Agenda - 03-21-1990 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

• Housebreaking and socializing her to her housemates, a cat and a scarlet macaw, began immediately. Training has been an on-going, integral component of Katula's daily life. She is obedience trained. Come, sit, stand, down, belly-up, flip, fetch, out, stay, wait, crawl, back, gentle, place, let's go, and heel are the commands in her current daily vocabulary. Her training, socialization and guidance continued to the day she was arrested. Patricia, my wife, was/is taking her through one of my group obedience classes with dogs 4 months to 4 years of age, 25 to 100 pounds. She missed her group lesson on the past two Sundays -- and they missed her. The process is unfinished; she is still an exuberant, puppyish, loving and responsive canine, and there is much more to be done. She possesses an impressive intellectual capacity. She has learned basic tracking and my associate and fellow trainer was preparing her for Human Search and Companion Animal work. I ask for a conditional exemption and offer these conditions as both realistic and adequate: • supervision by professional dog trainer(s) • adequate confinement • continued socialization • further obedience training • resumption of Search training • relocation away from the old neighbors and neighborhood. • continued collaborative interaction with both Animal Control and APS. I realize you are faced with a difficult and potentially precedent-setting circumstance. I, too, plan a growing future in offering precedent-setting services to animal loving Orange County -- Katula has been and is a significant factor in that plan. I can only offer my continued support and cooperation. It is a complex issue! The dog is the most variable specie in the animal kingdom next to man, and that variability accounts for its remarkable intelligence and talents. Dogs range in size from four pounds (Chihuahua) to 220 lbs. (Tibetan Mastiff), and in temperament from the placid to the ferocious." "As far as we can tell from genetic analyses, canis familiaris, doesn't exist. It's Canis Lupus. They hybridize freely and their offspring are fertile. All the breeds we see, from the teacup Chichuahua to the giant mastiff, are subsets of the grey wolf. The dog is a man-made artifact." (THE POLITICS OF DOGS - Mark Derr - ATLANTIC MAGAZINE March 1990) Thanks for your patience, effort and consideration / S________________ Ilk ohn Stuart Coleman