Injured and orphaned elephant babies come to them from all over East Africa, where each individual is rescued, medically treated and then raised up to an age in which it can be integrated into a wild herd. Next we visited the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, as known as the Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage. (Do you love the “Do not climb up the wall’ sign?) Here’s me and good friend Donna feeding an adult female. But mostly, I loved having their massive heads–the size of our torsos–floating down toward us, followed by their long, purple tongues curling around the treats we fed them. Along with being in complete and total animal rapture, I loved that we were treated like rational adults who would (or would not) listen to the keepers who warned us about certain animals. Some are docile, others enjoy bashing your head with their own (their primary method of fighting). Watching them glide across the plains, seemingly frictionless, is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.īesides supporting their conservation efforts, visitors get to hand feed the giraffes. Giraffe are hands down one of my favorite African animals. There are only about 1,600 left in the wild, and the center has re-introduced up to 40 giraffes into wildlife parks. We went to the Giraffe Centeron our first day in Nairobi, which protects and breeds the endangered Rothchild’s Giraffe. The photo’s today are from the beginning of our trip. MEANWHILE, back in Africa: So much to say, so many photographs. I know of many people who love dog parks, and have had nothing but good experiences there. I should also mention that I am very lucky: I live in the country with large, fenced areas for my dogs to play, and nearby areas where a well-trained dog can be safely off leash. I can say that 1) I’m not a fan of small ones, especially with a single entry gate that allow entering dogs to be swamped, 2) I have strong feelings about how they should be designed (large, double entries, rules that keep people from playing by the gates, owner education efforts to name a few, 3 There are lots of dogs I’d never take to a park (Maggie would crumble into pieces at one), and 4) The dog parks I visited with Luke and Lassie around San Francisco (Bark’s home field), when I lived there to do my Animal Planet show, were full of some of the best behaved dogs I’ve seen. Of course, I’ve been to many in Wisconsin (with clients) and have indeed seen lots of healthy play and behavior, as well as cases of problematic dogs and oblivious owners. No one ever came to me because their dog loved going to the dog park and never had any problems at one. ![]() Full disclosure is that I have few objective opinions, because I, and my colleagues, only see clients whose dogs have either created problems at a dog park or suffered from them. ![]() In fact, despite at times the presence of an irresponsible owner and unruly dog, most off-leash areas we’ve frequented for three decades are relatively incident free. Here’s part of what they have to say, after agreeing that parks could be better monitored and that yes, some parks have problems:īut we take issue of the tone and heavy-handedness of this article-the main takeaway is that dog parks are teaming with dog fights, careless owners and rife with disease! That has not been our experience. Soon after, Bark Magazine came out with a counter to these arguments titled Dog Parks Can Be Great Places for Offleash Activity. ![]() Make the time you have with your dog meaningful and enriching after all, your dog wants to spend time with you, too.” “Ultimately you’re the only one who can determine if the risks outweigh the benefits of dog parks, but there is no shame in not surrendering your dog to what has become the quintessential urban dog experience: running with dozens of strangers in a small, smelly pen as people stand by, looking at their phones or gossiping. Here’s a concluding sentence from the article: The article points out problems that can be found in dog parks, problems that many of us are well aware of: They are lousy places to “socialize” young puppies, they may contain dogs who are not necessarily aggressive (although that too is possible), but are playground bullies who terrorize other dogs like some nasty kids on a playground, they have the potential of spreading disease, there is usually no separation between small and large dogs, which can cause injuries or dogs being frightened (see “playground bullies” above) and can contain owners wh0 are oblivious to important social signals between dogs that signal discomfort, downright fear and/or hard-eyed aggression. But the Times jumped into the fray, with an article provocatively titled The Dog Park is Bad Actually. No controversy there, right, about the good, the bad and the ugly of them? However, the pros and cons of dog parks are usually discussed inside the dog world, not in a national news outlet like the New York Times.
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