bark's 100 best & brightest

17
49 Feb /Mar 2010 Bark BARK’S 100: The best and brightest During the past 25 years, there have been amazing advancements in the dog world. To commemorate them, we set out to find the people behind these accomplishments— the innovators, thinkers and achievers who relished challenges and whose creativity, compassion and commitment helped reshape the world of dogs and our understanding of it. Without further ado, we present our Honorees: The Bark’s 100 Best & Brightest.

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Page 1: Bark's 100 Best & Brightest

49Feb/Mar 2010 Bark

BARK’S 100:The best and brightestDuring the past 25 years, there have been amazing advancements in the dog world. To commemorate them, we set out to find the people behind these accomplishments—the innovators, thinkers and achievers who relished challenges and whose creativity,compassion and commitment helped reshape the world of dogs and our understandingof it. Without further ado, we present our Honorees: The Bark’s 100 Best & Brightest.

Page 2: Bark's 100 Best & Brightest

50 Bark Feb/Mar 2010

Patricia McConnellcombines her love for dogswith a well-grounded scien-tific understanding of them.For decades, she has spokenand written about the ethological aspects of caninebehavior and the importanceof applying that scholarshipto practical work that helpsboth dogs and people. Shebrought a vast knowledge of canine visual signals to ageneration of dog trainersand other professionals, andwas the first to teach aboutthe signals’ importance forreading dogs, understandingtheir emotional states and

The gospel of

Jean Donaldson—

cheerful training with

profuse praise and gentle

correction—has happily

permeated the world of

co-pilots like water on

a sponge, thanks to her

bestselling books,

including Culture Clash,

Dogs Are from Neptune

and Oh Behave!,

and the Academy for Dog

Trainers—sometimes

called Harvard for dog

trainers—that she founded

and directed for a decade.

predicting their future behav-ior. She has always valuedunderstanding people anddogs in order to improve therelationships between them;Trisha truly likes people asmuch as she likes dogs, and isrespectful and kind to mem-bers of both species. Despitecharges of anthropomorphiz-ing, she maintains that dogs’emotions are important andcan be studied. By discussingthe natural behavior of bothcanines and humans, she hashelped dog lovers be closer totheir animal companions andcommunicate more effectivelywith them.

—Karen B. London

The public gleans practicalwisdom from animal behav-iorist Nicholas Dodmanthrough his bestselling books,including The Dog Who LovedToo Much. But his fellowveterinarians look to him aswell. The founder and directorof Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine’sAnimal Behavior Clinic, oneof the first of its kind in1986, Dr. Dodman works onthe frontier of behavioralpharmacology—conductinggroundbreaking studies onthe use of medication totackle knotty behavioralchallenges, such as caninecompulsive disorders.

Top: Amy F

reeth-Rice; B

ottom: Amanda Jones

BARK 100

MENTORS Teachers on a grand scale, our mentors guide, support and generously share their knowledge.Where would we mentees be without them?

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51Feb/Mar 2010 Bark

Couldn’t survive without aGentle Leader? Gratitudegoes to R.K. Anderson.The multi-laurelled, multi-degreed veterinarian, epidemi-ologist, behaviorist, researcherand professor co-invented thetried-and-true headcollar aspart of his mission to gentlyand humanely prevent behav-ior problems that land dogsand cats in shelters by themillions. Dr. Anderson is alsoa main mover behind theAnimal Behavior ResourcesInstitute, a free, collaborativeeducational resource withexpert videos, podcasts andarticles for professionals andtheir clients.

Training methods usingrewards and a whistle or aclick—more formally knownas operant conditioning andbridging stimulus—havebecome so ubiquitous thatmost of us take them forgranted. We tip our cap to the late Marian BrelandBailey, who (along withKeller Breland and Bob Bailey) developedthese humane approachesand taught them to others for more than 60 years; thousands sharpened uptheir skills and became bettertrainers at the Baileys’ oper-ant-conditioning workshops,a.k.a. “chicken camps.”

Karen Pryor’s impact ondog nation has a soundtrack—or rather, a sound: click! A pioneer of positive rein-forcement training (inspiredby the operant conditioningshe mastered working withdolphins in the 1960s), Pryoris the founder and leadingproponent of clicker training.Today, marking desiredbehavior with a noisy click(and a treat) isn’t limited tothe dog world—the sharpsnaps regularly ricochet offzoo enclosures, out in pas-tures with livestock and evenin gyms, signaling “well-done” to human athletes.

