Four years ago yesterday, we adopted Irie. We’d visited her shelter because we’d seen an Australian cattle dog on Petfinder, but once we arrived at the shelter we realized the cattle dog was just too energetic to be a companion to our then 15-year-old Yoda.

While we were at the shelter, we recognized another dog whose photo we had seen in this Petfinder photo:

The rest, of course, is history! The six-month-old pup in that shelter photo we saw on Petfinder is now our Irie.

Because Petfinder has been instrumental in bringing us three of our family members–Irie, Tiki and Inca–we are so excited to be co-hosting Super Dog Sunday with AllThingsDogBlog.com to benefit Petfinder Foundation.

If you’re not as familiar with Petfinder Foundation as you are with Petfinder itself, we wanted to provide a little more information about this nonprofit. According to their website:

Petfinder.com Foundation works with shelters, rescue organizations and animal welfare organizations across the country to help ensure that no adopt-able pet is euthanized for lack of a good home.

Petfinder Foundation helps shelters and rescues in a wide variety of ways. Recent projects have included assisting The Plain and Fancy Animal Rescue of Pennsylvania when it was devastated by an electrical fire. It has helped SpokAnimal Care and Meadow Gates Farm Sanctuary obtain digital cameras so they could share photos of their adoptable animals on Petfinder. It has joined other charitable groups in providing $150,000 worth of grants to animal welfare agencies impacted by the Gulf oil spill. The list goes on and on with projects big and small.

This weekend, we’ll be working hard on Super Dog Sunday and we look forward to seeing and sharing your photos of your pets and awarding all the great prizes to the winners.

But we’re also so happy to be helping out Petfinder Foundation through the donations of our great Super Dog Sunday sponsors and by encouraging Petfinder Foundation donations from our readers. There’s NO fee to enter Super Dog Sunday but, if you have a moment, we’d love for you to consider a small donation to Petfinder Foundation. You can click on the Petfinder Foundation image at the top of this post or you can text 4PETS and your email address to 20222 to donate $10 to Petfinder.com Foundation!

And, as always, the next time you hear that a friend or neighbor is looking for a dog, cat or other pet to add to their family, please ask them to check out Petfinder.com as they start their search. There are a lot of great dogs like Irie out there looking for their forever home!

Whether you’re having a full-fledged Super Bowl party at your house or just plan to kick back and have a little tailgate party of your own in the living room, we’ve got some tips for you on keeping Fido safe during the football fun:

• Keep an eye on alcoholic beverages. Don’t let Bowser near the beer or any kind of booze. While you may always be careful about that practice, your guests may not so keep an eye on their drinks, too.
• Keep cautious canines crated or otherwise secured. All that football action could very well mean some raised voices and waved arms, not to mention strange people in the house if you’re hosting a party. If your dog is fearful or shy, let him have some quiet time in his crate, away from the action, in a far bedroom, or safely in a fenced yard. You can go out and tell him the score at halftime.
• Watch the trash. Super Bowl parties mean food and a lot of it…and that means trash. Be sure to keep your trash secured so your dog cannot eat the disposable plates.
• Beware of bones. Many Super Bowl parties mean buffalo wings with bones. Chicken bones and dogs are a definite no-no so keep an eye on those plates of wings.
• Manage the munchies. Many of the tempting munchies that your guests might bring–from trail mix with raisins to decadent chocolate brownies–can be dangerous to your dog. Keep an eagle eye on chocolate, raisins, macadamia nuts, onions, grapes, and diet foods containing Xylitol.
• Tag Your Dog. Even if your dog doesn’t typically wear his collar in the house, be sure your dog is tagged for party time. The coming and going of guests and the activity of the day could mean a loose dog.
• Designate a Dog Watcher. Designate one member of your family to keep an eye on your dog throughout the party fun.

A few minutes of preparation before your Super Bowl party and during the party itself can score a touchdown in terms of canine safety!

