fitz.

It sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun!

They're being held as a lead up to the main Terry Fox run being held in September. If you're interested in getting involved you can call Gillian at 423-8131

A living room full of dogs

The dogs were feeling photogenic yesterday, so I took a couple of photos, and the below is the result. Even Charlie and Daisy got in on it. Daisy's photos are what a dog looks like when they're having their butt scratched - sort of an intense, "yes I like what you're doing - please continue..."

Reply to a comment about pit bulls being bad

I had a couple comments left on my post - "Ontario Suprement Court dismisses bid to quash Ontario's ban on pit bulls"

Check this out, dog kissers: Of the 88 fatal dog attacks recorded by DogsBite.org, pit bull type dogs were responsible for 59% (52). This is equivalent to a pit bull killing a U.S. citizen every 21 days during this 3-year period.

http://dogsbite.org/

Now how many Labradoodles killed people in the same time?

and then -

My goal here is not to antagonize y'all but to make you aware of the safety and health issues surrounding off leash dogs in public areas.

I recommend you check out the site i posted above and watch the videos of pitbull attacks - truly horrifying stuff. Again, I doubt your Lab or daschund or corgi could cause this damage. My corgi never could - as far as i can tell.

I went to the dogsbite.org study. I'm not going to go into the foolishness that is the dogsbite.org website - I've talked about that myopic site before, so I'm not going to give it any more exposure that it deserves - but I will talk about the study that this commenter thinks tells us that "pit bulls" are dangerous.

The commenter says that Of the 88 fatal dog attacks recorded by DogsBite.org, pit bull type dogs were responsible for 52.

What the commenter didn't say was that at the end of the study, in the fine print it says -

"For purposes of clarity, this report depicts "mixes" as the predominant breed. For example, a boxer-mix is depicted as a "boxer," a husky-mix is depicted as a "husky" and a pit bull-mix is depicted as a "pit bull.""

As well - the study information "was gathered through media accounts that were available at the time of the attack or found through Internet archives, including: Google News Archive and AccessMyLibrary"

So - the data was gathered through media accounts - and the breed identifications included mixes - so a black and tan dog would be called a "rottweiller" if the person relating the story to the media thought that's what it looked like - and the writer of this study accepted that breed identificaiton carte blanche - and likewise - if the dog had short hair, and a square head - the person relating the story to the media most probably called the dog a "pit bull" - even if the dog was a labrador retriever.

If there's anything we've learned in the last several years - if the media can all any dog a pit bull - they will - and I don't think anyone will dispute that fact. So any study that's based on media reports without any further investigation MUST be taken with a lot of skepticism.

So in this study done by dogsbite.org - which isn't really an organization but a one woman proselytizing wishmaker - she says that 19 different breeds contributed to the 88 recorded death - but in reality - it could have been any number of mixed breeds who contributed to the 88 deaths - but because the media reports identified those mixed breeds with one major attribute - the author put them into one category. That is flawed logic on the part of the study logic.

Another point that the study tried to make was the fact that "pit bulls" 81% of the "off-property" attacks - intimating that pit bulls are the most dangerous types of dogs for people to encounter out in public - so therefore pit bulls should not be allowed to go out in public - if they aren't banned outright - we should at least do something right by imposing public space bans on them and keep them in our own backyards and basements - hopefully tethered by 6 feet very heavy chains.

The problem with that logic is that the reason why there's more "off-property" bites is that they probably ARE being chained on the owners property - and they break their tether and go on walk-abouts in their neighbourhood - and end up biting and maiming strangers and children because they're #1 not socialized, #2 not altered, #3 hyper aroused because they've never been off their chain - and they don't know what to do - so they just react. It's very unfortunate that pit bull type dogs tend to be abandoned and chained in the back yards of North America much more than any other breed of dog when they are also the breed of dog that loves being with their humans seemingly more than just about any other breed of dog.

You can manipulate numbers pretty easily - and the dogsbite.org study is a pretty clear case of this.

Using media reports only as the basis for your facts, including mixed breeds in with purebreeds in your statistics, not looking at the reasons why the statistics exist - the reasons why a certain breed would have a higher bite ratio off his own property as opposed to on his own property - just shows us that the author of the study has their own agenda. And the author of dogsbite.org definitely has their own agenda.

And that agenda is to annihilate the breed type of "pit bull" - and maybe the whole genus of dog entirely. And that is a world any responsible dog owner wants no part of - and must be exposed any time you see it.

I certainly don't want to minimize the danger of dog attacks - or to diminish the suffering of people who have been attacked by dogs and those who have died from a dog attack. Any serious bite is unacceptable and shows the negligence of their owner, and shows it in two very important ways - they didn't keep their dog safe, and they didn't keep the public safe. And I say that as a dog owner who is the owner of a dog who is a targetted breed. I do everything I can to keep my own dogs safe - and the public safe.

I have trained my dogs, I have contained my dogs, and I leash my dogs when they are in public. I have socialized them so they are good canine citizens, and I try to be a good example for other dog owners.

But my rottweiller is no more dangerous than my toy poodle - and it's because of the person who owns those dogs. If either of those dogs were owned by different people, it might be a different story. And it's the same with pit bull type dogs. And it's as simple as that.

With the sad news this week of Ontario's continuance of their pit bull ban, Karen Delisle published a new page on her website at the National Canine Research Council with some good news stories - it's at http://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-news/ and it talks about a horrible animal abuse case in Philadelphia where a poor pit bull was set on fire and had to be euthanized because of his injuries, how the cocker spaniel may now be the most aggressive dog, it asks the question - can YOU tell the difference between a mixed breed pit bull and other mixed breeds - and how a mother in Texas is the latest person to be charged with negligent homicide after her dog killed her child. Hopefully it's a sign of things to come - that dog owners will be seen as causing the humans death - not the dog.

Some of the dogs who went to Liscombe Lodge's "Gone to the Dog's" Last weekend

So from all of the reports I've received - last weekend's "Gone to the Dog's" at Liscombe Lodge was a ton of fun for everyone who went - the facility is beautiful, and if you were thinking of going this year and didn't go - you should definitely go next year.

