Cat treats are a little harder to come by than dog treats. It’s easy to see why – treats tend to be mostly about training, and most people don’t even think about training their cats!

That said, I think cats can and should get some training. Most cats can be taught to come when they’re called, and if you catch ‘em young, they can be taught all kinds of tricks. Check out this youtube video from the States.

I reckon at the very least, cats should be taught “come” (which could save their life one day), and “get down” which comes in oh so handy at our place where little black pawprints cover every surface.Another command I think every cat should learn is “stay”. Think about it. How many scenarios can you come up with where that would come in handy? Just off the top of my head…

• Keeping an indoor cat from running out the door (it works because they know they’re busted!)
• Keeping an outdoor cat from running out in front of a car.
• Stopping a cat from jumping up onto food preparation areas.
• Keeping a cat from jumping down into a dangerous situation – like when you’ve just dropped a glass and haven’t picked up the bits (or is that just me? I’m kinda clumsy.

I’m a great believer in treat-based training, but I couldn’t for the life of me find something that my cat would work for – besides the not really health-and-sloppy fish paste option.

Cat treats need to be yummy to the cat but easy to handle and dole out in small quantities. I bought some scary heart-shaped ones but Mei Mei turned up her tiny nose at them. My last cat loved dried fish, but again, they were not to the likings of our little princess. I was fast running out of options, until I discovered these appallingly-named treats at Woolworths. Say it with me now “Love ‘em Purrfect Liver Treats.” Naming products is a science, see?

They come with all kinds of reassuring claims about natural goodness and veterinary degrees and such. They’re dry enough to handle and moist enough to be tasty, you can break them up if you want to, they cost just four bucks and best of all, Mei Mei will literally jump through hoops for these.

I tend to run my dog through his arsenal of tricks about three times a week these days just to keep him on the ball. Now when we’re doing our little trick sessions, I often feel a pair of beady blue eyes on me – that’s Mei Mei, wanting treats too.

She learned “sit”, “stay” and “get down” so fast I’m kind of wracking my brains for other useful things to teach her. Like all treat-based training, you have to be sneaky or she’ll only do it when there are treats in sight. Good thing these are generally within reach now.

RATING:
BUY IT: Woolworths/Pet Supersavers
COST: AUD$3.95

I’ve always wanted a climby thing to keep my acrobatic cat amused and out of our hair, but as a lifelong renter the options aren’t so good. I can’t exactly be screwing avant-garde home-made climbers into the wall a la apartment living. And the thought of purchasing a standalone cat climber is a little depressing. (Seen how much floorspace these babies take up? Now get out your calculator and work out how much rent you’ll be paying to house this. That’s valuable floorspace you’re paying for my friends. Floorspace you could be STANDING IN RIGHT NOW.)

So file this amazing over-the-door cat climber under “Why didn’t I think of that?” It’s spring loaded, minimalist and generally, like I said, amazing.

It’s puppy season again and new owners everywhere are falling in and out and back in love with their new best pals. My Jack is nearly through the puppy stage now, but memories of our little terror are still vivid in my mind. So here is Miss D’s definitive list of products that make the road to puppy ownership a little less, erm, slippery.

1. Puppy School

Puppy School is taking off all over the world. The idea is, a bunch of starry-eyed owners and their ridiculously cute new pets gather together in council halls and veterinary surgeries in the first week. You get to learn all about What You’re In For, and get the fun of watching every puppy grow even bigger and cuter over the weeks as their owners develop worry lines, nervous twitches, marital problems, etc.

Seriously though, puppy school is the single best thing we did for ourselves and our sanity. Ours had the cutest puppies in it, Bouncy the poodle, Ben the Boxer, Jazzy the Bitza. Jack was a fearful little pup and I’m sure that puppy school went a long way towards making him the happy little soul he is today. And as for myself, I hold onto a mantra that the trainer gave me: “Just think how calm he’ll be when he’s eight.”

2. Puppy pads

Puppy pads are to puppy owners what nappies are to mums and dads. They may not be cheap, or environmentally friendly, but geez, they make the job of toilet training easier. We bought the wickedly expensive ones at first and then graduated to the cheaper model, available at K-Mart. Jack took to them like a dream. The expensive ones, I must admit, turn liquid to an easy-to-pick-up gel, and have some kind of chemical attractant embedded within them so the pup doesn’t need much encouragement to use them. But the cheap ones do well too. We had all kinds of dramas getting Jack to go on newspaper. Puppy pads made it all much much easier.

3. Wizdog

As you might gather from the sidebar, I’m like a Wizdog Pusher or something. This simple little tray to hold newspaper for your dog is one of the smartest products I’ve seen for dogs. Once Jack was paper trained, moving him on to the Wizdog was easy. I loved that it held your standard newspaper and was so easy to clean.

4. Positive Dog Training

The book that Jack eventually chewed to bits. It is a great introduction to the philosophy of positive training. If you’ve been tempted to scold or hit your dog, or resort to vinegar and water-type remedies, have a read of this for a different perspective. It’s a great introduction to the technique and taught me so much about managing Jack without losing my temper. The result is a happy, trusting dog who does what I ask and comes when he’s called – I’m amazed.

5. Puppy Kong

Oh the Kong the Kong! (Sing it with me now.) The kong is another of those Greatest Dog Inventions Ever, and I’ll never be convinced otherwise. It’s pretty simple really. If you’ve got an indoor dog, you need a Kong.