We’ve got some great tips here today from petMD.com (a super resource for all these related to your dog’s healthcare). Here are their top recommendations for both preventing and treating uncomfortable skin problems in dogs and cats:

• Avoid bathing your pet with shampoos or soaps during the winter. They can strip away natural oils and moisture and result in dandruff. Simple water baths should be sufficient.
• If shampoo is absolutely necessary, make it a moisturizing shampoo, and add in an additional moisturizing rinse.
• If you have passed the point of prevention and need to treat your pet for irritated skin, oatmeal baths are a well-regarded remedy.
• When choosing products for treatment, you need to keep in mind your pet’s age, health status, coat type, skin folds, and more. It is best to speak directly with your veterinarian or groomer for recommendations.
• Use a soft brush on your dog’s coat. This will stimulate the hair follicles and natural oil glands, removing dead skin cells and loose hair and giving the skin a better chance to heal.
• A nutritionally balanced diet year-round will keep your pet’s skin in its best condition.
• Make sure your dog is receiving adequate levels of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. Consult your veterinarian to determine if your pet’s food contains proper levels, or if cat or dog supplements would be best.
• You can’t control the outside temperature, nor can you keep your pet indoors all the time. You can, however, maximize your indoor air quality through the use of humidifiers and fans to keep air circulating and prevent allergens from collecting.

In the continued series of training videos from trainer April Mackin from Birds and Animals Unlimited, today April teaches you how to train your buddy to lay down. April is the trainer for the “Treasure Buddies” movie, coming to Blu-ray/DVD on January 31, 2012. And, along with April, you’ll see Rosebud starring in this fun, positive reinforcement video.

If you love the “Buddies,” don’t forget to enter our giveaway for the new “Treasure Buddies” DVD…10 lucky readers will receive copies!

Have you made your football-themed photo for Super Dog Sunday yet? The photo contest and blog hop on February 5 are going to be a lot of fun (with great prizes from our sponsors) and will feature photos of your pets with a football theme, whether that’s a photo of your dog in a football jersey, with a football, or a “dressed out” photo with a football theme!

Recently we wrote about how you can use ImageChef.com to give your photos (or Petfinder photos of adoptable dogs) a football theme. Today we’re going to cover Picnik, another service that makes online editing a snap.

The bad news is that Picnik is closing in mid-April. The good news is that, in the meantime, all of its features are free, even premium features!

First, pop over to Picnik, sign up for a free account, and upload a photo of your dog or a Petfinder adoptable dog. A forward-facing photo like the one of Tiki, above, makes it easy to work with but you’ll find football-themed goodies facing different directions (and you can flip directions, too).

Once you’ve uploaded your photo, the fun begins! Open the “Edit” tab then select “Stickers” (see the pink highlighted area). “Stickers” will give you a whole array of football options, from footballs to helmets. I’ve pasted the beige helmet on Tiki; it has sizer corners to drag and resize the helmet to fit the photo:

Once you’re happy with the image, you’ll save the photo to your computer. That’s it!

Once you’ve saved the photo, you’re all set to submit it to Super Dog Sunday, the special event we’re co-hosting with All Things Dog Blog to benefit the Petfinder Foundation! Help us score a touchdown for homeless pets with your photo!

Brett will be sharing his tips on both the Life+Dog site and in the magazine (which is going national on Feb. 14…watch for it in Barnes and Noble stores everywhere!) but first we wanted to share some of our favorites from his many tips.

We love this lighting tip, especially appropriate during the winter months…

For more advanced photographers, Brett had some tips so they could take advantage of natural light without reaching for that flash…

We’re just learning post-production tricks on Photoshop, and we’re definitely going to follow this tip of Brett’s:

We love this lighting tip because it requires no special equipment and it’s applicable no matter what type of camera you’re using:

Finally, this last tip is one that applies to just about everyone these days because we’re all carrying cell phones! (And, after all, the best camera is the one that you have with you!)

Why Organic for your Dog?

Guest post from Arcanatura LLC, a pet care company specializing in holistic veterinary products.

U.S. sales of organic food and beverages have shot up from $1 billion in 1990 to $26.7 billion last year in 2010. The terms “natural” and “organic” have become a growing trend, the shelves in supermarkets increasingly stacked with more of the foods we should be eating. Organic foods mean more nutrition and less antibiotics, pesticides and environmental degradation; simply put, organic foods are grown and raised in harmony with the earth, rather than in factory farms that destroy the land and pollute the environment. Eating organic not only means supporting your own healthy diet, but a conscious effort to better understand how the 2,000 pounds of food the average American eats each year impacts the environment. View a cool infographic about food consumption in America here.