Ian Dunbar’s ideas aboutdog training—that it shouldbe a fun bonding experience—have become so central tothe practice, it would be easyto forget someone (Dunbar!)got us thinking this way inthe first place. Advocating ahands-off, reward-basedapproach at his Sirius DogTraining centers, the behavior -ist and vet first promulgatedthe now-accepted-as-gospelnotion that teaching goodbehavior to puppies before sixmonths of age, using positivereinforcement, prevents mostfuture problem behaviors.

Whilst the dog is still a puppy, it is fareasier to convince him to join theteam so that he enjoys life with us.

—Ian Dunbar

“”

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For more than two decades, Robert K. Wayne hasused the powerful tools of genetic analysis to revise and,in some cases, redraw the evolutionary history and rela-tionships of the family Canidae. In constructing thatevolutionary tree (or phylogeny), Dr. Wayne, a professorof evolutionary biology at UCLA, his students and post-doctoral fellows have documented the monumental lossof diversity the gray wolf eradication programs of thepast three centuries have wrought here and in Europe.

In the early 1990s, Dr. Wayne used mitochondrial DNAto clinch the case for the gray wolf as the wild progenitorof the dog, laying to rest that “southern,” or pariah, dogswere descended from jackals, while “northern,” wolf-likebreeds came from gray wolves.

A few years later, Dr. Wayne and Carles Vilà, a postdoc-toral fellow, proposed that dog and wolf started down theirseparate evolutionary roads as long ago as 135,000 years,

but certainly not much after 40,000 years ago in multiplelocations. The dates are still controversial, and others havebeen proposed, but odds are that the final number will beclose to that put forth by Dr. Wayne and Dr. Vilà. Withgraduate student Jennifer Leonard, Dr. Wayne also showedthat dogs were not domesticated in the New World inde-pendently; rather, they appear to have arrived with the ear-liest people crossing the Bering Land Bridge. More recently,he has worked with Elaine Ostrander and Heidi Parker atthe National Institutes of Health to complete a new breedphylogeny, showing interrelationships among breeds andpointing to the Middle East as a center of early separationof wolf from dog.

In conducting his groundbreaking research, Dr. Waynehas also trained many of the people studying the geneticsof canid evolution and has been consistently generous inassigning credit where it is due.

—Mark Derr

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53Feb/Mar 2010 Bark

While at London’s NaturalHistory Museum, JulietClutton-Brock pennedmany definitive texts on thearchaeology of animaldomestication, including A Natural History of Dom -esticated Mammals. In herwork, Clutton-Brock illumi-nates our tangled historywith dogs (among others),establishing a baseline forunderstanding the reasons,biological and behavioralimpacts, and unexpected con-sequences of domestication.

L. David Mech, founder ofthe International Wolf Centerand chair of the IUCN WolfSpecialist Group, has studiedwolves and their prey since1958. His is among the foun-dation work on canines wildand domestic.

Mark Neff, a professor atthe University of California,Davis, participated in theDog Genome Project at UCBerkeley as a postdoctoralfellow. More recently, he hasbeen working to locate thegenes that cause a variety ofgenetic disorders in domesticdogs. Among his researchresults is the identification ofthe gene that causes dwarfismin several breeds, and hisfindings continue to informveterinary medicine aboutthe inheritance of manycanine diseases.

On the trail of human and canine cancer, Elaine Ostrander and her group map the genesresponsible for cancer sus-ceptibility in both. Earlier, as part of the Dog GenomeProject, she searched for thegenetic markers that make up the concept of a “breed,”and found that genotypingcould be used to assign 99percent of individual dogs totheir correct breeds.

Kerstin Lindblad-Toh,co-director of the GenomeSequencing and AnalysisProgram at the BroadInstitute, maps genes associated with cancer andautoimmune diseases indogs. Her group developed a SNP chip that has beenused to identify the genes forseveral canine diseases.

James Serpell, director of the University of Penn -sylvania’s Center for theInteraction of Animals andSociety, is currently involvedin researching the relation-ships between domestic animals—especially dogs—and people. He has alsotraced the natural history ofthe human-animal bond,including the processes bywhich various species havebeen domesticated.

Stanley Olsen, a pioneer in the discipline of zooar-chaeology, was among thefirst to search for the originsof the domestic dog; his worklaid the foundation for laterstudies that significantlypushed back his original8,000 year date.

Geneticist Jasper Rine and

his Dog Genome Project

collaborators began with a

theory that it was possible to

map the chromosomes of

the domestic dog and

thereby discover the genetic

basis of mammalian devel-

opment and behavior. In his

early research on purebred

dog behaviors, he crossed a

Newfoundland with a Border

Collie, two distinct breeds

with very different breed

typical behaviors, and then

bred the offspring to see

how these various behaviors

were inherited.

