Dogue's Blog

Apr 28 2015

Human Emotional Management

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

Working with animals is extremely rewarding, but it also yields a dirty secret, people in our line of work burn out. We change bad behaviour into good behaviour, we improve the human-animal bond, we teach, we…

Apr 22 2015

Emotional Projection - Part 2

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

A while back I wrote a piece called Emotional Projection. The scientifically oriented article focused on possible sources of projection. Unfortunately, the somewhat long description didn't discuss how to actually use projection to change emotions…

Apr 14 2015

Time to Say Goodbye

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
The hardest part of owning a pet is when we realise our animals don't live forever. We live in such close proximity to our companions that pain felt by their loss is not only profound and…

Mar 31 2015

How To Train Fearful Dogs The Social-Cognitive Way

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

Fear and anger are emotions expressed through fearful and aggressive behaviours. Of the two, fear proves to be the hardest dog behaviour problem to overcome. Many trainers don't address fear and prefer to refer clients because…Read more

Mar 24 2015

Conflict, A Force To Be Reckoned With

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

In human society, certain people have come to believe conflict is a necessary process in order to establish and maintain social relationships. That being said, non-human social animals have developed displacement behaviours to prevent conflicts from…Read more

Mar 17 2015

When Anger Gets in The Way

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
Ever have one of those days when you feel, for no particular reason, like nothing is going right? You drop everything, the milk went bad, the cat pooped in the tub AGAIN, the dog had a…

Mar 3 2015

It's A Matter of Choice

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
I'm often asked how did I merge passion and profession. Although there's no one answer to this question, there's one guiding principal which governs any professional opportunity, it's called choice. You must first decide to make…Read more

Feb 23 2015

From Bed to Bait Dog

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
We were in a small village in the northern part of the Dominican Republic, between San Juan and Puerto Plata. The three kilometer section of beach I was covering that week was delimited by a small…Read more

Feb 4 2015

Winter Puppy Syndrome

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
Every spring, I see a reoccurring phenomenon. I've termed this event Winter Puppy Syndrome*. The cyclical event occurs every spring and affects the behaviour of thousands of dogs. Winter Puppy Syndrome is an insidious phenomenon…

Feb 3 2015

How to Train "Sit", The Social-Cognitive Way.

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

This week's article will focus on one behaviour we believe is an essential component to your dog's behaviour repertoire. We will discuss and teach you how to do a perfect sit. In future weeks, we…Read more

Jan 27 2015

Dog Companionship No More.

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT

I've written a lot of articles in past years, yet one type of article stands out from the group, relationship articles. People are fascinated with human-dog relationships and strive to understand their companions. Science teaches us…Read more

Jan 20 2015

Socialisation: Adult Dogs Are Key.

By Gaby Dufresne-Cyr, CBT
While we certainly don't encourage people to buy puppies for Christmas, tis the season for thou new bundle of joy to enrol in puppy class. Puppy socialisation classes aim to teach puppies how to communicate as…