Dogs are our companions, playmates for our children, and best friends. Some dogs even have jobs: there are a number of tasks that dogs perform. Dog owners often get their dogs specifically for this purpose, or at least train them accordingly. Here are a few dog professions and their areas of activity.
Rescue dogs are deployed in crisis situations. For example, they help find people who have been buried after an earthquake. Once the rescue dog has found something or someone, it must signal this to its handler. These dogs must have an extremely good sense of smell and be very stable in character. They must not show any fear or aggression towards humans or animals. These dogs need strong nerves in their work, whether searching through rubble, searching large areas, mantrailing, water rescue, or avalanche search.
These dogs mostly support people with physical or mental disabilities. An assistance dog is trained to perform minor tasks for humans. These include, for example: opening and closing doors, transporting laundry to the basket, turning lights on and off, "calling" the elevator, getting help in an emergency, and picking up and fetching objects. When working with deaf people, they are trained to alert them to important sounds. Assistance dogs include signal dogs (for deaf people), service dogs, epilepsy dogs, and diabetic alert dogs.
These dogs help people to cope with various tasks, including those of an emotional nature. They help children, mentally ill people, and the elderly. This requires the animal to have a high stimulus threshold and tolerance level. Training includes basic obedience training and is designed to enable the dog to carry out certain commands at any time. Before starting work, such dogs must pass certain tests.
Docile but also stress-resistant dogs are trained with special tricks for working in front of the camera. Not only do they have to be able to do certain things on command, they also have to get along well with lots of people so that they are compatible with a wide variety of actors and actresses.
These dogs undergo special training and are trained for a wide variety of events and situations. Drug detection dogs must also have an exceptionally keen sense of smell so that they can sniff out things that humans cannot find. In fact, there are also dogs that are trained to sniff out endangered species in suitcases or to find hidden data storage devices, such as hard drives or USB sticks, containing information that is relevant to criminal investigations.
Hunting dogs – actually called working dogs – must pass an appropriate working dog test before they can be used. These dogs are often tasked with searching for wounded or killed game. They have a variety of roles: some are used in hunting packs, others in burrows, for flushing game, or for retrieving. In all cases, the hunter is responsible for their dog, which is not allowed to simply run through the forest and chase game.
These assistance dogs are specially trained to support blind or severely visually impaired people. They learn to recognize obstacles and guide their owners safely from A to B. Guide dogs even have to master a kind of independent thinking. This can be seen, for example, when the blind person wants to cross the street with the dog, but the dog does not do so because a car is approaching. These dogs are raised in foster families from the age of one until they begin their training, which allows them to build trust in humans.
Sled dogs are athletes. In a team of dogs and with their musher, they perform at the highest level of competitive sport. The work is particularly physically and mentally demanding for the leader—the lead dog, who bears full responsibility for his team of up to eleven dogs. This dog communicates with his musher, carries out his commands, and motivates the entire team.
When humans began to engage in agriculture and livestock farming on a larger scale, dogs took on a key role in working with grazing animals. From then on, their task was to keep the herds together and drive them.
The valuable livestock on the pastures also needed to be protected from predators such as wolves and bears. Since herding dogs were usually too small for this task, livestock guardian dogs were bred. These courageous and imposing dogs live with the herd from an early age and are used to working independently of the shepherd. With the return of the wolf, livestock guardian dogs are once again being used more frequently to protect herds, including from livestock thieves.
The task of a guard dog is to guard its territory or a herd of livestock. How exactly it should react to an intruder or danger depends on the dog handler. The guard dog's repertoire ranges from barking and scaring off intruders to actively defending its territory.
While dogs almost exclusively suffer from an underactive thyroid gland, cats often develop an overactive thyroid gland (hyperthyroidism). This is the most common hormonal disorder in older cats and often first manifests itself in weight loss despite a consistent food intake.
There are many different situations in which your horse may find itself in distress. But is it really an emergency? And what is the right thing to do? Here you will find useful information on how to assess your horse's situation. The most important thing is to stay calm and keep a clear head.
Obstetrics deals with monitoring pregnancy, preparing for and assisting with childbirth, providing postnatal care, and performing any necessary surgical procedures, such as caesarean sections. It is a branch of gynecology.
Cats are among the most popular pets worldwide. Around 15.7 million domestic cats live in Germany. However, living with cats has changed significantly in recent decades. From farm cats that caught mice, they have increasingly become domestic cats that have had to adapt to their owners' daily routines. Restricted in their desire for freedom, the majority of these cats now live exclusively indoors. This can result in varying degrees of behavioral changes in cats.
When keeping horses, we as owners are constantly challenged to consider what might be best for our horses. One positive development in horse husbandry is that more and more stables are trying to offer conditions that meet horses' natural needs for sufficient free movement and contact with other horses. However, keeping horses exclusively in groups, such as in an open or active stable, may not be the best option for every horse, especially in the case of stallions or older horses with special needs. It is up to us to decide on the best form of care for each individual horse and to create the best conditions for them. One aspect of this is the choice of bedding in the stall or the lying area of our horse.
They purr, wrap themselves around us, and are small and cute. Cats can be very quiet and gentle. But they can also be very different: cats kill when necessary with a few well-aimed bites. A cat's teeth are a weapon.
Ultrasound, medically known as sonography, is a standard procedure in veterinary medicine alongside X-rays due to its simplicity and non-invasive nature. It can be used to visualize various internal areas of the body in two dimensions.
As the name suggests, anemia means that your dog has too little blood, or more precisely, that the number of erythrocytes (red blood cells) and hemoglobin (the pigment in blood) is reduced. Anemia is not a disease in itself, but a symptom that can accompany many different diseases.
It's pretty much every cat owner's worst nightmare: your pet has eaten something poisonous! Now you need to act fast – get your cat to the vet immediately.
This herpesvirus specific to dogs (CHV-1) is the main pathogen responsible for kennel cough and is also the main cause of fertility problems with a high mortality rate in dogs. Like the human herpes virus, the canine herpes virus can retreat into the host cell and cause latent (present but not visible) and persistent (ongoing) infections that can be reactivated by stress.
Bearded dragons are somewhat reminiscent of miniature dinosaurs – a fascinating species of reptile. These interesting lizards can become very attached to their owners and form close bonds with them.
Stomach ulcers have long been considered an "occupational disease" in racehorses and competition horses. It was thought that early training, the stress of the racetrack, or frequent transport to international competitions caused stomach ulcers. However, we now know that this condition can affect horses of all breeds and performance levels. Even your neighbor's pony, grazing peacefully in the meadow, could be suffering from a stomach ulcer. Although around 90% of all racehorses are still affected by stomach ulcers, the proportion of leisure horses with the condition now stands at 37%.