These are some photos of the dogs who were at the seminar that Betty and Mary - the ladies who run the Antigonish SPCA took at the seminar they gave - the dogs look pretty happy to be there - I'm sure they were kept pretty busy all weekend and were happy to have a few minutes to just hang out and lay down and listen!

Ontario supreme Court dismisses bid to quash Ontario's ban on pit bulls

Unbelievable - all the money, blood, sweat and tears put in by owners of bully dogs - and owners of every other type of dog all across this country here in Canada - and across the world - to show the people of Ontario, that the ban their government had imposed on pit bulls was draconian, wrong, unnecessary, ill-advised, targetted the wrong thing, was baseless, wouldn't fix the problem - if there was indeed one in their province - and we were all willing to put our money where our mouth was.

So literally 100's of thousands of dollars was raised and faith was put in the man named Clayton Ruby so that the fight could be taken all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada - and today that battle was lost. In a CTV news article just published - "The Ontario Appeal Court concluded that pit bulls are dangerous and unpredictable dogs that have the potential to attack without warning."

Really, they couldn't be more more wrong. How can something so important to so many people have come to such an illogical conclusion? How could this have ended so badly? I am really confused. Things are always supposed to end so that the right decisions are being made when it's the smartest people in the country making the decisions. I don't understand. How can they be legislating the deaths of animals that absolutely don't deserve it? Did they even go anywhere to meet an animal that they could find that they'd call a "pit bull"?

Did they know the fallout of what their decision would be? And what is going to happen now? That it's going to give legislators and dog haters everywhere carte blanche to start killing square headed muscular dogs wherever they find them? I just don't understand it. It is such a dark day for Ontario, there aren't any words to describe it.

Everywhere else in the world is beginning to see the light and repeal their bsl laws - and here in Canada - it's becoming firmly entrenched. For the places where it hasn't come to yet - we've got to make sure that it doesn't take a foothold, that's for sure. And we've got to fight hard.

And we've also got to make sure that Ontario knows how displeased dog owners are with this decision - a total embargo on Ontario by every dog loving Canadian. It's the only way until there is no bsl in Ontario.

Here's the CTV article -

SCC will not hear appeal of Ontario's pit bull ban
Updated Thu. Jun. 11 2009 10:26 AM ET

The Canadian Press

OTTAWA -- The Supreme Court of Canada will not hear a bid to quash Ontario's ban on pit bulls.

The attempt to take the fight to Canada's highest court was launched in April by lawyer Clayton Ruby.

In his submission to the Supreme Court, Ruby argued there is no scientific or statistical basis to conclude that pit bulls are more dangerous than other dogs.

He asked the Supreme Court to review a decision from Ontario's Appeal Court last October that upholds the province's ban.

Today, the high court dismissed the application to hear the appeal.

The Ontario Appeal Court concluded that pit bulls are dangerous and unpredictable dogs that have the potential to attack without warning.

The Ontario government enacted the Dog Owners' Liability Act in 2005 to ban the breeding, sale and ownership of pit bulls after several incidents in which the dogs attacked people.

LLOYD HINES IS DEFEATED

I just watched the ticker tape run through on CTV and Lloyd Hines has been defeated in Guysborough Sheet Harbour!

How many complaints does it take to close a dog park in the HRM?

So how many complaints do YOU figure it would take to get a dog park closed in the Halifax Regional Municipality?

You'd figure that it would take quite a few, because dog owners DO pay taxes, we DO deserve to get some benefit from those taxes, and the indiscretion of a few bad apples shouldn't make every dog owner suffer for the few. If there are complaints - increase the monitoring at that particular park - and increase the fines at that park so that the people who are being bad will stop being bad. That makes sense, don't you think?

Well here in the Halifax Regional Municipality - the bureaucrats and elected officials don't seem to want to do their job that way. They have shown time and time again - that they have a hatred for dogs and their owners that borders on the submlime - and they're showing this proclivity once again with the very well used, and much loved Robert Drive Park dog park in Dartmouth.

It's a super popular park for people to take their dogs to because it's completely fenced in - and dog owners who aren't completely sure that their dogs have perfect recall like the fact that this park is fenced in - so this park gets a lot of use - and is getting more use all the time as word gets out.

The city told no one that the park was supposed to be closed for the month of May so that the park could "reseed" itself - so they blamed dog owners and have closed the park now for the month of June, and have extended it into July - but they've also added something else to the Off-leash parks strategy page on the City's website about the Robert Drive Park dog park and said the following -

HRM has recently received complaints concerning dog owners who are abusing their off leash privileges at the Robert Drive off leash sport field. The signs at the entrance to the field clearly show that the field is open from Nov 1- May 1 and from June 1 - Nov 1. The field is closed to off leash use in May to allow for grass to regenerate in worn areas of the field. It's evident that some dog owners have continued to use the field during May. The field has been severely impacted and will likely be closed to off leash use during the month of June in order for the grass to return.

Complaints have also been received concerning dog owners who have unleashed their dogs while children are playing in the field. Please remember that children come first. If you arrive at the field and children are playing then please wait until they have left the field before unleashing your dog. It is also evident that some dog owners are not cleaning up after their pets.

The field is a shared resource. It is not intended for the exclusive use of dog owners. The HRM Interdepartmental Off Leash Parks Committee will be meeting on June 19 to consider the future of the sport field for off leash uses. The field may be closed permanently for off leash activities if dog owners continue to disregard these basic rules.

A regular user of the Robert Drive Dog Park - Tara Bayne - contacted the city, and animal control, to try and get some statistics to see what the complaints were that had been called in and how many of them there were.

And guess what. There have been TWO COMPLAINTS called in about this park. Two complaints from the public are going to close this park. The HRM Interdepartmental Off Leash Parks Committee is going to meet and contemplate closing this much needed and well used dog park based on TWO COMPLAINTS.

Can you believe this?

