World-renowned
animal behaviorist Dr. Temple Grandin will be joining us on Hounds Town Radio
Saturday, March 26th, at 3 p.m. on 103.9 F.M. Dr. Grandin, an international bestselling
author, autism activist, and animal advocate, has been responsible
for positive changes in the livestock industry and how the industry treats
animals. She has also done extensive research in the animal behavior field and
has a solid understanding of animals, how dogs view the world, and how we can
better communicate with them.
Here’s
one of the questions we asked her about our misunderstanding of our dogs:
Hounds Town Radio: What do you think the biggest misunderstanding about animals is? What
are we as humans not understanding about how to communicate with animals?
Dr. Grandin: I think in some cases, people don’t let dogs be dogs. I had a student
who did a study at an animal shelter and what she found is, if you give dogs in
a shelter 45 minutes a day of good fun with a person, doing lots of things, the
next day the cortisol goes down (a hormone released in response to stress). But
you have to keep doing it! So for shelters, one of the most important things
they need to do is have volunteers that take each dog out for 45 minutes each
day. Dogs need people. We have bred them to need people, that’s what some of
the latest research has shown.
For privately owned dogs
NOT in a shelter, there are just too many dogs left home alone. Some dogs get
stir crazy, they never get a chance to do stuff with other dogs! We have bred
dogs to be hyper-social … dogs have a social emotionality. If you take a dog
and leave it home alone all day, then you wonder why he’s chewed up the house!
It’s because it doesn’t have any social life. We’ve bred this hyper-social
animal, and where I live in Fort Collins, we have Draconian leash laws. You’re
not allowed to have your dog off the leash except a park, so a lot of dogs
don’t even get the chance to play with other dogs off the leash in a normal
way. That effects all behavior.
Tune
in Saturday, March 26th, to 103.9 F.M. at 3 p.m., listen live on www.linewsradio.com, or go to
houndstownradio.com to listen to the full 1-hour interview! We’ll be
discussing:
-Why
dogs behave the way they do
-Theories
behind animal behavior
-What
we can do to make animals’ lives better
-How
we can address certain behaviors like fear and aggression
-Why
socialization is so important
-How
dogs view the world
You
won’t want to miss this show!