So, what makes pet food natural?

“Natural” foods have more recently crossed over into the pet realm with brands promoting their products showcasing images of smiling dogs and grassy fields. The truth is, the only way to ensure your pet’s food is entirely natural and wholesome is to take to the kitchen and make it from scratch. According to Dr. Karen Becker of the Huffington Post, “living foods” are important: “‘Living foods’ are simply uncooked foods in which the natural enzymes necessary for proper digestion have not been heated or otherwise processed ‘to death.’ These enzymes are considered the ‘energy’ or ‘life force’ of food.” The best way to deliver these types of nutrients to your pet is to feed them nutritious, fresh foods prepared at home. It doesn’t take a canine or feline culinary master to care for a healthy, organic pet, though – this merely means feeding your pet human-grade foods like organic meats, fruits and vegetables.

The Problem with Commercial pet foods is…

They often contain ingredients like “beef tallow,” “poultry fat” or synthetic proteins in place of real, nutritional ingredients. These cheap additives are hard for your pet to digest and difficult for their little organs that are put into overtime trying to process the bologna. If you’d rather purchase prepared pet food, before you buy, check the label for processed ingredients like these that are used as fillers, binders, and offer little to no nutrition.

Pet Food Ingredients to Avoid:

1. “Animal Fat” (animal source unspecified)
2. Artificial colors
2. By-products
3. Corn/Wheat Gluten
4. Sugar, Salt or Corn Fructose

Visit The Dog Food Project to view a complete (and seemingly endless) list of what to avoid and why when buying pet foods. By choosing to feed your pet organic meats rather than processed, fake ones, you have made the wise decision not only to better your pet’s health by delivering them the proper natural nutrients their body needs, but also to conserve the environment. In our country with over 93 million cats and 77 million dogs, each organic pet pledge counts.

Unsure what to feed your senior pet? Read more here to make sure they’re getting the right nutrition for their needs.

Training your dog is one of the most important things you can do to keep your dog happy, healthy and balanced.  While there are many types of trainers out there to choose from, one thing that will benefit any and every dog is using a harness instead of a collar to train them.  Harnesses keep your dog and pup’s neck, throat and spine safe, provide your dog or pup with better body awareness and will never ever choke your dog again.  And it’s the most humane way to train any dog or pup.

Sharing with our Dogtipper.com audience the benefits of harnessing your dog’s energy to unleash their greatest potential is our resident Dog Training Columnist, Alecia Evans.  Alecia is the inventor of the Walk In Sync™ Humane Dog Walking and Training System (enter to win your own here).

Alecia has successfully transformed hundreds of dogs over the last decade humanely  and is on a mission to raise the bar on the tools we use to train dogs to make all training tools humane and and bring awareness to Training our Dogs Humanely so that harness training becomes the new gold standard.

Here is our interview with Alecia:

Can you tell us about your background and how you came to invent Walk  In Sync?

I have lived with and loved dogs all my life.  My training background started a fitness trainer for humans helping people reach their health and fitness goals.  In my early 20s, I adopted a Chocolate Lab named Barney (think Marley’s younger brother).  As I was not a dog trainer, training Barney was a total challenge.  The trainers I worked with told me to continue using training tools that were harsher and harsher: choke chain, prong collar, nose halti and shock collar, none of it seemed right to me.  Barney’s issue wasn’t that he was a bad dog, the issue was that I was using the wrong tools to use to train him.

I had been reading a book on dog training by Linda Tellington Jones and in it Linda mentioned that sometimes dogs lose their connection to their body, this had never occurred to me before.  She suggested wrapping the leash around the dog which changed Barney’s awareness in seconds, instead of pulling me he stood still and just looked at me and he shaped his pace to mine.  It was instant and amazing but not at all possible to walk down the street with him.

In that instant I made Barney a promise that I would find a way to train dogs completely humanely and with total respect for the dogs/puppy’s body so that no dog would need to be choked again in the training process.

