Tag Archives: Dr. Mercola

Dog Behaviors, Triggers, and Training

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Are You Making This Mistake When Your Pet Misbehaves?

 

Story at-a-glance

  • If your dog has a problem behavior, the first thing to do is identify what’s triggering it.
  • The next step is to figure out how to avoid the trigger so the problem doesn’t escalate (and so no one, including your pet, gets hurt).
  • Once your dog isn’t being triggered and he’s not responding from a place of fear, anxiety or aggression, he’ll be more receptive to behavior modification therapy.
  • Positive reinforcement behavior modification is the only effective way to alter your dog’s negative response to triggers. Punishment has no place in changing a dog’s behavior.
  • Setting realistic expectations for things your pet may and may never be comfortable doing will help you accept and adapt to your canine companion’s limitations.

 

By Dr. Becker

Most dog owners are at some point faced with a problem behavior in their otherwise adorable four-legged buddy.

When a troubling behavior arises in your pet, the first thing you should do is make an appointment with your vet to rule out an underlying physical cause for the behavior.

Pain can create or exacerbate undesirable behavior in animals.

So can a metabolic disorder, which is any disruption of the conversion of food to energy at the cellular level.

Examples of metabolic disorders include diabetes, Addison’s disease, Cushing’s syndrome, and hypo- or hyperthyroidism.

If a health problem is identified, it should of course be treated.

Only then will you know whether you’re dealing with a true behavior problem or behavior resulting from a physical cause.

Once medical problems are either ruled out or resolved, undesirable behaviors can be addressed.

Identifying the Problem Behavior and Its Triggers

The next step is to identify the problem behavior, how often it occurs, how severe it is, and what triggers it.

Let’s say your large dog gets very excited when guests come to visit and jumps up on them as his way of saying hello.

  • Problem behavior: jumping up on people.
  • Frequency: every time someone unfamiliar comes to the door.
  • Severity: dog cannot be restrained; guests are pawed, scratched, licked, in danger of being tripped or knocked down.
  • Trigger: visitors to your home.

Next Step: Avoiding the Triggers

Initially what you must do in a situation like the one above — since you can’t remove the trigger — is remove your dog from the triggering situation. This means you’ll need to put your dog in another room or the backyard before you open the door to guests.

This strategy as a first step helps your guests stay safe and stops the problem behavior from escalating.

The ultimate goal is to help your dog extinguish problem behaviors. But behavior modification training must be done when your pet is calm, because dogs don’t learn well in a highly aroused state. Initial behavior modification efforts should take place outside the presence of the triggering event.

In the meantime, your focus should be on avoiding the triggers that provoke your dog’s problem behavior so you can move forward safely and sanely with positive reinforcement behavior modification techniques.

Trigger Avoidance with Aggressive Dogs

If your pet is aggressive toward other dogs, places where lots of dogs gather should be avoided.

When you walk a dog-aggressive dog, try to steer clear of areas where there are other dogs, and pick times of day when few dogs are being walked. Find places to walk where you’re not apt to encounter other dogs. And make sure your own energy is calm and relaxed on walks, because your dog will pick up on your mood.

When you do come upon another dog, create space between your dog and the other one, and keep your dog in control. Head collars can help, and avoid retractable leashes. Use a set-length leash for improved control.

If your dog is aggressive toward you or other family members, the first order of business is to take common-sense steps to prevent injury to the humans involved.

Identifying which situations seem to trigger your pet’s aggressiveness is important. If your dog is aggressive at meal time, she should be fed in a quiet spot, and needless to say, she should not be disturbed while eating.

If she’s aggressive when awakened, don’t allow her to snooze on furniture, and if you need to wake her, call her from a distance.

If her aggression appears during a particular game you play with her, avoid the game.

If your dog is aggressive toward visitors, your first priority is to keep guests safe. Secure your dog in another area before allowing visitors into your home or yard. If you have a lot of visitors or your dog is hard to catch, leave a leash either by the door or on your pet to improve your control over the situation.

Trigger Avoidance with a Territorial Dog

If your dog snarls, growls or barks excessively looking out a window or door, or from behind your backyard fence, you’ll need to block either his visual or physical access.

Close the blinds, close the door, or restrict your pet’s access to the room or the fenced area where he becomes territorial.