How many dog owners are there in the HRM? How many dog owners use off leash dog parks in the HRM? And TWO COMPLAINTS are going to close down one of those off leash spaces?

Can you spot the inequity here?

Do you think that perhaps the City is listening to the wrong demographic on this subject?

I hope I'm not the only who's feeling sick to their stomach right now.

A man in Windsor blaming Animal Control for his dead dog

It's happening again. This time in Windsor - same shit, different day - and this time it was a child that was bit by the family dog - and the father is looking for anyone but himself to blame for his dog being dead. Although the animal control officer certainly doesn't seem to have done himself any favours either - but we're only hearing one side of the story.

It's being played out on Kijiji currently - in the words of the dog owner - he had an earlier version that actually named the animal control officer, and in the last sentence of the original posting he said -

"I would like to get more info on Garry Lunn for when the animal cruelty charge goes to court. So if anyone has more info for me please let me know and of course I will update things as I know more." -

and in the second, toned down version he said - "I am now trying to get Mr. so and so charged with animal cruelty, I want his license to be revoked and have him pay for what he put Max through. He tells me that I won’t win in court with my fine but I know I can."

So this is the story that this fellow - he hasn't said his name, has put on Kijiji:

"Some guy guess I’m not allowed to say his name is the Windsor N.S animal control. Why I’m not sure, but let me tell you what he has done to my family.

I have 3 children and had 3 Valley Bulldogs. Unfortunately my male dog Max had aggression towards people and animals when he had food.

One day on May/25/09 Max was in the fenced in yard eating a bone and my 8 year old decided to go and pat all the dogs, when she got to Max he jumped on her, knocked her down then bite her, and yes I know that was very wrong of him but she is fine and still loves him very much. As a parent I called animal control for help.

Mr. so and so wanted to place him with a lady that can barley take care of herself, but she said that he should be put down, so at the vet in Windsor (not mine) they said we need to wait for 10 days to make sure there would be no rabies.

Mr. so and so said he had a rabies kennel and would take him for the 10 days.

Meanwhile I put an ad out for max to get some help from a professional because of course I could not bear to have him put down. Unfortunately no one could help Max at that time. So I decided to get him fixed then have a dog trainer come to my house and help me train him. My vet said that was a great decision and getting him fixed would help a lot.

On June/04/09 Mr. so and so called me and said (time is up you need to come and get Max)

So when I called him back to set up a time he asked me if I maid the appointment with the vet. I said yes but he is getting fixed not put down. He then told me that I have to put him down because he bit my child. When I went to get max he then slapped me with a $337.00 fine and submitted to the court that Max be seized and put down immideitly.

While I was waiting for my fine I seen a dog chained up to a post, when I looked again I realized that it was Max so I asked Mr. so and so what he was feeding him, he said 2 kinds of food but would not tell me the brands. When I went to Max I could see that he lost about 10-15 pounds in 10 days as you can see in the pictures. The first picture was taken on May/26/09 the second on June/04/09 and he also stunk so bad that I almost got sick.

Also that rabies kennel was only a cage in his garage, so if you ask me I don’t think he was feed at all even when he said his kids feed him.

Later that day I got a call from a social worker wanting me to get Max out of the house right away, when I said no I am taking control of the situation she said that she was coming to my house in the morning with the R.C.M.P. Some how I knew that the morning would be that night, so I left with my girls and hid them till the next day.
She did come that night with the R.C.M.P and blocked off my driveway till about 9pm.
So as you can see I had no choice but to call the vet and put max down.

My vet thank god did not want to put him down because as they could see he is a great dog with an easy to fix problem. So they asked me to sign Max over to them and they would fix him and find him a home with someone who can rehabilitate him.

Mr. so and so thinks that he won this fight but he did not, I won by keeping Max alive."

So what I find interesting about this post is the line "let me tell you what he has done to my family"

What is the origin of this story? Didn't this man's people and dog aggressive dog bite his child? Where was he when this happen? Was the child and dog being supervised when it happened? Was the dog inside the house? Or maybe chained outside? Since the man acknowledges that the dog is people aggressive - that means there have obviously been previous incidents of aggression/biting before - how did any child get within biting distance of this dog? And this man is blaming someone other than himself for the death of this dog? And he's blaming the animal control officer for the death of the dog?

But oh wait - the dog isn't dead - he's feeling oh so smart - he's smuggled the dog somewhere so that it can bite another day somewhere else - and maybe someone else's child.

And I'm saying all this based upon what the man himself has said in his own Kijiji posting!

My next question that I would ask this fellow is something else he says in his posting - why did he wait until after his dog bit his child - to seek the help of a professional for what he says is an easy to fix problem, and have the dog neutered? Why didn't he feel the need to do that before his dog bit his child?

The animal control officer for the area - Gary Lunn - has said in newspaper articles - “People need to understand that if their dog bites, even while on their own property, they are still liable.”

This is the same area of Nova Scotia - Windsor, Nova Scotia to be precise, that a couple months ago we had the woman who killed the kittens because she couldn't find anyone who would take them off her hands - and she was then charged with animal cruelty - so its an area of the province that would seem to have a problem with empathy when it comes to companion animals.

The animal control officer has been very blunt actually in newspaper articles about what happens to dangerous dogs in his purview - after just an initial search, I found 2 articles from just this year - one article called "Calling for a tight leash on dangerous dogs", and another article called "Canine Complaints: Municipality addresses Fierce or dangerous bylaw" - maybe this guy doesn't follow his local news.

So long story short - I am confounded as to why - if he didn't want to have to pay a hefty fine for his dog biting his kid - why he even called Animal Control in the first place, and then why he thought his dog wouldn't be deemed vicious for his dog biting a child - and why he wasn't worried that his dog would be expected to be put down.

And then blaming the whole thing on the animal control officer - and then transferring all the evil onto the animal control officer and accusing him of animal cruelty because of the treatment his dog received while in the care of him - is unbelievable, really.

