Your family is filled with animal lovers, and few people are as interested in furry companions as your children are. However, while they already know all the joys playing with a pet can bring to their lives, you also want them to understand what a big responsibility it is to care for another living creature. How can you teach them this?

You will need to first think about your children, and determine what they can understand about caring for a pet, and how you can show them the skills necessary to do so. Younger children will need frequent reminders and can really benefit from some role-playing opportunities in addition to lots of supervision when around a pet. Older kids may be able to handle more tasks on their own, and can better understand the reasoning behind certain care requirements. For more information, please contact your local San Leandro, CA vet clinic.

... Read more »

Obedience training helps your dog learn what you want him to do, usually with a command. This would include sit, stay, down, come and the like. The general method is to use a food treat to approximate the desired behavior. You introduce a command and when your dog does the behavior, he gets the treat and praise. Eventually you reduce and then eliminate the treats so he obeys you by the command and praise alone. Behavior training, on the other hand, generally involves teaching your dog what not to do and includes housetraining, not jumping on people, not begging at the table, among other behaviors. This training relies on your deterring your dog from doing the behavior through redirection or prevention. Then you anticipate when the undesired behavior will occur and giving him something else to do. Neither type of training i ... Read more »

Your pet is a big part of your family, and you take caring for her very seriously. This means that you not only want to be able to spend time with her, but also give her every opportunity to live a life she is happy with.

Preventative care can help with this, as it will give her a chance to pass over some issues entirely, and make others less severe. Because your pet is likely to combat certain things throughout her life, preparing for them and taking the time to ward these off can make a large difference in her quality of life. Consider taking the time to talk with her vet about ... Read more »