Thom

as Brummett (opposite)

BARK 100

DETECTIVES In academia or in the field, these scientists and researchers work to unlock the mysteriesof the canine genome and pin down the history of domestication.

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54 Bark Feb/Mar 2010

Mark Derr, journalist andauthor, set the “fancy” worldspinning in 1990 with hisAtlantic Monthly article aboutpractices in the show-dogrealm. In his seminal book,Dog’s Best Friend, he provedthat his range of interests inall things canine extended farbeyond that topic. With aninvestigative reporter’s lovefor unearthing a scoop bal-anced by a wide-rangingknowledge of his subject, he ishighly regarded by dog afi-cionados (and a nudge tosome). As Bark’s science edi-tor, he has been an invaluableadvisor and translator when itcomes to the latest researchand discoveries.

Elizabeth MarshallThomas took a bite out ofthe bestseller lists with heroriginal examinations ofdogs. Fueled by her Husky’sramblings through civiliza-tion, field work with wolvesand anthropology training,Thomas described surprisingbehaviors that in ensuingyears have been affirmed instudies. In The Hidden Life of Dogs and The Social Livesof Dogs, Thomas deployedher keen eye and novelist’ssensibility to shed light onthe mystery of dogs withouterasing their magic.

Donald McCaig

would be notable

enough as the author of

beloved dog books

like Nop’s Trials and

Eminent Dogs,

Dangerous Men.

We also celebrate him

as an early activist

against the homogenizing

perils of inbreeding, on

behalf of his beloved

working sheepdogs.

That tale, too,

is skillfully rendered in

his book, The Dog Wars.

He writes with an insight

and subtle humor that

befits his own Virginia

breeding.

Before you get a dog, you can’tquite imagine what living withone might be like; afterward,you can’t imagine living anyother way.

—Caroline Knapp

”The first year that Caroline Knapp and Iwere friends, in 1996, we took the dogs on a beach runat Gay Head, on the south-western tip of the island ofMartha’s Vineyard. MySamoyed, Clementine, wasnot yet two, strong as an oxand full of fire. Caroline’sShepherd-mix, Lucille, wassmaller in stature and calmerin demeanor. We spent theafternoon watching themcharge up and down thebeach, until a series of sonicbooms from a nearby navalairfield shattered our reverie. Clementine took off downthe beach at a full run, aswild-eyed as a spooked horse.I got her back long enough toleash her, but she had thesled-dog ability to pull a smallcar, and I fell in the sand justtrying to hang onto her.

“Let me have her,” saidCaroline, and took hold ofClemmie’s leash and startedrunning alongside her thehalf-mile to the car. Lucille,seeming to understand that Iwas the one with the bad leg,stayed by my side.

The larger world knewCaroline Knapp through her

narrative voice: the wry intel-ligence and emotional hon-esty she brought to all herbooks, but most belovedly toPack of Two: The IntricateBond Between People andDogs—the story of the shel-ter dog named Lucille whochanged Caroline’s life.Armed with 20/20 acuity,Pack of Two delivered a kaleidoscopic view of theplace of dogs in contemporaryAmerica. But becauseCaroline brought her wholeheart to her story, she gaveus, as well, the essence ofwhat it means to love a dog.

For the rest of her life—another six years—she wasthe one person I trustedutterly with my dog. In thereal world, the world of pastoral beach walks and terrifying moments, she wasas steadfast as any narrativepersona could have hinted.And in my interior vision ofheaven—wherever Carolinecould possibly be, given thatshe isn’t here—she is sur-rounded by every dog whoever loved her, includingClementine and Lucille. All of them are trying to getin her lap.

—Gail Caldwell

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Through their words, art and photography, these creative people make tangible the intense and heartfelt connections we have with our dogs.HELPERS

BARK 100

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55Feb/Mar 2010 Bark

Poet Mary Oliver hasgraced the world with hermeditative eye and exquisitelanguage for nearly 50 years, bringing the physicalworld—dogs not least amongit—into sharper focus forthe rest of us. Using humorto reconcile the intellectualwith the natural, she impartswisdom through such gemsas this line, written from herdog’s perspective: Books?says Percy. I ate one once. Itwas enough./Let’s go.

Inspired by the late, great Earl,MUTTs creator and animalactivist Patrick McDonnellis a cartoonist with a message,showing readers the worldthrough the eyes of his animalcharacters.