If you have more than one dog and they fight, it’s often a territorial behavior problem. Separate the dogs at meal time and maintain control over toys and any other triggers you’ve identified.

You might also choose to use leashes or head collars at home to have better control when a fight starts.

Managing a Destructive Dog

First, remove all temptations (also known as avoiding triggers). If your dog gets into the garbage, place it behind a cabinet door with a lock or in another hard-to-reach spot.

If your dog counter surfs, make sure no food is left out. If she chews up shoes, items of clothing or other belongings, make sure she doesn’t have access to those things.

Provide your pet with plenty of exercise, attention, and toys that are mentally stimulating.

Crate train your dog and tuck her in there when there’s no one available to supervise her behavior.

If she’s eliminating indoors, review and implement house-training techniques.

Managing Your Own Response to Problem Behaviors

When your dog is actively engaged in a problem behavior, your response must be calm and controlled.

Try to remove your pet from the situation if it’s safe to do so, or remove the trigger. Failing that, calmly try to redirect your dog’s attention with a command he normally responds to, or attempt to distract him with a food treat, a favorite toy, a walk or a ride in the car.

Remember, you’re only using these diversionary tactics to avert potential disaster. Doing so at every turn will only reinforce the behavior you ultimately hope to extinguish.

All you want to do in the heat of the moment is not make the situation worse. When your dog is highly aroused, upset and reacting with undesirable behavior, it is not the time to attempt to train him.

Punishment Creates More Problems and Solves Nothing

If you find the evidence of a problem behavior after the fact, for example, a puddle on the carpet or a shoe chewed beyond recognition, the only productive thing to do is clean up the mess and vow to avoid the trigger in the future. Ask yourself how your dog was left unsupervised long enough to relieve herself on the floor or destroy footwear, and decide what steps you’ll take to avoid the problem next time.

Most importantly, you never want to respond to your dog’s undesirable behavior with aggression or punishment. Punishing your dog after the fact for a behavior you didn’t see happen can quickly turn her into a sneaky piddler or destroyer of belongings.

Being aggressive and punishing with a dog in a highly aroused, reactive state is a recipe for disaster. This type of response can cause the dog’s behavior to escalate, resulting in injury to one or both of you.

Punishing your dog can increase his anxiety, fear and aggressiveness, while making no change in his behavior. It can also sometimes stop only what you see on the outside, without improving your pet’s underlying emotional state. Often the result is a problem behavior that appears randomly, giving you no opportunity for trigger avoidance.

With all that said, you also don’t want to respond in a comforting way to a problem behavior. Your dog can easily mistake comforting words and touch for praise, which increases the likelihood he’ll continue to perform the undesired behavior.

The Goal of Trigger Avoidance and Control

The goal in managing your pet’s problem behavior is to keep it from escalating while you work with your dog toward a more permanent solution.

One of the main goals of positive reinforcement behavior therapy is to change the dog’s underlying emotional state. Once your pet is no longer aggressively aroused and full of fear, she is open to learning different responses.

If you feel changing your dog’s behavior is something you need help with, I recommend a consultation with a certified animal behavior specialist.

There are also some excellent online resources for dog parents who are looking for canine behavior and training tips. A few of my favorites include:

Setting Realistic Expectations

to read more, go to:   http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2012/01/05/how-to-get-the-wellmannered-dog-your-family-deserves.aspx?e_cid=20120115_SNL_TPA_1

GM Mosquitoes, GMO Foods, Health, etc.

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Refuse to Eat These Foods – They Could Destroy Your Reproductive Organs

Posted By Dr. Mercola | January 10 2012 | 274,282 views

Story at-a-glance

  • Avoid genetically engineered (GE) corn and soy, which have already been shown to reduce fertility in animals
  • Private firm plans release of genetically modified (GM) mosquitoes into the environment of the Florida Keys, sometime this month
  • In an effort to reduce the mosquito population, the mosquitoes are genetically modified with a gene designed to kill them unless given an antibiotic known as tetracycline. Offspring of the GM mosquitoes will thus die before reaching adulthood
  • Genetic engineering (GE) of both plants and animals is in full swing. As a result, virtually ALL processed foods and beverages contain at least one genetically engineered ingredient. Animal-based foods are also affected, such as meat and eggs, as conventionally-raised livestock are typically fed GE feed; the toxins of which tend to bioaccumulate in the animal
  • What will happen when we increasingly begin to replace natural-born life forms with genetically engineered versions? Based on the best evidence available, that the end result is bound to be less than ideal for human survival
  • Animal studies have linked GE crops to a wide variety of health problems, from abnormal immune responses and organ disruptions to reproductive problems in both males and females. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, used in large doses on GE RoundupReady crops, has also been linked to fertility problems in male and female rats, along with a 35 percent drop in testosterone levels at otherwise non-toxic glyphosate levels