His dog bit his child because his dog is people and dog aggressive - and he had up to that point never done anything about it. Up until the point when animal control became involved - it appears as if he had never been a responsible dog owner - he had never even got the dog neutered. And he still has 2 more valley bull dogs at home. I wonder what their status is. If I was the social worker who arrived with the RCMP that evening that he had hidden his children elsewhere - I'd be taking a close look at those 2 dogs and seeing what kind of disposition they have.

What a mixed up world we live in.

Sunday morning frolic

This morning the dogs were out in the backyard having a good time
Well actually - Buttercup wasn't too sure it was worth getting her feet wet for - she's in the background here at the top of the steps

And Jackie just looked on from above with his disapproving one cloudy good eye

Charlie thought it was a good time
Daisy tries to have a good time out of even the worst circumstances - she's been through a lot in her life
And she figures anything can be solved with a good deep play bow
And Bobby likes to run and bark
And run fast with things in his mouth and attempt to bark at the same time
And then run and bark some more
And run and bark











I think you get the idea

Stuff Going on

(These are a couple of dogs having fun last summer at a lab fest at Seaview Park)Lab Rescue of Nova Scotia is having their annual auction on June 13th - in Enfield at Shooters - which I'm assuming is a drinking establishment/restaurant. The live auction starts at 6 and the real bidding begins at 7pm. Paddles are $5 and there's no set dinner, you can just order from the menu. I've been to a few lab rescue fundraising events - and the lab rescue auction I went to back in 2006 was a real hoot! Trish - the head of the organization has created a Facebook event for the evening if you care to go and join up.


And not to be missed is the Metro SPCA dog jog on June 21st - it's one of the SPCA's biggest fund raisers - so it's important for everyone to get out and participate - and it's always such a fun day and a great way to spend time with our canine life companions - who wouldn't want to go and hang out at Point Pleasant Park for such a good cause?

There's going to be a dog wash at Vetcetera Animal Hospital on June 27th in aide of Bide A Wile, Pick of the Litter Society and the Metro SPCA - this is an annual thing that's been a big success every year - so if you've got a dirty dog - Bedford is the place you should be on June 27th - There's going to be a bbq, refreshments, and door prizes - for the humans I'd imagine! It's from 10am to 4pm at 1440 Bedford Highway - for more information you can call 832-4818.


For those of you who have been avid readers of the local magazine Furry's - it has unfortunately shut down for good - it's owner Lynne MacKay has moved to Lunenburg and is going to be starting up a new business venture.
That is too bad for local dog owners who enjoyed the content and articles by Adina MacRae and other local writers. We'll just have to satisfy ourselves with "Pet Country" magazine and the NS SPCA newsletter for our dose of local dog writers.

I'm hoping to have the energy to write a separate post about this - but just as I was writing my post about some of our sports fields being off-leash - the city has decided to close Robert Park Drive to off-leash use for at least the month of June. They say that it's to regenerate the grass in the area - but in the advisory they posted on the HRM's web page at http://www.halifax.ca/RealPropertyPlanning/OLPS/index.html - they also say that "complaints concerning dog owners who are abusing their off leash privileges at the Robert Drive off leash sport field."

They also say "Complaints have also been received concerning dog owners who have unleashed their dogs while children are playing in the field. Please remember that children come first. If you arrive at the field and children are playing then please wait until they have left the field before unleashing your dog"

There are like 100 places for children to play in the HRM - and probably 100's more than that - and about currently 13 places to legally go offleash with your dog. That sounds a bit uneven to me. It's another clear cut case of the HRM trying to bully dog owners - and if you feel moved to write to the city because you are a regular user of the Robert Park Drive off leash space - you can email John Charles at parkdog@halifax.ca

A new canine learning centre has opened up! "Ditto's Canine Learning Centre" has opened up in Mahone Bay - owned by Jane Smith, formerly of Lietash - she has new classes starting up in the middle of June - and is also going to be offering puppy classes - which always seems to be a super popular thing that I seem to get tons of emails about from people who are looking to start their new dog-love life off right with. So you should definitely check out her new website and join her facebook group - and sign up for a class too!


Have I mentioned before about "Pugapalooza" going on July 25th from 12 - 4pm at Fetch on Joseph Zatzman Drive in Dartmouth? It sounds like it's going to be the biggest small dog event in the HRM this summer - so start getting read for it now! And it's open for all small dogs - not just pugs - so if you've got a small friendly dog - get your cutest outfit picked out now, and get ready!

I've been a big fan of the "Petstuff on the Go" organization for years. They've always been at most of the dog events I've gone to, selling their stuff - and they've had a table at the Halifax Farmer's Market and one of the flea markets in Dartmouth as well. They are a local not-for-profit pet supply delivery business operated by mental health consumers, specializing in top quality pet foods and products.

The lady who runs the place has been talking about opening a store front operation for the last couple of years - and they've finally done it. They had their "official grand opening" May 29th and 30th - which I missed, because I'm so far behind in my emails - but I still wanted to mention here on the blog about their store - so that I could make sure that people know that the store is open and ready for people to go visit them. They're at 261 Pleasant Street in Dartmouth and their website is at http://www.petstuffonthego.ca/

For a couple more business newsy things - I recently got an email about "Tails of the City" - it used to be owned by Bob Curran - but is now owned by a man named "Robin Hall" - his website is at http://citytails.ca/


There's also a new institutional type doggy day care opening - it's called "Happy Hounds Doggy Day Care" and it's at the corner of Barrington and Young Street - you can check out their new website at http://happyhoundsinhalifax.com/

Lastly - the "Disaster Animal Response Team of Nova Scotia Group" - is putting on some great training in August - it's a 3-day course designed to familiarize participants with disaster situations and provide the background necessary to become an effective emergency animal relief responder. The class includes two days of mixed classroom/hands-on instruction and a long half-day of specialized tabletop exercises. After completion of DART, graduates will have a basic understanding of disaster response for animals and will be in a position to help develop their own local DART teams.

