Pet owners believe that a service provider's concern for the welfare of their pet matches their own. But there can be a decided and definite disconnect between what is advertised and what is being delivered...
By definition, people who use pet care businesses are looking for services to insure the welfare of their pets. Services that are often selected based on a perception that the service is the best one available, at a reasonable price and in a convenient location.
Part of what is being purchased is “peace of mind.” Take the dog owner who might worry that a dog is bored or lonely when the owner is away from home for 12 hours a day. Providing for the pet’s welfare by purchasing the services of a dog walker or a doggy day care establishment allows the owner the valuable belief that their companion animal is well cared for in a way they might care for them. And when it comes to paying for services such as grooming or training, stress free handling is part of what pet owners believe they are paying for.
Workers who enter the pet care services field, bringing with them a love of animals, may expect that every interaction will be enjoyable for them and the pets they work with. The reality mostly doesn't match. Working with animals can involve a good amount of manual labor in loud and smelly environments. What may be the hardest part, is the realization that other people’s animals do not comfortably respond to trainers, groomers or handlers without the support of their owners. Pets with a history of bad experiences in these situations, unfamiliar environments, and inappropriate handling because the person has not learned or been taught an informed, humane approach can be fearful and reactive.
Unfortunately, along with no regulatory requirements for formal education or licensing, not even a rudimentary knowledge of animal behavior and stress free handing are required or trained by most pet care service establishments. Even more disturbing, is often, even if people want to learn on their own, popular literature on animal behavior and training offers misleading and conflicting information and is now often dominated by the resurgence in force based compulsion training and handling methods relying on outdated dominance theories and punishment devices, such as prong, choke or shock collars (now called “training” collars).
Pet care services establishments are businesses that keep an eye on what makes the most sense for them time wise, the bottom line and their profit. That's fine, unless it leads to the conditions found all too frequently:
> Overcrowding pets kept in rooms without toys or furniture as many as 30 dogs or more at a time, looked after by one person.
> Loud and discordant music played for staff- even as studies find this disturbs pets while classical music benefits pets.
> Resulting boredom and frustration can lead to displacement behaviors such as feces eating, fighting or repetitive mounting.
> Pet care businesses including walkers, sitters, groomers and daycares, can use punishment for behavioral control, including yelling, scruffing, hitting, rolling dogs over, spraying them with water, placing them in extended isolation a/k/a "time outs," reliance on restraints such as crates, muzzles and being tied to walls.
> Trainers, on site and board and train, can use force based compulsion training including the use of prong, choke or shock collars (euphemistically called "training" collars).
> Services may have limited or no outdoor walks, insufficient sanitation, including the over-application of strong chemical cleaners such as bleach, to the point where both workers and pets suffer respiratory and/or skin irritation.
> And in extreme cases, even the loss of the pet's life.
If pet owners were aware of the way their pets were treated at some pet care services, they would not be back.
Meeting the challenge of overcoming insufficient training and harmful practices is what PetCenterEd is all about.
Ensuring our pets are cared for with the competent and humane professionalism they deserve is what PetCenterEd is all about.
We want to empower pet care service learners with a strong foundational knowledge of the science of animal behavior, the ethics and application of force free training, learning theory, biology and stress free handling, along with the time and oversight needed to develop a standardized level of applied skill so they can be the best at what they do for the pets they work with and themselves.
Providing additional services to our community through offering New York State elementary schools humane education promotes both responsible pet ownership and animal welfare.
That is what PetCenterEd is all about.