 

By Dr. Mercola

Genetically modified (GM) mosquitoes could be released into the U.S. environment as early as January 2012.

A private firm is planning to initiate the release of the GM mosquitoes in the Florida Keys.

The first GM mosquito release took place in the Cayman Islands in 2009, and the second in Malaysia in 2010.

Now, residents of the Florida Keys, like those of the Cayman Islands and Malaysia, will be subjected to these genetically manipulated insects, without having any say in the matter.

Natural Society reports:

“The mosquitoes are genetically modified with a gene designed to kill them unless given an antibiotic known as tetracycline.

Offspring of the GM mosquitoes will receive this same lethal gene which will kill the offspring before it can ever reach adulthood.

As more genetically modified mosquitoes mate with wild mosquitoes, the idea is that more and more offspring will be produced with the lethal gene, thereby reducing the mosquito population.

Of course the risks these mosquitoes post … are highly unknown …

With the release of genetically modified insects could come the downfall of both local and global ecosystems …”

While the biotech industry remains steadfast in their official stance that genetically engineered foods and animals are safe and provide valuable benefits, realityis telling us otherwise…

Genetic Engineering of Plants and Animals is in Full Swing

Unfortunately, many people are still completely in the dark about the genetic engineering taking place, both in plants and animals.

I’ve written numerous articles about the health dangers of genetically engineered (GE) foods, and while I’ve not covered the issue of genetically modified animals to any great extent, this too is taking place. For example, sheep that are 15 percent human have already been developed in an effort to create spare parts for organ transplants, and goats have been engineered to deliver spider silk in their milk.

Cows have also been genetically engineered to create something more akin to human breast milk, in an effort to make cows milk more nutritious…The list goes on, but you probably get the gist.

While the rationale behind all of these experiments appears altruistic, the fact of the matter is that we’re playing with and artificially altering carefully balanced systems. And when we do so, unexpected ramifications are virtually guaranteed to occur, because we simply do not understand all there is to know as of yet…

As for the release of genetically engineered “suicide” mosquitoes, what will happen to the local ecosystem when the mosquito population decreases or is eliminated entirely? While you and I may abhor mosquitoes, and while they do carry diseases like dengue fever and malaria, they are also primarily a food source for other life forms… Taking the myopic view that we simply want to eradicate a disease-carrying insect is dangerous in the extreme once you start to contemplate the impact it may have on the entire food chain, from the bottom to the top!

What exactly will happen when we increasingly begin to replace natural-born life forms with genetically engineered versions?

The truth is, we don’t know! But we can make educated guesses, based on the best evidence available, that the end result will likely be less than ideal for human survival… It may seem obvious that no one would trade financial gains for the extermination of all life on earth, but that is in essence the path we’ve set ourselves on, with the ever-expanding array of genetically modified seeds and animals.

Genetically Modified Foods Already Linked to Reduced Fertility

Genetically engineered (GE) corn- and soy have already been shown to reduce fertility in animals, and glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s weed killer Roundup, which is heavily used on GE crops, has also been shown to alter fertility.

For example, female rats fed GE (Roundup Ready) soy for 15 months showed significant changes in their uterus and reproductive cycle, compared to rats fed organic soy or those raised without soy. According to researchers, if women experience similar changes in the uterus lining and altered hormonal levels, it might increase the risk of retrograde menstruation, in which menstrual discharge travels backwards into your body rather than through your uterus. This can cause a disease known as endometriosis, which may lead to infertility.

The disorder can also produce pelvic and leg pain, gastrointestinal problems, chronic fatigue, and a wide variety of other symptoms.Genetically modified soybeans are called Roundup Ready.