Stanley Coren takes thecanine IQ seriously, and hascovered the topic in numerousarticles and books. His workhas done much to popularizethe subject of dogs’ intelligenceas well as our bond with them.

As the founding editor of thestaunchly independent WholeDog Journal, Nancy Kernshas been empowering dogowners with intel on dog-friendly training, holistic healthcare and practical nutrition—i.e., how to read a dog foodlabel—for more than 10 years.

When Harriet Ritvo, a notedprofessor at MIT, wrote TheAnimal Estate: The English andOther Creatures in the VictorianAge in 1987, she launched aninnovative animal studies curriculum that has inspiredsimilar programs at universitiesaround the globe.

Nationally syndicated petcolumnist Gina Spadafori,author or co-author of a half-dozen top-selling books aboutanimals, was hailed from thefloor of the United StatesCongress for her coverage ofthe 2007 pet food recall.

Oh, those fabulous

Weimaraners! Though

William Wegman is

renowned in the art world

for his work in a variety of

media, it is his photos of

his pack of elegant, sil-

very grey dogs—dressed

in zany costumes and

posed in tableaus reflect-

ing his special brand of

visual puns—for which

he is most widely known.Snoopy, everyone’s favoriteBeagle and the quintessenceof canine cool, sprang fromthe fertile imagination (andpen) of Charles Schulz,who created him along withthe rest of the “Peanuts”crowd. Over a period of

Percy(2002–2009)

This—I said to Percy when I had leftour bed and gone

out onto the living room couch wherehe found me apparently doing nothing—this

is called thinking.It’s something people do,not being entirely children of the earth,

like a dog or a tree or a flower.

His eyes questioned such an activity.Well, okay, he said. If you say so. Whateverit is. Actually,

I like kissing better.

And next to metucked down his curly headand, sweet as a flower, slept.

����������������

����������������

MUTTS ©

Patrick McDonnell, distributed by King Features Syndicate, Inc; ©

William Wegman; C

harles Schulz, PEANU

TS ©

United Feature Syndicate, Inc.

nearly 50 years, Schulz drew18,250 cartoon strips, basingthe character of CharlieBrown on himself andmemorializing the dog of hisadolescence in the characterof Spike, Snoopy’s bedrag-gled, desert-dwelling brother.

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56 Bark Feb/Mar 2010

For trainers who embracescience and medicine, KarenOverall has been an auth -oritative voice of reason andresearch for more than adecade. Dr. Overall’s best-selling textbook, ClinicalBehavioral Medicine for SmallAnimals, was among the firstto provide techniques for theprevention and treatment ofbehavior problems; someconsider it the bible for vetsand behavior consultants.

After running the behaviorclinic at U Penn’s School ofVeterinary Medicine for morethan 12 years, Dr. Overallshifted her focus to studycanine behavioral genetics asa research associate in UP’sCenter for Neurobiology andBehavior. Her clinical workcenters on humane treatmentof troubled pets and their dis-tressed people; she focuses onunderstanding the neurobiol-ogy and genetics of caninebehavior and cognition, andon developing natural geneticand behavioral canine models

wisdom of two decades agoupside down, and undoubt-edly saved tens of thousandsof dogs from harm.

Brian Hare began his aca-demic career by examiningthe ability of dogs to followhuman body language;recently, his lab opened theDuke Canine CognitionCenter to further explore theeffects of domestication oncanine cognition.

Shirley Johnston, anexpert in the field of animalreproduction, oversees theFound Animals Foundation’sMichelson Prize and Grants,established to inspire thedevelopment of a low-costnon-surgical sterilizationproduct for dogs and cats.

Lawrence Myers, whofounded the Institute forBiological Detection Systemsat Auburn University, wasamong the first to determinethat dogs can detect diseaseconditions.

Adam Miklosi helpedfound the Family DogResearch Project at Budapest’sEötvös Loránd University in1994, and he and his grouplead the world in the study ofcanine psychology.

Alexandra Horowitz’sresearch, which resulted inher book, Inside of a Dog,explores what dogs know andhow they know it, adding animportant chapter to thestudy of canine cognition.

It was no surprise to doglovers when Karen Allen, a social psychologist withSUNY at Buffalo, defined the“pet effect,” or the ability ofour dogs to lower our bloodpressure and help us copewith stress.

Larry T. Glickman’slong-term longitudinal studyof bloat, undertaken atPurdue University’s School ofVeterinary Medicine, followedmore than 1,900 dogs of 11breeds for five years, and thefindings inform treatment ofthis dangerous condition.

Ronald D. Schultz is chairof the department of micro-biology at the University ofWisconsin, Madison, and oneof the world’s leading veteri-nary vaccine researchers. Hisstudy of the science behindvaccine protocols, the harmfuleffects of unnecessary vac-cines, and different types andbrands of vaccines, particu-larly for canine parvovirus,has turned the conventional

for human psychiatric ill-nesses, particularly thoseinvolving anxiety, panic andaggression.

—Barbara Robertson

Marc Bekoff, professoremeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at theUniversity of Colorado,Boulder, has studied dogs,wolves and coyotes, findingthat these animals have anotion of fair play and a kindof moral sense based uponempathy. Bekoff is also inter-ested in the human-animalrelationship, and how thisrelationship affects the emotional lives of animals.

Pulling back the curtain onthe mysterious social life ofdogs, German researcherDorit Feddersen-Petersen demonstratedthat several dog species com-municate with each other,and possibly us, using a com-plex spectrum of barkingsounds.

Vilmos Csányi, author of If Dogs Could Talk,

introduced a new approach to the study of ethology,

one that relies on analyzing behavior’s genetic

architecture. He and the department he founded

at Eötovös Loránd University maintain a profound

interest in dog-human relationships.

Amanda Jones (to

p), Andrew Pinkham (opposite)

BARK 100

EXPLORERS Charting the mysteries of the inner dog and searching for the trail to better health, these scholarsimprove life for canines and humans alike.

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John Paul Scott and John L. Fuller conducted anextensive study of the inheritance of various behaviors offive breeds at the Jackson Laboratory at Bar Harbor,Maine; all of the dogs were of similar size but very differ-ent in their breed-typical behaviors, providing variancesthat could be measured as the dogs developed. Theauthors were the first to suggest the concept of “criticalperiods” in which puppies’ social behavior develops.

Konrad Lorenz, Nobel Laureate and co-founder of thefield of ethology, was one of the first theorists to writeabout dogs. Man Meets Dog (1953) demonstrates that hewas a remarkable observer of animals, a lover of dogs inparticular, and oftentimes got things wrong. But, since hewas the one who, according to Donald McCaig, “startedall these debates,” his book remains a classic that deservesto be read (judicially) for that fact alone.

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58 Bark Feb/Mar 2010

Since the 2005 debut oftrainer Victoria Stilwell’shit television show, It’s Me orthe Dog, her no-nonsense,positive-reinforcement-basedapproach has endeared her to pet lovers all over theworld. Her holistic methodsempower families to worktogether to create lasting solu-tions to behavioral problems.

Stilwell’s acting backgroundand dog-training experiencehave put her in an ideal position to promote positivemethods to both professionaland mainstream audiences in more than 30 countries.She’s judged contestants onthe television show Greatest

Together, Suzanne Hettsand Dan Estep came upwith the concept of behav-ioral wellness, which empha-sizes the need for baselines todetermine what is “well” interms of pets’ behavior.

Pamela Reid, director ofthe ASPCA’s Animal BehaviorCenter, not only lectures onanimal behavior and learningtheory, she puts it into actionto improve human-caninerelationships.

Terry Ryan has been aguru for a generation oftrainers. Teaching others howto motivate dogs throughgames, lecturing, writing andpresenting seminars, she is abright light in support ofgood relationships betweenpeople and their pups.

Pia Silvani turned her loveof teaching people and dogsinto an amazing career as aninternationally recognizedcanine coach and one of thetraining and behavior world’sgo-to people.

For the past 30 years, Wendy Volhard—who iscredited with developing thefirst puppy test and first drivetheories—has been teachingpeople how to communicateeffectively with their pets.

Sophia Yin is a multi-talented vet, behaviorist, trainer,lecturer and videographer, witha great knack for impartingknowledge and expertise bothto her colleagues—via hertextbooks—and to the generalpublic. Her site has invaluableinfo and fantastic videos.

American Dog and appearedon numerous talk shows,written for several periodi-cals, and authored two books:It’s Me or the Dog: How toHave the Perfect Pet and FatDog Slim: How to Have aHealthy, Happy Pet (a thirdbook is in progress). Plansare currently underway for afoundation to raise moneyfor smaller rescues and assis-tance-dog organizations.

Stilwell’s influence on popular culture has helpedcreate exposure for positivetraining while providing amedia counterbalance to thosepromoting dominance-basedmethods.

—JoAnna Lou

Emily Weiss

probably never thought of

herself as a matchmaker,

but to the benefit of many

adult dogs in shelters, it’s

worked out that way.

During a career dedicated

to creating positive,

humane animal behavior

programs, Weiss devel-

oped MYM SAFER

(Meet Your Match Safety

Assessment For Evaluating

Rehoming), a test that

helps animal-welfare pro-

fessionals identify potential

aggression in dogs as

well as opportunities for

behavior modification,

which ultimately leads to

more—and more success-

ful—adoptions through

appropriate placement.

If you want to become

fluent in “dog,” start

with Dog Language, the

seminal work by ethologist

Roger Abrantes,

widely known for his

views on social behavior

and its applications to

the daily understanding

of pet behavior.

BARK 100

TEACHERS With their deep understanding of what makes dogs tick, these individuals show us how to expandthe bond between pilot and co-pilot, bringing harmony to our shared lives.

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Sabrina Helas/Cookies and Water Photography

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59Feb/Mar 2010 Bark

Well ahead of most of hisivory tower peers, Leo K.Bustad, dean of WashingtonState University College ofVeterinary Medicine, per-ceived the healing power ofanimals and dedicated him-self to establishing the sci-ence behind the notion thatour dogs and cats make usfeel better. As co-founder ofthe Delta Society, he pro-moted greater understand-ing of the human-animalbond, and helped create thegold standard for animal-assisted therapy in healthcare settings.

Joan Esnayra, founder andpresident of the PsychiatricService Dog Society, works toopen people’s eyes to thismore subtle form of service;much of her work focuses onassisting veterans sufferingfrom PTSD.

From the depths of grim personal experience, SisterPauline Quinn found theinspiration to start the PrisonPet Partnership Program that has helped heal the livesof an untold number of dogsand inmates alike.

Bonnie Bergin

originated the concept of

“service dogs,” canines

trained to perform essential

everyday tasks, such as

opening doors and

switching on lights, for

people with mobility

limitations—and then

dedicated herself to getting

these life-changing dogs

to the people who needed

them. In 1975, she founded

Canine Companions for

Independence, the first

nonprofit to train and place

service dogs. She later

established a university

of canine studies and

spearheaded campaigns

to help low-income

individuals with disabilities

afford assistance dogs.

Kathy Zubryckiand her late husband, Ted Zubrycki, pioneeredthe innovative developmentof “special needs” guide dogtraining, showing that guidedogs could be successfullytrained for blind people withadditional disabilities.

After a puppy spontaneouslyalerted Mark Ruefenachtto a dangerous drop in hisblood sugar, he foundedDogs4Diabetics, which isdedicated to training dogs todetect the subtle scent of life-threatening hypoglycemia.

Inspired by her son’s cere-bral palsy service dog, pro -secut ing attorney EllenO’Neill-Stephens intro-duced canine advocates intoSeattle’s criminal courts, andthen co-founded CourthouseDogs to promote the use ofdogs to comfort traumatizedvictims and witnesses.

Sandi Martin’s flash ofbrilliance: Children whostruggle to read will do betterif reading to dogs. The suc-cess of her IntermountainTherapy Animals’ ReadingEducation Assistance Dogs(READ) program spawned a four-pawed literacy rev -olution.

For nearly three decades,working-dog trainer andhandler Larry Allen hasbeen transforming “problemdogs,” especially Blood -hounds, into happily

employed trackers for lawenforcement agencies acrossthe country.

Retired British orthopedicsurgeon John Churchmade the leap from anecdoteto science when he and histeam undertook the first sci-entifically robust study thatproved dogs can be trained todetect cancer.

We not only look out for our dogs, our dogs look out for us. These folks help them learn how to do it.HELPERS

BARK 100

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60 Bark Feb/Mar 2010

she holds the first endowedposition in this field at Colorado State University’sCollege of VeterinaryMedicine.

Veterinarian AnthonySmithmakes saying good-bye gentler for dog andguardian alike through hisRainbow Bridge VeterinaryServices, one of the onlypractices in the worlddevoted exclusively to pro-viding end-of-life care.

Ann Martin, author of Foods Pets Die For, wasamong the first to raise thealarm about the dangers ofcommercial pet food, andcontinues to monitor theindustry today.

The work of the lateEuropean herbalist Juliettede Bairacli Levywas thefoundation upon whichmany later holistic practi-tioners built; her book, TheComplete Herbal Book for theDog, originally published in1947, is still in print.

Barbara Fougere’s PetLover’s Guide to NaturalHeal ing for Dogs & Cats forti-fies the bookshelves ofguardians with an interest innatural healing by providinga straightforward alternativetherapy reference for layfolk.