It runs from August 15th to August 17th and tuition ranges from $50 to $125 depending on who you are and it's being held at the Nova Scotia Agricultual College. It sounds pretty interesting! You can check it out at http://www.humanesocietyu.org/workshops_and_classes/dart_novascotia.html - thanks to Kelly at the NS SPCA who's the Education coordinator there for telling me about this great opportunity for us all!

A Couple stories from away reminiscient of stories from here

There's a story blowing up in the news up in Toronto about the Toronto Humane Society and it's president, Tim Trow - he seems to be acting completely crackers - veterinarians are quitting in protest - they mistakenly adopted out a dog with a broken leg, and now Mr. Trow is saying that the "dog didn't have a broken leg - she had a limp because her leg had been broken and had healed prior to coming to the society and that the dog was not a candidate for further treatment and can live her life normally. When the people got the dog home and took her to a vet - they found out completely otherwise - so a melee has ensued because this has happened a bunch of times.

There's a series of articles that the Toronto Globe and Mail has done blowing the whole thing open - the first article was called "Killing them with Kindness" - and it's quite an amazing article. It talks about some of the alleged animals that have died in their cages and the suffering that's been going on behind closed doors that's been allowed to continue because of Tim Trow being in charge. If it's true - the Toronto Humane Society is not a place where animals should be going.

There's a photo montage - but I didn't look at it because it said some of the photos are graphic - and I don't need to upset myself by looking at photos I can do nothing about - so choose for yourself whether or not you want to look at them. The photos in the main article are bad enough.

The Second article was called "A Leader with a passion for animals, loyal supporters, and an iron grip" and it also includes a rebuttal editorial by the president Tim Trow

There's also a great blog in Toronto called "One Bark At A Time" that is following the story - and he's got some good posts about the topic - he's got a great line when he says =

Now I realize the one person's "kitten resting in cage" may be another person's "kitten being neglected, covered in shit and left dying in cage" but eventually members of the THS are going to have to decide for themselves whose interpretation of reality they want to follow.

And to show even further that the Toronto Humane Society's current problems are quite like the NS SPCA's of the last couple years - Fred has a post with an article from 2001 outlining how the THS was imploding even back then - not unlike how the NS SPCA had a report in 2001 called - I'm paraphrasing here - "how to build harmony in the NS SPCA - because everything at the Board level was going to shit - even back then.

The other story from away that's like a story that's been going on locally is a story down in San Antonio Texas. I found the story on "Yes Biscuit's" Blog in a post called "Holding Ourselves Accountable: Confinement" - and it's about a pitbull who's owner has had a string of pet pitbulls and continues to let them run at large through her neighbourhood, and her neighbours had become so pissed off that they'd started a petition because they felt like prisoners in their own homes - and everything has gotten so out of hand between the dog's owner, the neighbours and the city that the dog in question may be killed - and he's never even bit a dog or a human, he's completely acknowledged to not be dangerous, and the town is talking about a ban on pit bulls - all because of this dog owner.

There's a couple of interesting twists to this story - this dog owner is accusing a couple of her vietnamese neighbours with EATING two of her previous pit bulls - and there's some video footage that you may want to check out.

It's all very interesting because it really shows the importance of leash laws and having control of your dogs - and that if you cannot control your dogs - that they will be taken away from you.

And also - the time to work with Animal Control about your dog problems - and the time to work with your dog about his problems - is before Animal Control takes him away. Respect the laws that are already in place - like leash laws, and you'll be pretty safe that you won't have any run-ins with Animal Control.

The Animal Control Department in San Antonio determined that the dog in this story was not in fact dangerous - but they decided NOT to give the dog back to the owner because her inability to control the dog could cause the "situation to escalate" - so in other words - she could not control her dog. Interesting.

The news story is at "San Antonio News"

Beautiful

Lloyd Hines and the Provincial Election in June 2009 – and what Responsible Dog owners need to know about him

Zeus Cameron – who’s Mom & Dad won his fight against Lloyd Hines to live out his life in Guysborough

I heard that Lloyd Hines is taking part in a debate Monday night, so I put together a little sheet that I'm hoping is going to make it down to his corner of the province so that some of his constituents will learn a couple things about what he thinks about dogs. This is what I said on it - and I also put a photo of Zeus Cameron on the sheet - reminding people about that dog - that was a pit bull, who very peacefully got to die in his own home - no thanks to him.

Lloyd Hines and the Provincial Election in June 2009 –
and what Responsible Dog owners need to know about him

In 1995 Lloyd Hines lobbied for and passed breed specific legislation in the district of the municipality of Guysborough – banning pit bulls, with no grandfather clause built in.

Because the media paid virtually no attention to this issue, most residents of Guysborough were unaware of the new law in 1995 . Apparently without public support or, to the contrary, outrage, the municipality amended the by-law in 2004 to ban Rottweilers (the amendment contained a grandfather section to exempt Rottweilers already living in the Municipality). The ban on Rottweilers was passed after the New Brunswick attack that led to the death of the four year old child. Warden Lloyd Hines was active in pushing for these bills, and he threatened to push a breed specific ban through the Union of Municipalities – which he almost successfully did in 2008 – but because people in other areas of Nova Scotia know what happens when breed bans become law – Lloyd Hines failed in his bid to pass breed restrictions throughout the whole province.

Lloyd Hines is currently running as a Liberal Candidate in the provincial election in the riding of Guysborough Sheet Harbour in the June 2009 Election.

When Lloyd Hines was Warden of the District of the Municipality of Guysborough he made it a priority in his mandate to first ban pit bull dogs, and then add rottweillers to that ban.

When Lloyd Hines was first Vice President, and then President of the Union of the Nova Scotia Municipalities he made it a priority of his mandate to have breed restrictions passed throughout the whole province of Nova Scotia.

If he is elected as a Member of the Legislative Assembly of Nova Scotia – what do you think one of his major priorities will be when he gets there?

This is a quote that Lloyd Hines said in 2004 when he was attempting to have rottweillers banned in his municipality –

"I don't want to be the warden of the Municipality of Guysborough and have to go to the funeral of some kid who was eaten."

