This is a wonderful post written by fellow behaviourist and friend Kris Glover on the importance of choosing someone who has the academic depth of knowledge to be able to take a full and detailed case history, liaison with your veterinary surgeon and be able to accurately diagnose why there is a problem, and what steps to take to overcome this. A few weeks ago I worked with a wonderful caregiver who spent his limited budget on a behaviourist to help solve the issue of the his dogs fighting in the house. The caregiver paid close to a total of £200 for 3x one hour visits. The behaviourist did not request medical histories from the dogs vets- if they had they may have read some very important details crucial to the case. The behaviourist has no knowledge of ethology- if they had they may have understood better the reasons why the dogs were fighting. If the behaviourist had the knowledge that the caregiver thought they had, then they would have advised on a suitable behaviour modification plan taking health and ethnology into account and the dogs would no longer be fighting....instead the behaviourist advised on basic training; sit, down, recall. A consultation with me has involved taking a full case history, the dogs interactions with each other, their caregivers, establishing which resources are important to each other and their individual RHP....I spent an hour on the phone with the caregiver and reading the behavioural questionnaires, and medical reports. I spent 4 hours at the clients house and a further 2 hours writing my report and in the coming weeks I will spend at least 2-3 hours answering questions etc.... Thats a total of at least 9 hours.... would you be surprised that the cost of this is far less that the £200 charged by the behaviourist. The caregivers pet insurance will cover my costs as I am a Full member of the APBC. There have been no more fights since MY visit... BEWARE OF EXPENSIVE IMITATIONS- spend your money wisely ask for proof of academic qualifications, being good with dogs is not enough!
Posted on: Sat, 03 May 2014 11:23:03 +0000
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