Carvel Tiekertfounded the AmericanHolistic Veterinary MedicalAssociation in 1982 and is the heart of this organization,which explores and supportsalternative and complemen-tary approaches to veterinaryhealthcare.

Allen M. Schoen is one of the pioneers in holisticmedicine; his writings andinfluential speaking havebrought complementary andalternative veterinary medi-cine to the hearts and mindsof practitioners everywhere.

Cheryl Schwartzwas among the first to useTraditional Chinese Medicinein the care of companion animals; her book, Four Paws,Five Directions, spread theword and made it accessibleto everyone.

Tellington TTouch—needwe say more? LindaTellington-Jones is anexpert in rubbing dogs (andother animals) the right way,and shares her techniquesworldwide, much to thedelight of dogs everywhere.

Narda G. Robinsonapplies rigorous scientificmethods to the study of com-plementary and alternativemedicine for small animals;

Back in the age of kibble,

Ian Billinghurst took his bible of

Biologically Appropriate Raw Food (known as BARF)

directly to the people. In Give Your Dog a Bone,

the Australian veterinary surgeon repudiated grain-based,

commercially produced dog foods and advocated

a diet based on what wild dogs eat, including

plenty of raw, meaty bones. While BARF has detractors,

there’s no doubt it shifted the entire dog food

paradigm toward better nutrition.

Well before most Americans

would consider acupuncture for themselves,

holistic health care icon Ihor Baskowas seeing good

results using the ancient Chinese technique on arthritic

and pain-racked dogs. Since the 1970s, he has been a

leading light for expanding treatment and prevention

options for animals with alternative therapies, including

acupuncture, herbs and minerals, dietary therapy,

homeopathy, and massage. Dr. Basko is a founder and

current president of the Veterinary Botanical

Medical Association.

BARK 100

WELLNESS There are many paths to wellness—here are some of the people who marked the alternative way.

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REUTER

S/Vincent D

u

Page 13: Bark's 100 Best & Brightest

Many people havelearned throughrelating to animalswhat it is to care for and acceptresponsibility foranother being.

”—Richard Pitcairn

chiropractic to homeopathy. He was among the first voicesto question the then-common practice of routine annualimmunization for dogs and cats, pointing out that suchprotocols could be risky and were probably unnecessary—wisdom that is now altogether conventional. Today,holistic veterinarians have their own medical association,the AHVMA, and even otherwise conventional veterinar-ians often recommend homemade diets and practiceacupuncture. It’s a changed world, and one that mightnot have happened without Pitcairn’s early influence.

—Christie Keith

A veterinarian with a PhD in immunology, Richard Pitcairnwas a pioneer in the field of holisticpet care and raw feeding, both of which gained their current prominence largely due to his seminal book, Dr. Pitcairn’s Complete Guide to Natural Health for Dogsand Cats, published in 1982 and now in its third edition.He challenged the orthodoxy of the day that dogs andcats can only thrive on commercially formulated diets,and gave his readers an overview of the entire field ofalternative medicine as it could apply to their family pets,from acupuncture to Chinese and western herbs, andDon Ayers

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As founder of what is nowthe No-Kill Movement, Rich Avanzino changedhow Americans view shelteranimals. In his 22 years lead-ing San Francisco SPCA,Avanzino demonstrated thatshelters could be transformedfrom death camps for discardsto adoption centers for petswhose worst sin was choosingtheir people badly. Now head-ing Maddie’s Fund, Avanzinoanticipates the day when sup-ply and demand balance, anda no-kill nation is achieved.

Kate Hurley, director ofthe Koret Shelter MedicineProgram at University ofCalifornia, Davis, heads oneof the very few dedicated pro-grams of this type in the U.S.

Motivated by a New Year’sresolution to save one dog amonth, Betsy Saul and herhusband created Petfinder.com

in 1996; in the years since,the free website has helpedmore than 13 million dogs,cats and other critters land ingood homes.

Lawyer, author and no-killactivist Nathan Winogradis the voice of America’s dis-placed pets and the conscienceof the animal sheltering indus-try. Uncompromising andcommitted, he heads the No-Kill Advocacy Center.

Since 2004, vegan Wayne Pacelle has builtHSUS into a public policypowerhouse; his organizationnow has investigation, litiga-tion and campaign teams. He has broadened HSUS’sscope beyond companionanimals, and was the forcebehind California’s over-whelming passage of Prop. 2.HSUS has also recentlyteamed up with Maddie’s

Fund to develop the ShelterPet Project.

