Hand & Paw - Blog related to pets, health and products,dog, cat, and all pets.

Watch your language!

Posted by: “Charlotte McGowan”

Thu Nov 20, 2008 6:27 pm (PST)

Fostering - This is a term used for children taken by the state and put in the care of people not their parents. We don’t foster dogs. We provide temporary care for displaced dogs. Sorry if you find that awkward but we can all benefit by retraining ourselves. 

Guardian - legal term used for the legally responsible person caring for a minor child or incapacitated person. I think we get this one. We have to fight Guardian language in animal ordinances tooth and nail because a guardian takes away ownership from the owner. If you own a dog it is yours. If you are a guardian, you are not an owner. You are a person or entity with legal care responsibility. If dogs have guardians instead of owners, we no longer have ownership rights. 

Puppy Mill- There is no such thing. Puppy mill is a slur, like the “n…..” word. Let’s stop using it. We hate substandard kennels. We want all dogs to be kept well. Well kept dogs are well kept dogs whether they are in kennels or in homes. It isn’t about how many dogs there are it is about how well they are kept. HSU$ calls all farms factory farms. When have you ever heard them talk about or care about family farms? Now they call all breeders puppy mills. They try to mumble in a remote footnote that there might be some good breeders but for them it is all about shelters and if not shelters rescues. Do you get it? They use language to slander all animal use and all dog breeders. Their mumbled lip service doesn’t fly with me. 

Rescue - what is a rescue? To me, IMHO, it is taking on the care and rehoming of a dog in a true need situation. This includes when the owners are incapacitated or die, have to go into a care facility like a nursing home, lose their home, etc. When some one just wants to dump a dog because they are tired of it, that’s a disposal job. I am not nice to such people. When purebred rescues go into auctions and buy dogs I call that just plain dumb. That is assisting and supporting commercial breeders. Some people may not agree but supporting this sort of thing does absolutely nothing for purebred dogs. 

Words that do not belong in the language at all - furbabies, furkids, fur children. All of these terms make animals into children who (gasp) need guardians, adoption and fostering. 

The first military Dog training center was born in August 1942 in Front Royal, VA. Of the 10,425 dogs trained, around 9,300 were for sentry duty. The largest group of sentry dogs (3,174) were trained in 1943 and issued to the Coast Guard for beach patrols guarding against enemy submarine activities.

Sentry Dogs: Worked on a short leash and were taught to give warning by growling, alerting or barking. They were especially valuable for working in the dark when attack from cover or the rear was most likely. The sentry dog was taught to accompany a military or civilian guard on patrol and gave him warning of the approach or presence of strangers within the area protected.

Scout or Patrol Dogs: In addition to the skills listed for sentry dogs, scout/patrol dogs were trained to work in silence in order to aid in the detection of snipers, ambushes and other enemy forces in a particular locality.

Messenger Dogs: The most desired quality in these dogs was loyalty, since he must be motivated by the desire to work with two handlers. They learned to travel silently and take advantage of natural cover when moving between the two handlers. (A total of 151 messenger dogs were trained.)

Mine Dogs: Called the M-Dog or mine detection dog they were trained to find trip wires, booby traps, metallic and non-metallic mines. (About 140 dogs were trained. Only two units were activated. Both were sent to North Africa where the dogs had problems detecting mines under combat conditions.)

In July 1948 dog training within the United States was transferred to the jurisdiction of Army Field Forces.

Check out http://www.uswardogs.org/

I absolutely love the snow. There is nothing better then that first blanket of frest snow, everything is just beautiful.

Here’s a little video for those who like snow… a lot of it!