When Guysborough dog owners go to the polls in June – hopefully they will go to the voting booths with the knowledge that they are voting not just for themselves – they are voting for every dog owner in Nova Scotia.

Someone's been to the beauty parlour!

Today Bobby went to the beauty parlour and he came out looking very beautiful I think.
And I think he think's he's looking quite beautiful too.
He is looking like a proper toy poodle now.


Buttercup doesn't get to go in until June 16th, so I think she's feeling a bit jealous.
Bobby was being quite the bon-vivant in the backyard this afternoon.
Even Daisy's head was being turned by the spectacle.
Jack was at the beauty parlour yesterday - so he's looking very spectacular his own self - 2 dogs at the beauty parlour = about $140 = 2 nice looking dogs = empty pockets, but it's all worth it
But Daisy showed them all up in the end - she gets to roll around in the dirty and comes out looking the same as when she started - you have to love the double coated breeds!

PETA, seals, other countries & making money + maple syrup

So I got a new action alert from PETA today - all lovers of seals are now being called to boycott Canadian Maple syrup until the heinous Canadian seal hunt is stopped forever. And to advertise it PETA has a travelling show of a person dressed up as a baby seal going from town to town taking a hekapik to a very large cardboard representation of a bottle of Canadian Maple Syrup. Isn't that fun?


The email says that 85% of the world's maple syrup comes from Canada - that's a statistic I can get behind. That's fabulous to hear. Bravo for our Canadian Maple syrup producers! You know what I love? Maple syrup peanut brittle - now THAT is tasty. If you've never tried it, you should. It is yummy.


Getting that email got me to thinking a little bit. I remember getting an email about the Faroe Islands a few months ago. You remember that place? In Denmark? That has the pilot whale slaughter every year? That's considered an important part of the culture and history of the area - done since the 10th century? I know that because I looked it up on Wikipedia. I received the lovely photos in this blog post a few months ago - if you do a google search you'll find more.


I wondered if PETA was hollering from the roof tops about this slaughter the way they do about the bloody massacre Canada’s annual seal hunt - "the largest slaughter of marine mammals on Earth" - so I did a Google search of "Peta seal hunt" and came up with the page - "PETA.Org Help stop the Bloody Seal Massacre" - which has video, links to other PETA pages about the seal hunt, links to pages where you can buy merchandise, and the obligatory links to pages where you can send them money to help stop the seal hunt. It's one of more than 68,000 pages about PETA and the seal hunt.


When I typed in "PETA Faroe Islands" - I came up with a page - "Stop the Bloody Whale Massacre on the Faroe Islands" - and all it is - is an advocacy alert page that sends a letter to the Prime Minister of the Faroe Islands. Boy, that's scary - isn't it? That's going to quickly send a very sinister message around the world about the horrible massacre that's going on over there in Denmark.


And when you do the Google search of PETA and Faroe Islands - only about 2 or 3 of the top hits even have anything to do with PETA and the Faroe Islands - it turns out that PETA doesn't even seem to really care about the Faroe Islands. Why is that now? Is it because nobody really cares about a lot of blood? They only care about white coats and really big eyes with beautiful eyelashes? I wonder. hhhmmm..... I wonder.

I also have to say that at this point - and to me, it would seem obvious - as I am an animal lover, and anybody who reads this blog would also be an animal lover - that I love seals, my dogs love seals - I also love whales, and I love cows, and pigs, and chickens - and I love cats, and rats, and mice - I love every kind of animal.

I love harp seals, I love grey seal - but the thing is, the seal industry is an abattoir without walls. It's no different than the cow industry, or the chicken industry - or the dogs as food industry over in Asia.

But because it's done on pristine white ice - and photographers can get in close - and the organizations saying they are trying to shut it down know they can make a lot of money off the advertising of the killing - then you have the organizations of PETA and HSUS we have today. Very rich organizations. Targetted at places like my part of the world - and not at places that make them no money.

I'm not saying that the seal hunt is okay - it's as wrong as the cow killing industry is - it's all bad. Just like killing dogs for food is bad - they are ALL THE SAME. One is no worse than the other. Do you understand what I'm saying?

Organizations like PETA cannot cherry pick their money making ventures because of the cuteness of the meat, and easy access to the abbattoir.

That is the ridiculousness of what this situation shows.

Duelling Cuteness

So tonight I had both Bobby and Buttercup being unbearably cute at the same time
I didn't know where to put the camera, because Buttercup was being cute on the couch and Bobby was being cute on the floor.
Buttercup was doing her schtick where she rolls around with a toy and sticks her arms up in the air and wrestles with me and just goes crazy and acts like a puppy instead of a 13 year old dog









And Bobby was on the floor throwing his toys around, play growling and looking at me, being just so cute





I don't think it's possible to decide who is cuter than who.





Jack spent the time at my side trying to keep either one of them from coming too close





And Charlie is never too fussy about all the hub-bub of dogs being cute - he could take it or leave it





A close up of Jackie keeping his good eye on the cuteness action





2 last shots of Bobby with his favourite at the moment teddy bear










Buttercup telling me that she should be the victor on this night





And Bobby telling me that since he's the new one - it should be him! I think it's going to have to be a tie....

Legal off leash spaces I didn't know about!

It always helps to surf the HRM's website, I guess - I thought I knew where all the legal off leash spaces were in the city - but I have realized that I didn't.

I had an email from a reader of my website asking if I knew of any completely fenced in areas where she could run her dog, and I sent her a couple spots - but I went to the HRM's website to have a look around - which by the way, is becoming very outdated, because everything is from 2007 and 2008 - so hopefully nothing has changed - because nothing's been updated it seems in almost a year - and for some reason I've never clicked on the "Summer Off leash Sports Fields" section.

There's seven of them - and they're quite well spread out around the HRM, and one of them is even hear where I live - so if I wanted I wouldn't even have to break the law on a daily basis! haha!

