Imagine this…you’re walking along, and suddenly your dog is at your side, staring at you. You look around and you see why….chicken bones on the ground, squirrels playing near the path or that ever-so-tempting pile of horse poop!

A solid “Leave-it” cue is cool but an automatic leave-it is way better!

This webinar is all about just that. Starting with no cue at all, Denise will walk you through the steps of developing a strong leave-it! First you’ll teach a traditional cue and next you’ll work towards an automatic response to attractive options in the environment. How cool is that?!

Along for the ride is a leave-it for the food refusal exercise found in a variety of dog sports.

Join Denise and find your walks become a lot more relaxing as your dog takes responsibility for leaving stuff where it belongs – in the environment!

WEBSITE LINK:  https://www.fenzidogsportsacademy.com/index.php/self-study/webinars

Out of all the events your nonprofit may have on its annual fundraising calendar, donor cultivation events are one of the most important. After all, donors don’t grow on trees—although it’d be cool if they did…

That is not reality; let’s rewind. What is a donor cultivation event? And how is it different than a regular fundraising event? A donor cultivation event, also known as a friendraising event, is a more intimate event tailored to cultivating new donors!

During this webinar you’ll learn:

• How donor cultivation events are the gateway to individual giving
• 7 tips on hosting a Friendraising event
• How to identify your next donors
• How to engage your board in Friendraising
• How to engage your top donors in Friendraising

Speaker: Sabrina Walker-Hernandez, President/CEO of Supporting World Hope

WEBSITE LINK:  https://www.networkforgood.com/resource/evt-cultivate-new-donors/

Pregnant queens with their tiny baby kittens are already arriving in many parts of our country – and in some places, the kitten season never stops!

These moms and their babies need trained fosters to save their lives. Have you thought about fostering a mom with kittens? Have you fostered already, but would like to know more? Join us for this free training!

Register for the event here

Presenter: Susan Spaulding, AKA “The Nation’s Kitten Mom”

If you can’t join us for the live presentation, don’t worry! Sign-up anyway, because a recording of this, and other webinars, will be available on NKC’s eLearning Center no later than 2 weeks after they air.

WEBSITE LINK:  https://kittencoalition.org/event/pregnancy-and-birth-caring-for-pregnant-and-nursing-cats-and-their-kittens-2/

Work-life balance is never easy for people who work in animal sheltering, and increased lengths of stay and high staff turnover have only made the job more challenging. As you support the people and pets in your community, caring for yourself and your teams can feel like a secondary goal. Join Lindsay Hamrick, Director of Shelter Outreach & Engagement with the Humane Society of the United States, to learn why work-life balance can be difficult in animal welfare and practical tips for organizations and individuals to identify barriers to achieving better balance. Attendees will learn strategies to create boundaries between their professional and personal lives, affording time for individualized self-care and wellness while still meeting the needs of the mission. Register to join us live on Thursday, March 16 at 5pm CT.

WEBSITE LINK:  https://zoom.us/webinar/register/6016782060176/WN_bFeC6G6NR8yw9miDQOq8Rg

The most common cause of companion dog relinquishment and non-medical euthanasia is problem behavior. Many animal behavior professionals utilize descriptive assessments, functional assessments, or medical assessments to try and identify the functions of problem behavior in order to target those functions in behavior modification protocols. However, studies have demonstrated differences in accuracy and efficiency between functional assessments and functional analyses.

Mouthing is a relatively common problem behavior observed in pet dogs, and many owners seek to reduce the frequency of the behavior. However, the functions of dog mouthing are unknown; therefore, behavior interventions are based on descriptively-informed behavioral functions. As a result, current interventions may lack efficacy or even worsen the behavior.

Although the functional analysis is the gold standard for identifying human behavioral functions and developing function-based interventions, its use in the animal behavior field is still relatively rare. This study assessed the validity of the functional analysis for mouthing in companion dogs and tested function-based interventions informed by the results. Participants included three dogs and their owners participating in a functional analysis and intervention assessment. Data indicate that function-based interventions informed by functional analysis results were efficacious for reducing problem mouthing.

Discussion in this session will include how the functional analysis was set up, behavior was measured, data were analyzed, and results were integrated into interventions.

