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Spinning in circles, jumping, frequent barking, chewing on kennel bars or on
their own bodies are common kennel stress behaviors in dogs. Animals can become
aggressive, making them go from being adoptable to unsuitable for adoption. The
potential for over stressed animals to quickly become ill is higher.
Kennel stress can be dramatically reduced or eliminated by providing a variety
of sensory and intellectual activities for the dogs. The dogs benefit
tremendously from the varied activities we provide such as scents, sounds and
physical activities.
Some
of the Kennel Enrichment activities include social interaction with volunteers
in the way of obedience or agility training, time in one of our two real life
rooms to relax and learn how to behave inside, opportunities to play outside or
just be given a variety of toys and treats delivered in unusual ways such as
frozen in ice cubes or tucked inside of foraging toys just to name a few. These
activities help the animals maintain a better quality of life while they wait
for adoption.
We
want our Kennel Enrichment personnel to have a more intimate interaction with
the dogs held at the kennel.
The
goal is for the dogs to have adequate social skills to be a desirable human
companion (and be adopted and not returned). Some dogs have no human
socialization and need work from the ground up; other dogs need to be engaged so
their skills do not deteriorate.
There
are plenty of dogs to work with in many different ways, and they all need human
compassion.
Our
concerted effort to help these dogs and record our activities as we go, will
build a more efficient system to better benefit these most vulnerable members of
our animal community. |
Your in kind donations make it possible for us to continue our Kennel Enrichment
Program.