Fast forward 14 years and I have been professionally training dogs for 6 years and still am looking for a way to train them without choking them.  I was introduced to front clip harnesses and fell in love with the ease and effectiveness of them.  I was also a canine massage therapist and while I loved the harnesses I began noticing that I was not happy with the fit as it was cutting across the dogs and pups shoulders, the buckle was chafing their back leg and from a biomechanical standpoint this was not acceptable to me.

So I starting asking myself and the universe, “What else is possible in being able to create a training system that offers tools that are biomechanically correct for the dog, will never choke them, will be easy for their people to use and work with consistently, will improve clear communication between human and dog and works so well it will feel like the dog trained itself?”

The vision for Walk In Sync™ came to me one day and I began developing the prototype 2 weeks later.  It has been a steady climb doing research and development with over 1000 dogs to make sure I have produced the best fitting, most effective, and totally humane walking and training system that can be used with any dog, any time, any age.

The main mission of Walk In Sync™ is to raise the bar on all training tools making them totally humane (pain free and choke free) for all dogs and puppies.  Its time for us to take a more critical look at using anything around a dogs’ neck to train them and the potential harm that we could be causing their neck, throat and spine.

What do you see as the biggest training challenge for most dog families?

The biggest training challenge for any dog family is consistency.  Consistency of leadership is what produces consistency of a dog.

What most people forget is that dogs are the best trainers and raisers of dogs.  Humans try to be good but we are at a deficit because we speak different languages.  And while dogs are so accommodating to us to learn what we need from them, rarely do we try to accommodate them by learning the silence of their language.

A puppy will be trained 24/7 by his mom, dad and pack as they teach them how to survive.  Dogs love based on respect.  Humans on the other hand work off of emotion rather than instinct so we try to have the puppy love us before it respects us and we do so at broken up intervals that are not consistent and this is where problems start.

So the biggest challenge is teaching humans how to be consistent trainers like dogs.  We as humans tend to look at training as an activity, where dogs look at training and socialization as a way of life.  It is because of looking at it as an activity rather than a lifestyle that we fail our dogs.

The unique handle grips on the Walk In Sync™ Accu-Grip™ Leash coupled with the Walk In Sync™ Harness which offers a great fit and will never choke your dog or pup allows for precise handling, clear consistent boundaries that the dog learns almost instantly and a totally new spin on training that honors and encourages the dog’s intelligence to make healthy choices while respecting their body by never choking them.

Many families added a new dog to their household during the holidays.  What advice would you give on leash training your new puppy?

Leash training should begin as soon as possible even just around the house.  The greatest suggestion I can make is to make sure that you work with a harness on your puppy to attach the leash to.  Your puppy’s neck is very delicate and yanking on it with a traditional collar can cause unseen damage by causing neck vertebrae to become misaligned which could lead to other health challenges that you might not relate to this vertebral imbalance early on, it can also cause soft tissue or cartilage damage that you may not be aware of.   I always suggest keeping a collar on your dog because it is what holds his/her tags but I do not recommend using a collar to train or walk your pup.

Harnesses are safer, provide your pup with much better body awareness and just make more common sense.  Think about it: Would you put any of the tools, even a flat collar , not to mention a metal choke chain, a metal prong collar, a nose halter or a shock collar around your or your child’s neck and allow them to choke themselves and think for one second that they would be able to think clearly and be happy about being choked and want to actively participate in that?  So then why do we do that to our dogs?

According to Temple Grandin, from her book, Animals In Translation, says, “The single worst thing you can do to an animal emotionally is the make it feel afraid…Animals feel intense fear when they are threatened in any way, regardless of whether they’re predators or prey.”   If you had a metal choke chain popped on your throat, do you think you might feel afraid?  Or if you have metal prongs sticking into your neck or a shock give to you, would you think it might cause you a bit of fear?

Then please imaging for a moment what your sweet puppy may feel and use a harness and leash training system that will help you help them easily and consistently.

If a family has been having difficulties walking their grown dog, what’s the best course of action to retrain a dog so that everyone, human and canine, can enjoy the walk?

With over a decade of training and almost 15 years of bodywork on animals under my belt I will share with you my perspective on retraining.

First, almost all dogs or pups that pull do so because they have been taught that pulling gets them to move forward, even if it is in small increments because they are dragging a human behind them.  Pulling means go forward and if it has worked for them in the past then they will continue doing it in the future unless you retrain them, more importantly until you train yourself to stay consistent on the walk and not allow them pull you.