They contain a bacterial gene that allows the plants to survive a normally deadly dose of Roundup herbicide. Although the spray doesn’t kill the plant, its active ingredient, glyphosate, actually accumulates in the beans themselves, which are then consumed by livestock and humans. There is actually so much glyphosate in GE soybeans that when they were introduced, Europe had to increase their allowable residue levels 200-fold!

Glyphosate Poses Risk to Female Reproductive Health

Although there are only a handful of studies on the safety of GE soybeans, there is considerable evidence that glyphosate—especially in conjunction with the other ingredients in Roundup—wreaks havoc with the endocrine and reproductive systems.

Glyphosate throws off the delicate hormonal balance that governs the whole reproductive cycle. It interferes with aromatase, which produces estrogen, and it’s also highly toxic to the placenta in pregnant women. In a 2009 French study, scientists discovered that glyphosate can kill the cells in the outer layer of the human placenta (the trophoblast membrane), which in turn can kill the placenta. A mere 1/500th the amount needed to kill weeds was able to kill these cells! The amount is so small, according to the study’s authors, that the “residual levels to be expected, especially in food and feed derived from Roundup formulation-treated crops” could be enough to “cause cell damage and even [cell] death.”

If the endocrine function of the placenta is destroyed, then ovarian and endometrial function may also suffer, and the end result could be a miscarriage.

It’s important to remember that glyphosate can accumulate in your body, allowing its toxic effects to grow worse with repeated consumption of foods containing these Roundup Ready crops. Clearly, this may become a serious concern for the next generation, as most young children—girls and boys alike—growing up today are fed processed foods containing GE ingredients on a daily basis, year after year…

Glyphosate Affects Testosterone and Harms Male Reproductive Health Too

Last month, an animal study published in the journal Toxicology in Vitro, found that glyphosate induces necrosis and apoptosis (cell death) in rat testicular cells in vitro, and decreases testosterone production even at low exposure levels. The authors write:

“Roundup is being used increasingly in particular on genetically modified plants grown for food and feed that contain its residues. Here we tested glyphosate and its formulations on mature rat fresh testicular cells from 1 to 10,000 ppm, thus from the range in some human urine and in environment to agricultural levels.

We show that from 1 to 48 hours of Roundup exposure Leydig cells are damages. Within 24-48 hours this formulation is also toxic on the other cells, mainly by necrosis, by contrast to glyphosate alone, which is essentially toxic on Sertoli cells. Later it also induces apoptosis at higher doses in germ cells and in Sertoli/germ cells co-cultures.

At lower non toxic concentrations of Roundup and glyphosate (1ppm), the main endocrine disruption is a testosterone decrease by 35 percent. The pesticide has thus an endocrine impact at very low environmental doses, but only a high contamination appears to provoke an acute rat testicular toxicity. This does not anticipate the chronic toxicity which is insufficiently tested, and only with glyphosate in regulatory tests.”

GMOs Have Never Been Proven Safe, Nor Beneficial…

Last year, I interviewed Dr. Philip Bereano on the topic of genetic engineering. Dr. Bereano has spent the last 30 years investigating genetic engineering of crops, animals, and humans. His work led him to participate in the negotiation of two international treaties under the United Nations that dealt with issues relating to genetically modified organisms (GMOs). In that interview, he shares his perspective on the complete lack of safety of GE foods, stating:

“First of all, we need to understand what we mean by the word safe. Actually, in terms of the academic literature, “safe” refers to “an acceptable level of risk.” It doesn’t refer to situations where there is no risk. Most of us drive in cars all the time and consider it to be safe even though we know that people are killed and injured in automobiles frequently. We have to understand that safe equals acceptable risk.

The problem with calling genetically engineered organisms safe is that there are no valid risk assessments being done on them. There is no research, really, being done into the health or environmental effects of a genetically engineered organism. Certainly no work that is published in the open peer-reviewed literature, or that isn’t proprietary. Corporations promoting these things claim that they have done research, but you can’t get any information on it because it’s all claimed to be proprietary.

Under what is known now as the precautionary principle—which is what your grandparents used to teach you about “looking before you leap”—the only prudent course of action is to NOT proceed with something which has potential risks and onlypotential benefits until you know a little bit more about it.”

I couldn’t agree more.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/01/10/genetically-modified-food-reduce-fertility.aspx?e_cid=20120115_SNL_MV_1to read more, go to: