November 2008 - ABC Radio Perth, Australia - Breakfast Show

Thank goodness for continuing jet lag! I had to be up at 5 am (and I am not the best early riser on the planet!) so we could beat the rush hour traffic and get to the centre of Perth for my 7am interview with Eion (pronounced Ian) Cameron.

I had been told by his colleague Brad that Eion may be bringing in his “psycho spaniel” and sure enough when I arrived and met the big man himself he was accompanied by Taj, a 7 year old cocker he had rescued from almost certain death.

To listen to the audio - click below

Taj had previously bitten – in fact Eion informed me that his record was 7 people and one dog in a single day! It took one question to ascertain the reason for the biting – the same old story of people going up to Taj. Of course, he is an adorable looking dog, but a dog nonetheless. He tried to jump up on me and I gently pushed him back down without speaking or looking at him. Taj was cool about this and left me alone at once. Job done – no biting. Easy really.

The interview quickly became a phone in and the switchboard was jammed. I gave advice to people whose dogs were messing in the house, chewing the washing, digging up the garden, not coming back when called, barking non-stop, fussy eating etc etc. In short, the usual things. All good stuff and they were pleased with the whole feature (which went on 15 minutes more than they initially thought).

By the end it was interesting to see that Taj had decided to go to sleep at my feet, something which happens to me a lot. When a dog sees you are a leader it can trust, it chooses to be with you (I have to point out sometimes this does NOT mean the dog loves me more than the owners!).

So job done and immediately we are contacted by a vet who is very interested in having this kind of approach to dogs in his surgery – excellent. Here’s the thing though, and this is why I have my work cut out. Taj, the supposed serial biter remember, was far removed from the “psycho” I had been told about, as you can see from the pictures. Yet everyone who came into the studio (and even one girl outside when I was chatting to Eion and Brad after the interview) made a point of fussing Taj, even though he had a track record of telling people off when they did not respect his personal space. The fact that he did not react in this way now was a credit to his self-control.

One girl, when I asked her to initially pay no attention to Taj when she went in to do her slot, actually pouted at me as if I was asking her to kick the dog in the head. Folks, it is not cruel to ignore a dog at first. This is all about taking the pressure off a dog, about mutual respect for personal space. I respected the fact that Taj told people when they got it wrong, and he respected me for not doing that. It’s that simple. As I say many times, if only people get this one thing right 99% of dog bites would not happen.

Funny how little dogs bite more than big dogs do……. It’s because they’re “just soooooo cute….. ow!”

Tony