Open please

“I did not know they came in bottles!”

Photo Friday

Shepherd with his horse and dog on Gravelly Range Madison County, Montana, August 1942. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Russell Lee. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress Color America

From the Denver Post’s July 26, 2010 plog feature Captured: America in Color from 1939-1943.

These images, by photographers of the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information, are some of the only color photographs taken of the effects of the Depression on America’s rural and small town populations. The photographs are the property of the Library of Congress and were included in a 2006 exhibit Bound for Glory: America in Color.

Links to Make you Think

The Distorted Perspective on euphemasia

sarabeth photography’s photo essay on red lake rosie’s rescue

Why coffee makes you pee

No more pumpkin on store shelves (we still have plenty in the freezer)

A forest of ginormous dog sculptures – WANT, WANT, WANT!

Kennel Club Photography Contest Winners

The UK’s Guardian published photos by top winners in the Kennel Club’s 2009 Photographer of the Year contest.

The winner was this photo of a Leonberger towing a boat.  Leonbergers and Newfoundlands are the only dogs allowed to compete in Newfoundland Club of America water rescue trials.  Towing a boat  is a  requirements for the Water Rescue Dog (WRD) title.

Right Before You’re Eaten

H/T to Bayou Renaisannce Man for posting about a story in The Daily Mailon photographer Simon De Glanville who gets London’s animal residents to pose for unique close-up pictures by baiting them with chips, bread, kebabs and curry.  De Glanville uses an antique fisheye lens from Belarus to capture these incredible shots.  According to The Mail:

Simon, who trained as a zoologist before taking up photography 12 years ago, now works as a wildlife cameraman travelling the world shooting documentaries. However when he is not travelling the globe, Simon often spend hours at a time snapping the local talent near his South London home.

Here’s a small taste of his work – go see the rest and see what the world might look like right before you’re eaten.

In The Garden

We’ve all got jobs to do

Digging, hauling, removing rocks – darling husband does the heavy work

Watering, weeding, planting, pruning – the one-armed wonder does the light work

Audie does double duty – hauling a bucket of bugs, worms and weeds feed to his chooks and acting as chief of vermin control

The peeps manufacture mulch and fertilizer
Yup – in the garden, everyone’s got a job to do

 Well…. almost everyone

Dogly Dioramas

With ambient temps in the double digits below zero and the windchill approaching 40 below, it’s a really good night to stay inside and goof around on my computer.  Thanks to Jessica over at Bioephemera who posted a link to TiltShiftMaker, a nifty website that lets you upload photos and transform them to tilt shift style miniatures, I had something new to play with.  According to the folks at TiltShiftMaker:

Tilt-shift style miniature photos are simply photos of real life scenes that are made to look like miniature scale models.

This is done using either a special camera lens (one with tilt capability), or with software, instead of a special lens. These photos are sometimes called “fake” miniatures, because they are pictures of real-life scenes.

They look like dioramas made by skilled model makers.

 

 

“He Just Attacked Out of Nowhere!”

As a dog trainer I’m frequently called on to help people deal with aggressive dogs.  It is some of the most difficult, rewarding and sometimes heartbreaking, work I do.  Dogs evolved to be our companions in life – but they can also be very dangerous. 

If you have an aggressive dog in your home, do not try to fix the problem yourself.  Dogs can be very dangerous, even small dogs. Earlier this month a 6-month old child in Lexington, Kentucky was killed by a Jack Russell Terrier.

Don’t risk your life, or worse yet, a child’s life, by ignoring aggressive behavior or trying to trying to fix it on your own. And don’t make the dog someone else’s problem by dumping it with a rescue group without telling them the real reason you are getting rid of him.  To fix a problem like this you need to hire a dog trainer who has experience working with aggression.  We suggest you look for one who is a member of the International Association of Canine Professionals or the National Association of Dog Obedience Instructors.

Aggression is part of animal life and although there are many ways that animals express aggression, some features are common to most aggressive actions.  One of these is escalation.  Aggressive encounters usually start with a low risk, low intensity exchange of aggressive displays.  If these initial displays don’t end the encounter, increasingly intense – and progressively more dangerous – patterns of behavior follow.  If neither animal backs off, the encounter will eventually end with the most potentially damaging behaviors the animals are capable of.  This progressive increase in the intensity of aggressive behavior is called escalation.

Emotional aggression arises from impulsive actions and is therefore less affected by weighing risk against reward than resource-based aggression is.  Because of this, emotional aggression tends to escalate far more quickly.  A dog that is reacting out of fear, frustration or other emotional triggers will typically escalate more quickly than one who is calmly defending his territory. 

Dogs are masters at emitting and reading subtle contextual cues; most people are not.  The first signals a dog emits when he is aroused are usually very subtle and can therefore be missed by an inexperienced or inattentive person (or dog). When those initial, subtle signals are not acknowledged, the dog’s actions will escalate, especially if he is emotionally aroused.  I believe that this is why many people describe aggressive encounters with dogs as occurring without warning.  The warning was there, but it was so subtle that the person missed it. 

Escalation is a vital factor in canine aggression. The first step to curing problem aggression is being able to recognize key signals the dog exhibits early in the process. If we interrupt the dog at an early stage in arousal, it is usually easy to redirect him to more appropriate behavior. But if the dog has escalated to an overt threat stage by the time we try to intervene, we are far less likely to be successful – and far more likely to be bitten. 

Another key factor to keep in mind when you are faced with an aggressive dog is changes in rates of behavior.  When most people observe an aggressive dog, they look for specific reactions and postures (growling, bared teeth, stiff movement, etc.). These changes of the dog’s outward state are important, but we should also look for changes in rates of behaviors.  Escalation to the next level of aggression is often indicated by changes in rate of behaviors like pacing, panting, blinking, wagging, or other repetitive actions. For example, you may see a dog suddenly start to pace more quickly right before he moves into the next, more intense stage of aggression. 

When you observe a change in the rate of an action like pacing in an aroused dog, make a mental note of the postures, expressions and movements the dog displayed right before the change occurred. Some of these are likely subtle signals of aggression that you’ve missed in the past.  If the dog is still in an early stage in the process, it may be possible to divert his attention and redirect his behavior to another outlet.  If he is strongly aroused, there is more warning to avoid additional conflict or injury.

It is also important to realize that arousal happens quickly and calming down takes time.  Aggressive reactions are physiological, not just psychological, reactions.  Changes like increased respiration, heart rate, elevated adrenaline levels and other factors take more time to abate than they do to begin. To prevent an aroused dog from re-escalating, you should take him away from the source of his arousal and give him a chance to calm down. 

And remember – UNLESS YOU ARE AN EXPERIENCED, PROFESSIONAL DOG TRAINER – do NOT try to work with an aggressive dog yourself.  This article is purely informative.  It is not intended as a guide to working with aggressive dogs.

Links to three photos illustrating increasing levels of aggressive display.  In the first, Zorro is giving subtle signals (intent gaze, head positioned over Audie, tight lips) to young Audie to back off.  The second photo shows Zip intent on taking a toy from Audie.  The intense stare, prominent whites of her eyes, open mouth and ears aimed forward indicate she is in a higher state of arousal than Zorro was.  The third photo shows Aussie Roo (RIP) telling three much larger dogs to back off in no uncertain terms.  The completely bared teeth, tight forward-pressed lips, wide open (almost bulging) eyes and stiff forward posture are warning them that her next step will be to bite.