The most emails I get are people asking me about fenced in places to take their dogs off leash - and Robert Drive Park in Dartmouth is probably becoming the best known and best used park for offleash dogs that I know of - it's completely fenced in, and the users of it have even created their own facebook groupRobert Drive Park

Hammond's Plains also has been given their own off-leash space

with the green space between 2 ball fields on Kingswood Drive

In Clayton Park there is Glenbourne Field on Parkland Drive


Cole Harbour has George Bissett Field


Lower Sackville has the Eddie LebLanc Field on First Lake Drive


The field that's where I live by is on the Crown Field off the North West Arm Drive - I had no idea it was off leash!


And last is Conrose Field right off of Jubilee Road in South end Halifax - another field I had no idea was off leash.

So that has totally added to my retinue of places to go off leash - none of them are sniff and pass type places - but they're all great for finding other dogs to wrestle with or play with balls or to practice obedience or just hang out and have fun off leash. And they're applicable 5am to 10pm from May 1st to November 1st - with the exception of Conrose, which the website says is only available between 5am and 10am, which sucks.

Another thing I wanted to talk about which started up recently is a new message board/online presence for local people - and it's called "Halifax blogger" - and it has a section for dog friendly postings. The dog friendly section is at http://halifaxblogger.com/blog/phpBB3/viewforum.php?f=19 - the board is open to suggestions for what's going to be there - but posting of dog friendly events, your experience with dog friendly Halifax - and conversations about creating a dog friendly Halifax are all ideas about what we could talk about there. The main site is at http://halifaxblogger.com/ - so go check it out!

Animal League Defence Fund Thinks We're Okay

Almost a month ago I wrote a post about the Animal League Defence Fund publishing a book about animal protection laws across North America and the fact that they had a report ranking animal laws across Canada and how Nova Scotia had rated pretty high.

This week the Chronicle Herald and the CBC caught up and both did stories about the report, which is interesting.

The Chronicle Herald said that "The report said Nova Scotia ranked high because its laws allow judges to order abusers to reimburse the costs of care for an impounded animal, place restrictions on the abuser’s ability to own animals in the future and imposes increasing fines on repeat offenders."

For the story, the Chronicle Herald interviewed Mary Hill - secretary for the NS SPCA - and she said - "Upon closer reflection you have to bear in mind this is comparative and it says a lot more about the ranking of the other provinces that are lower on the list than it does about our legislation. It just means the other provinces have worse legislation."

I don't know if I quite agree with this - maybe we DO have good legislation in this province - but maybe what we have in Nova Scotia is a really shitty Justice department. Has that occurred to anyone? I know that anytime animal abuse cases have come up - it seems that the crown attorney's office has always come up short - saying that they can't do anything, they can't provide a burden of proof, they can't do this, they can't do that - when there's all this glaring evidence that the person has very obviously abused animals. It makes no sense. I'm no lawyer, but common sense has to come into play somewhere.

Today was the Metro Shelter SPCA's Open House!

So today was the long awaited open house and yard sale for the Metro SPCA shelter - and by all accounts it was a great success - the barbecue that was going on made a good chunk of change, and I'm sure the yard sale did a good job too. Bobby had a good time - he was very well behaved and got along with all the dogs he met which was great. He was just loving the attention, I think. As you can tell - the turnout was great - lots of happy people, and happy animals - hopefully some great applications got put in today as well. But it was super that we all got to see all the great new spaces at the shelter - I am sure that everyone was really impressed with the new rooms and how everything looks - all the small touches are also great - like instead of pieces of paper on the wall as signs - they have great bulletin boards inside beautiful frames - really nice touches like that - that will make a big difference over time when there aren't holes in the wall and tape tears in the paint.

I only went in as far as the entrance way since I had Bobby with me - but I did get a nice look at this litter of very cute kittens playing - they didn't even seem to notice all the hull-a-baloo going on around them!

A long shot of the crowd
After me and Bobby left the open house, we went for a drive and thought we'd check out the Frenchy's on the corner of Tacoma and Hartlen in Dartmouth. Here's a tip for all you dog lovers who like to spend your money in dog friendly stores. DO NOT GO TO GUY'S FRENCHY'S ON THE CORNER OF TACOMA AND HARTLEN!

I was in there for about 45 minutes with no problems, minding my own business, Bobby's feet never touched the ground, probably about 5 people approached me because he was so cute and 2 people came up to me because they thought he was a stuffed animal - one person was at me for about 10 minutes and insisted I take her email address because Bobby was exactly what she was looking for and she wants me to email her if I ever see anything come through rescue that's like him - so it was a good educating time for rescue stuff - and about 45 minutes into my shopping this person comes up to me and says - "you can't be in here - there's no pets allowed" - and I say "why?" - and the woman says - "people in here might have allergies" - and I look at my hypoallergenic toy poodle and say to her "do you allow people in here who wear perfume?" - and the womans says "yes" - and I say to her "then that excuse is not good enough, you're going to have to think of a better one".

That person walks away - and another one comes up and we go through the same routine and I say - "I've been in her for like 45 minutes, what's the problem?" - and the woman says "I just came on the floor now" - so I say "well, I'm almost done shopping anyway", so I keep walking - which is pissing off this girl royally (which isn't bothering me at all and I'm trying to draw out for as long as I can) - and she's staring at me, and I say to her - "are you going to let me buy the things I'm carrying around?" and she says "yes" - so I start ambling over towards the cash register and she follows me there and rings me up and I say to her "you should let people bring their dogs in her with them, you'd get a lot more customers". And I take my ill-gotten gains and leave.

So that was the first and last time I'll be going to Guy's Frenchies on the corner of Tacoma and Hartlen in Dartmouth - I wish I would've noticed the Salvation Army just around the corner - they probably would've been a lot more friendly. I was originally going to go back to the Value Village on Portland but thought it was too far to drive to - but I know better now.

Some of us got together and made a video in appreciation of what the staff and volunteers do everyday at the Dartmouth shelter - we went downtown last weekend and video'd some people saying thank-you for what everyone does, and we went to the shelter and video'd the animals saying thank-you - and this is the video we came up with - I originally uploaded it to You Tube, but You Tube has gone nuts with disabling audio because of the music you put on with the video's - so I'm going to try and see if it works just attaching it to this blog post - hopefully the audio won't be disabled by blogger - we'll see how it goes - enjoy!