6. Everlasting Treat Ball

If you’re feeding your puppy in a bowl, you’re missing out on a really fun opportunity to keep him happy and out of your hair. We moved Jack onto the everlasting treat ball when he was about six months old, and have never looked back. Six month old dogs are, if you’ll pardon my French, a pain in the tits. The combination of everlasting treat ball plus plastic funnel plus kibble keeps Jack out of our hair for hours. He loves it, we love it, everyone’s happy. I’ve worked “Where’s your ball” into Jack’s training routine, so he can help us find it when, once again, we lose the bloody thing.

7. Crate
Crates are controversial in Australia – most people’s instinct tell them that a dog in a cage = bad news. But I suspect that as society becomes more urbanised, we’ll embrace the idea. I bought a crate for Jack when we moved back to the inner city. We couldn’t let him sleep outside because he was barking all night at every little noise. But our new house was too small to have him sleep inside, either. A covered crate with a fancy-pants dog bed in it was the perfect solution. Jack sleeps in there all the time, and at night we close the latch and he doesn’t seem to mind. He took to it the day we bought it with nary a squeak of complaint. Get a folding one so you can fit it in the car. And make sure your dog can stand with his head held hight, and turn around comfortably, or else the RSPCA will get all grumpy with ya.

8. Car strap
Jack’s car harness is one of those gadgets that makes me glad to be living in the twenty-first century. Admittedly there’s a bit of wrestling involved in getting him into the harness and snapped onto the seatbelt, but it’s getting easier with time. And the payoff is great – Jack can’t jump around the car, and in an accident, he’d have a similar level of seatbelt protection to the rest of the family.

9. Stain remover - BioZet

Anything you can do to make clean up quick and easy will go a long way to reducing the stress of toilet training on yourself. For us, biozet was an easy and affordable answer to cleaning fabric, floorboards and carpet. It’s got enzymy thingies in it that break down the chemicals that puppies leave behind when they pee. That way, you don’t get repeat offenses once you’ve cleaned it up.

10. Aloveen Shampoo
This isn’t the only ph balanced moisturising shampoo on the market, and by no means the cheapest. But it was a godsend for us when Jack had an itchy skin complaint. We had the vet’s blessing to use this stuff up to three times a week. It smells nice and doesn’t dry a dog’s skin like many shampoos do.

Hoo boy do I have mixed feelings about this stuff. The vet handed it to me when Jack had a skin allergy and said: “You can wash him with this three times a week.”

Cue angelic choirs, guitar riffs and orchestra swells.

Not that I’m an obsessive neat-freak or anything (far far from it). It’s just that we’re having a particularly wet year, and when there are puddles of water around, Jack is as happy as a pig in – well, I think you know where I’m going here. The muddier and smellier, the better.

People coo at Jack’s cuteness when he’s all dry and fluffy. But when Jack finds a puddle, these same people run with their arms flailing like a Warner Bros housewife with a mouse in the house. “Argh! Get away! DON’T LET HIM TOUCH ME!”

Jack gets more spectacularly muddy than any other dog I’ve seen.

(By the way, did you know that “Poodle” comes from the German word for “Puddle”? I think this is deeply ironic given what it sounds like in English.)

Aloveen shampoo promises all kinds of lovely things like aloe vera (obviously) oatmeal, and a ph balance that won’t dry your dog’s skin. It smells nice, feels all luxurious and lotion-y like a salon shampoo (the kind that you have to sell your kids to afford) and does a great job. But a little bit, she doesn’t go a long way. I used a whole bottle in about a month. And the price – well, you won’t have to sell your kids, but it’s enough to make you cry.

“You should try the conditioner too,” the vet nurse said. “You can run it through his coat between washes to keep him smelling nice.

Hmmm. I wasn’t too impressed with shelling out for a nice smell. The only sound argument I’ve heard for Dog Conditioner is that it makes dirt fall off the fur more easily.

So anyway, yes, this is a lovely product, and yes, it kept Jack’s skin itch-free and yes, it’s probably worth the money if you have a dog with an ongoing skin complaint.

But for myself, the hunt for a non-drying but cost-effective dog shampoo continues.

RATING:
BUY IT:  Petalia
COST: AUD$25.75

The word “mouthy” is dogpeople talk for “nips fingers and toes ALL THE BLOODY TIME.” Our wee Jack was EXTREMELY mouthy as a puppy – to the point where I was leery of having him mix with children. He never bit hard, but like a human infant – everything went straight into the gob.

The conventional advice for puppies that bite all the time is to yell “ouch!” and withdraw all attention for ten seconds when they bite. Remind them reproachfully “gentle” and then resume play until they “mouth” you again. Repeat about a gazillion times.

This approach works because it mimics what happens in puppyland. You only have to watch puppies at play for a few minutes to see the principle in action – if you bite, there’s a yip and everything stops. Then after a bit, play resumes. This is how puppies learn to be gentle.

But there’s another school of thought on this subject. The theory goes that if puppies aren’t socialised with other dogs enough, they’ll never learn “bite inhibition”. And this means that the first time you step on poochy’s tail and he lashes out in pain, you could end up with a serious bite because he never learned that biting hard hurts.

This article, The Bite Stops Here, is written by positive dog training guru,  Ian Dunbar. Have a read and make up your own mind. I found that Jack’s “mouthiness” magically disappeared around the six month mark – although he still loved to lick. Three weeks of consistently crying “Ouch!” And withdrawing all attention worked a treat. He just wags up a storm now, because he knows that’s what gets him the pats.