All About Lost Pet Finders
Few things are more harrowing than when your beloved pet goes missing. Thankfully, there are trained professionals like Bonnie Wagner-Westbrook, a Certified Missing Animal Responder/Pet Detective. Bonnie was kind enough to answer a few questions to better educate us on this potentially life saving pet service. (more…)
Halloween 2023 Tips and Tricks For Our Furry Friends
Halloween is a fun and spooky time of year, but…
…it can be quite stressful for our beloved dogs and cats. It’s essential to consider Halloween from your pet’s perspective. Dogs have a natural instinct to protect their home and alert you to strangers, while cats usually prefer a quiet environment with their family. Let’s explore some tips and tricks to ensure your pet’s Halloween 2023 is fright-free.
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Boom, Boom…Paw?
Is your dog scared of loud noises? Pet Pro, Jennifer Damon, knows how to help!
Pet-icures and Other Paws-itivity from Petworks
Welcome to the freshly relaunched monthly newsletter from Petworks, where we’ve decided it’s spring (whether Mother Nature knows it yet or not). Spring! Time to take the dog for longer walks, sit outside with the chickens, and keep the cat from eating the blooms you’ve arranged in a vase on the table. And when you start in on a cleanout of the closets, don’t forget about your furry friends–they need a little spring spiffing too.
Let’s talk dogs. Every winter, most dogs grow a thicker coat to combat the cold. With spring, of course, comes the Big Shed (and furballs tumbleweeding through the house). You can help your dog with this process by brushing and bathing her, but even better (and involving fewer puddles on your bathroom floor) would be to take your dog to a groomer and let them decide on the best tool for your dog’s coat and/or undercoat and/or dreadlocks: a brush, or a slicker brush, or a rake, or a comb, or a trim. Other important areas to attend to are the ears, eyes, and toenails. (Dog owners know the real secret to inner peace isn’t a pedicure for your own paws but one for the defiant dog!) Check the Petworks listings for a mobile groomer near you.
As you can see, Petworks is the place to hook up with all manner of experts in their fields–from groomers to trainers to clinical pet nutritionists. Every day we serve as a bridge between pet parents and pros. It’s one of the most important functions we provide, so we take seriously every pet pro, every pet parent, and every communication between them. In future newsletters, we’ll be going “Behind the Scenes at Petworks” with stories from our pro and parent peeps.
If you want to hear some stories direct from your pet, you can always check in with an animal communicator. “How does that work?” you might ask. Well, we can tell you! Through our exclusive interview with Julie, we learned that answer and a lot more about this fascinating field. Based in New York, she offers in-person or distance energy sessions for animals (and their people). “Animals have so much wisdom to share with their humans!” Julie says.
As you might expect, Petworks founder Michael Caldwell and his wife, Danielle, and kids (Graham, 13, and twins Noah and Chris, 9) are all devoted to animals. Pictured here are the human Caldwells with their canine family member, Poppy, on her “gotcha” day three years back (all the way from the great big state of Texas courtesy of Rescue Road Trips). Poppy has a feline brother, Snowy, and a feline sister, Clementine, whose purr competes with the TV when she’s busy sleeping on your chest. Rounding out the family are Noah and Chris’s lively but lamentably nocturnal hamsters, Fluffy and Cookie, and Bubbles the betta fish, who keeps watch over the Caldwell kitchen counter. Any future additions to the menagerie? Maaaaaybe a bunny (Mom and Dad?). As Graham points out, “They’re like a pretty good size–not too big and not too small–and they’re fluffy.”
Thanks so much for reading! Feel free to stop by and put in a request for a pet-pro quote (https://www.petworks.com/request_quote), and stay tuned for our May “Focus On” pet detectives (and not the Ace Ventura kind)!
Yours in pet prosperity,
Team Petworks
Tips for Recovering Lost Dogs on July 4th
By Kathy Pobloskie, Co-founder Lost Dogs of America
At Lost Dogs of America, we try to prevent dogs from getting lost by educating the public about the dangers of fireworks and other stressful situations for pets surrounding the July 4th holiday. But we also recognize that over the holiday, we will receive dozens of reports for missing dogs from owners who were caught unaware. We are a first response agency and our mission is not to judge owners for not heeding the warnings, but to give sound, logical advice that will give them the best opportunity to recover their missing dog safely.
We help owners “profile” their situation so that they can concentrate their efforts on what probably happened to their dog. Dogs lost from the noise of fireworks fall into our category of “dogs lost from stressful situations”. Although we never say never, dogs lost from stressful situations do not usually go far unless they are chased. They bolt in fear and then hide. They often will return home on their own when everything goes quiet (maybe a few hours or a few days later) or they will be recovered nearby when they finally come out of hiding.
We find that if owners follow our “Five Things to Do When You Have Lost Your Dog” action plan (see below) , the chance that they will be successfully reunited with their dog is greatly increased. It is also extremely important that owners ask everyone who is helping them to not call or chase their dog if they see him. Dogs who aren’t being called or chased will make wise decisions and may survive indefinitely – allowing the owner a chance to implement a strategic plan to catch them. Dogs who are being chased will make poor decisions and run the risk of bolting into traffic and being injured or killed.
We also discourage owners from posting rewards for their missing dogs. Rewards encourage people to chase the dog which can endanger his life. Lost dogs who are allowed to settle and relax can usually be successfully and safely caught.
Enjoy your July 4th holiday but please be aware of the dangers of fireworks and keep your pets safe! If your dog does go missing please file a report immediately with our software partner, Helping Lost Pets, who will create a free flyer and social media links for you to use. We are an entirely free service run by volunteers and we want to help you get your dog back home safely. You can also use Petworks to help you hire a lost pet finder or pet detective in your area. Happy July 4th!
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About the author:
Kathy Pobloskie is the director and co-founder of Lost Dogs of Wisconsin, an all-volunteer 501c.3 organization committed to reuniting owners with their lost dogs. Lost Dogs of Wisconsin currently has sixty plus volunteers and over 70,000 Facebook fans who share postings and help find lost dogs in Wisconsin. Kathy is also a co-founder of Lost Dogs of America, an umbrella organization that is helping other Lost Dogs State Facebook pages get off the ground. Currently 35 states are participating. In 2016 alone, Lost Dogs of America helped reunite over 27,000 dogs with their families. All of the services provided by Lost Dogs of Wisconsin and Lost Dogs of America are free to the public.
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