The best way I have found without having to choke the dog or cause them pain is to use a harness that clips at the front, along with a leash that has handles on it to help you be very specific about your hand placement so that you create clear consistent boundaries with your dog and are able to set new rules.

The new rules are:

1. You pull, we stop.

2. We don’t move till you back up.  Have patience here and don’t correct the dog allow the dog to correct themselves to back off of pressure)

3. You back up (pat and praise), we can go forward.

Three easy steps, clearly communicated, from a calm, leadership standpoint will help any dog rebalance their behavior.

For super invested pullers, I suggest using a treat that motivates the dog to pay closer attention.   This makes it less of a struggle to regain leadership.

Also, convicted pullers have usually been at it for so long that they do not often feel the discomfort of choking.  SO in this case you will need to move the dog around more and direct their feet with yours making them pay more attention to where your feet are and thus more attention to you.  I suggest walking like a drunk person in circles, cutting straight in front of them and making quick turns without telling them, if they walk in front of you stop, if they go behind you keep walking and they will choose to keep up which will have them walking in sync with you in just minutes.   Your job is to be calm, confident and clear and treat when you are getting the behavior you desire.

What makes Walk In Sync different from other kinds of harnesses?

Walk In Sync™ differs from other harnesses in the following ways:

1. Walk In Sync™ is a system which includes a harness and leash that work together to stop pulling and train your dog to easily master walking on leash in just minutes.

 A harness alone is great to stop choking your dog but it won’t help you train your dog.  You want a leash and harness that work together and a harness that clips at the front to ensure easy, safe and effective training in minutes.

2. The design of Walk In Sync™ is biomechanically correct with our buckles on top and shaped so that your dog cannot escape from it.

Most other front clip harnesses are cut in a way that has the shoulder straps going straight across the dogs shoulder and limits the dogs shoulder stride.  This can cause muscle imbalances and interfere with your dog’s gait, especially puppies.  Most other front clip harnesses also clip under the front leg with a big buckle that sits right behind the dogs legs and often rubs the back of the leg raw.  Many owners have complained that their dog escaped from the other front clip harnesses.

3. The Accu-Grip™ Leash is the most biomechanically correct leash for your arm and will avoid shoulder or wrist strain injuries.

I recently found out from a friend who had to go to physical therapy that the second most commonly treated injury Physical Therapists see is: shoulder strains related to dog pulls.

4. The comfort handles on the Accu-Grip™ Leash will ensure that you never experience “leash burn” again.

Have you ever had a nylon leash rip through your hand and your dog pulled away in another direction?  I have once and it is not fun.

5. The Walk In Sync™ Harness has two leash clip positions making it easy for you to train your dog by clipping at the front and when done training clip your dog at the top for walking.

By placing the clip in front of the dog, when the dog bumps into the end of the amount of leash you have given him/her, he/she will choose to back up and move off of pressure because it is in front of them.  When a harness or leash is clipped at the back, the dog has the ability to use the power of their front legs to dig in and try to pull away from pressure.

6. Walk In Sync™ is a calm, quiet way to connect and communicate with your dog in a language of clear boundaries and silence which is closer to the natural language of your dog.  In seconds, the tools you are using will transform you into the calm, effective leader your dog has been begging you to be.

Teaching your puppy to sit is so important, and it’s an easy skill to teach. Today we’ve got a new episode in this month’s Disney training series for “Treasure Buddies” featuring positive reinforcement trainer April Mackin and Mudbud!

“Treasure Buddies” is available on Blu-ray & DVD Combo Pack and Digital on January 31, 2012.

As we continue National Train Your Dog Month, we wanted to share a video from Debbie McKnight, training expert for PetSmart (where our Irie was trained!)

This video helps illustrate how you can get your puppy accustomed to a crate, using his natural “denning” instinct to keep him from going to the bathroom until he is out of the crate. This video demonstrates how to teach a dog to go into and be comfortable in his crate; watch as Debbie teaches Wookie how to enjoy going into his crate.

We love that this video, like PetSmart training classes, uses positive reinforcement to make the training fun for both the dog and the trainer!