Learning Objectives:

• Identify the importance and definition of an operant behavioral function (what drives a particular operant behavior).
• Be able to describe the relative differences between functional assessments and functional analyses, in addition to understanding the differences in outcomes and efficiency.
• Understand the relative frequency and possible functions of dog mouthing behavior.
• Have a very general understanding of the setup of a functional analysis protocol and interpretation of functional analysis results in the context of dog mouthing behavior.

Presenter: Dr. Mindy Waite

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, KPA 1, IAABC Pending

Registered for the live event, get busy and cannot make it! No worries you will automatically receive a recording!

WEBSITE LINK:  https://petprofessionalguild.com/event-5064798

“Fawning” in dogs is a stress response often utilised when the threat is inescapable or unpredictable. Dogs in these situations will try to appease others to avoid conflict. This can involve tail tucking, crouching, and other appeasement behaviours, which may be misinterpreted as calmness or obedience. While fawning is less well-known than fighting or fleeing, it’s still a common response to stress in dogs and can have serious consequences for their mental and emotional health, particularly. For those dogs that have been impacted by trauma.

In this webinar, we’ll explore what fawning is, why it happens, and how it can impact our dogs’ lives. We’ll discuss how fawning can develop as a survival strategy in response to abusive or neglectful situations, and why it can be difficult to recognize and address as dog owners. We’ll also explore how fawning can contribute to anxiety, fear, and behavioral issues in dogs, and discuss strategies to build coping skills to aid rehabilitation. By the end of this webinar, you’ll have a better understanding of the fight/flight/fawn response in dogs, and be better equipped to identify and manage fawning behaviors. Whether you’re a dog owner, a trainer, or simply interested in learning more about the psychology of stress in dogs, this webinar is for you. Join us to explore this important topic and learn how to help your dog build resilience in the face of life’s challenges.

Presenter: Danielle Beck

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT , KPA , & IAABC Pending

Registered for the live event, get busy and cannot make it! No worries you will automatically receive a recording!

WEBSITE LINK:  https://petprofessionalguild.com/event-5172514

For over 20 years I taught a senior level Learning & Behavior college course. The topic that consistently led to the most confusion was negative reinforcement (-R). While many learning theories and ideas seemed logical and sensible to most students, negative reinforcement (as both a term and a concept) was often a sticking point. I see that same confusion for many animal trainers. That’s a shame, because negative reinforcement is a very powerful and effective way to change behavior. Unfortunately, it also has the possibility of being misused in damaging and unethical ways.

I believe that negative reinforcement is one of the most misunderstood concepts in operant conditioning because the term itself seems like an oxymoron. We typically think of the definition of negative as something bad. In the world of learning theory, negative actually means “to remove or take away something”. If you keep this in mind everything that follows begins to make more sense! We also need to consider the actual meaning of the term reinforcement when we discuss learning. Reinforcement is a consequence that is meant to increase a behavior. So negative reinforcement is something that is removed or taken away in order to increase behavior. Once the language and definitions are properly sorted out then we can move on to the good stuff; how to use it to change behavior.

This webinar will cover what negative reinforcement is and how it works, the related concepts of pressure, release, & relief, human & animal examples in the real world, the possible fallout & ethical issues associated with -R, and several basic training protocols. So get your training nerd hat on and come geek out with me about negative reinforcement!

Instructor: Deb Jones, PhD

WEBSITE LINK:  https://www.fenzidogsportsacademy.com/index.php/self-study/webinars

Do I really need to pill this cat?

In this complimentary, 30-minute VETgirl–Elanco YouTube LIVE event, Dr. Tamara Grubb, PhD, DACVAA reviews acute pain from a cat’s perspective. How do we know cats feel acute pain, and what can we do to identify pain? Tune in to learn what analgesic treatments are most effective for acute feline pain.

NOTE: To attend this YouTube LIVE session, there is no “registration”. To attend, simply go to our YouTube Page at the time of the event where the webinar will be hosted, LIVE!

Thanks to sponsorship from Elanco, this webinar is FREE to all! (Remember: you must be logged in as a free Trial or Elite member to register for the live event)

WEBSITE LINK:  https://vetgirlontherun.com/webinars/april-13-2023-youtube-live-what-cats-want-us-to-know-about-acute-pain/