Some cute stuff and some gooey stuff

Shall I start with the cute stuff? Bobby is turning out to be a dog who can play by himself and love it.
He loves to grab a toy and then run at top speed around in circles - through the back yard, around the back yard, and then he'll drop the toy and keep running - and up into the house and he'll tear through the house and out the back steps and through the back yard and on through again.
It has got to be just about the cutest thing you've ever seen - until you see Buttercup - and then you'll agree that Buttercup is the cutest thing you've ever seen.
But this little guy is coming in a pretty close second, I've got to say.
I was out mowing the lawn when he was doing this and he wasn't taking any notice of the lawn mower - he wasn't letting that dampen his mood at all. He was determined that he was going to have a good time.
He should be pretty tired out tonight, because he did a lot of running around, that's for sure.
2 year old dogs are a lot different than 13 year old dogs - it's been about 8 years since I last had a 2 year old dog - and back then there were 2 of me, so it was easier then.


So now on to the gooey stuff - last night there seemed to be something "off" about Buttercup's left eye, but I couldn't quite figure out what it was. Today when I got home from work her left eye was just covered in yellow puss - it was totally gross - something was very wrong, so we went right over to the vet - I was worried that she has torn her cornea like Jack did last summer - and I didn't want that to happen to Buttercup - but Dr. Lindsay at Carnegy's did a stain test on her eye and there's no tear - so hopefully her eye is okay. I never like to screw with dog's eyes when something goes wrong. She's got antibiotic ointment and hopefully it'll just get better - whatever it is that went wrong.

While we were at Carnegy's we met with big black great dane named Ruper - he was a very nice dog, only about a year old - and very large! Although I have yet to meet a small great dane - they always come in size large!

Questionnaires to three provincial political parties

Advocates for Responsible Pet Ownership sent a short questionnaire to the 4 provincial political parties - the PC's, Liberals, NDP and Green Party. The Green Party have yet to answer back, and it seems like they won't because they haven't even acknowledged receiving the emails - but the other 3 parties have - and their answers are posted on the ARPO facebook group - or you can go read them here -

The Liberal answers - the PC answers - the NDP answers

Their answers are pretty interesting. They are especially interesting when you taken into consideration WHO is running in some ridings, and also what happened during the last provincial election in 2006.

First we'll talk about WHO is running in which party here in Nova Scotia - and as a large breed dog lover - I would be very remiss to not note that the inestimable Lloyd Hines is running in the Guysborough Sheet Harbour riding - after having been the warden for the district of the Municipality of Guysborough for like the last kajillion years.

So what about the questionnaire answers from the Liberals was so interesting as it relates to Mr. Hines running as a liberal?

One of the questions that was asked was -

"Will your party push to have all municipalities enacting humane animal laws and require that BSL be rescinded in those municipalities that have enacted such legislation? (Breed specific legislation enacts punitive laws based on breed of dog rather then the actions of negligent owner’s regardless of breed or mix)"

And that question was asked on purpose - BECAUSE there ARE municipalities in this province that DO have BSL - the provincial government, working with the Municipal Government Act - could outlaw BSL on a municipal level if they wanted. They are the law - they can do whatever they want.

The PC Party said that "The Nova Scotia Society for the Prevention of Cruelty opposes the establishment of Municipal by-laws that declare recognized breeds of dogs vicious or dangerous." The questionnaire seems to have been answered by Rodney MacDonald himself, which is very impressive - and he goes on to say - "I think I'd be more supportive of legislation that addresses the causes of aggression rather
than targeting the banning of specific breeds. This position, I believe, supports that of the SPCA’s mission as well" - so they get an A+ for that answer I'd say.

The NDP said that "The NDP will work with the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities to develop model humane by-laws. The NDP does not support breed-specific legislation."

One would think that they'd sort of HAVE to say that somewhere in their questionnaire - seeing as how in 2006 Darrell Dexter sent an answered questionnaire out to a reporter (which was eventually blamed on an aide to Dexter) saying "personally I support breed specific legislation" - you can imagine the brou haha this caused in the dog community. My post from 2006 is - here - if you want to read it. What a hoot that was.

So the NDP is really BEHOOVED to be against BSL this election, I'd say! haha!

So now on to the liberals, what was their answer to this question? Here we go -

Liberals feel that the rights of municipalities to make and enforce their own bylaws should be respected and do not see a role for the provincial government to lobby for changes at the municipal level. The Liberal party believes that it can be most effective protecting animals and safeguarding the rights of animal owners by introducing changes within its jurisdiction. An example of this was the changes to the Animal Protection Act our party put forward last fall.

So, if the Liberals get in - they are going to give full rein to the Municipalities to do whatever they want - like they tried to do with their "housekeeping bill" that tried to push through breed banning province wide last year by changing the Municipal Government Act completely - or like with Wardens like Lloyd Hines (who was also the President of the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities who tried to push through that bill change of the Municipal Government Act) - who have enacted complete breed bans in their municipalities based on nothinng more than their own fear and hatred of certain breeds.

(from Lloyd Hines Facebook page - he's "red hot and ready to run")
And that person is now running for office in their own Party - so if he wins - he'll have a say and clout in their party decisions in the future. It is very well known that one of his dreams is to enact breed restrictions throughout the province of Nova Scotia - so what do you think is going to be on his mind if he is successfully elected to the provincial legislative assembly? I think that the topic of breed banning is going to come up at some point.

So the Liberal Party had better start getting their position statements on these issues ready - because the anti-BSL people already have their own position statements all written up - and they're pretty good.

But with answers like these to simple questionnaires - I don't think there's much of a chance for the Liberal party.

Did you all know that Stephen McNeil is the brother of the HRM Police Department's Robin McNeil - the person who wrote the bylaw A300 we're currently living under? Makes sense to me.