A high-profile and articulatevoice for companion andfarm animals from the high-lands of his native England to his home in Minneapolis,Michael W. Fox takes abroad view of the world inwhich our humanity and therights of animals are inti-mately interconnected. Theprofessor/bioethicist/veteri-narian has been a leader inthe movement to foster theethical treatment of animalssince 1967, including nearlythree decades at HSUS.

An expert in the human-canine bond, RandallLockwood gave everybodya reason to care about crueltyto animals. His groundbreak-ing research identified linksbetween pet- and domesticabuse, and demonstrated thatearly animal cruelty predictslater violence against people.As an officer of ASPCA, hehas advanced the forensictechniques and training ofcruelty investigators and, onthe brighter side, promotedhumane education.

To honor his cherishedMiniature Schnauzer, soft-ware mogul Dave Duffieldendowed Maddie’s Fund with$300 million to promote ano-kill nation and end eutha -nasia as a form of populationcontrol. Big fund, great goal.

Randy Grim and caninesidekick Quentin, a gaschamber survivor, patrol thestreets of East St. Louis, seek-ing new prospects for hisStray Rescue; 5,000 abused,abandoned dogs owe himtheir lives—we owe him ourgratitude.

Ed Sayres directedPetSmart Charities and ledSF/SPCA before becomingASPCA president in 2003;though ASPCA played a keyrole in the Michael Vickinvestigation, it thereafterdeclined to associate with hispublic rehabilitation.

Singer, dancer, actress, andanimal activist GretchenWyler had a big voice and abig presence, which she usedto help animals by establish-ing her own Hollywood non-profit animal protectiongroup, the Ark Trust, Inc.,and developing and promot-ing the Genesis Awards.

Bob Baker has a well-earned reputation as one ofthe country’s top animal wel-fare investigators. Now asso-ciated with the ASPCAAnti-Cruelty Initiativeseffort, he is a key player in theongoing battle to combat thecruelties of puppy mills andlarge-scale commercialbreeding operations.

Credit Tiny, Doris Day’s loyal companion

during her Ohio teens, with forging her lifelong bond

with canines. Still America’s all-time favorite actress,

she has used her ample supply of good will to do well

by animals through lobbying via the Doris Day Animal

League, now part of HSUS, and funding projects like

Spay Day and assistance to seniors seeking to keep

their pets via the free-standing Doris Day Animal

Foundation. Good dog, Tiny!

On the street, in offices and in courtrooms, they work to save lives, protect animals from harmand find them forever homes. ADVOCATES

BARK 100

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From humble countercultureorigins, Michael Mountainand a group of about 25 animal-loving friends laid the foundationfor what is today a vast animal sanctuary in Kanab, Utah, andthe nonprofit Best FriendsAnimal Society that supports it,giving life to their simple mission:“No more homeless pets.” Thecontinuing campaign by thatname gathers momentum in theeffort to achieve a no-kill nation.

In the 1970s, the foundersstarted taking in strays at theirArizona ranch; by 1986, theywere able to purchase land northof Kanab that was once the back-drop for countless movie and television westerns. Renaming it

Angel Canyon, they parlayed itinto a home for Best FriendsAnimal Sanctuary, whichincludes Dogtown, Kittyville and places for livestock animals.During a year of post-Katrinarescue work, Best Friendsrehomed or reunited some 4,000 animals with their people.Best Friends magazine, whichMountain edited, changed thetone of rescue and adoption fromgloom and gore to a more upbeatmessage of joy and progress.

Mountain, now 58, recentlystepped down to focus, he writes,on “building a global, grassrootscommunity of people who careabout animals, wildlife and thenatural world.”

—Tom Cushing

Veterinarian Elliot Katzfounded the animal rightsgroup In Defense of Animalsin 1983. For the past 25 years,he has campaigned againstpuppy mills, saved research-lab canines from the needleand convinced many to callthemselves “guardians.”

Nedim Buyukmihci,antivivisection vet and co-founder of Animal PlaceSanctuary and EducationCenter, challenged the con-servative status quo of hisprofession when he spoke outagainst the use of live animalsin vet school training labs.

Game show host BobBarker knows the media’svalue and its uses. A vegetar-ian, he has fought pet over-population, promotedanti-cruelty legislation anddonated $1 million each tofive top law schools to fundthe teaching of animal law.

Writer, humorist andhumanitarian ClevelandAmorywas fiercely dedi-cated to the cause of animalwelfare. An early HSUS boardmember, he later created theFund for Animals, for whichhe served as unpaid directoruntil his death.

Take a dash of showmanship,add entrepreneurial savvyand Buddhist monk–levelcommitment and you getMike Arms, adoption pro-moter extraordinaire. Goingstrong after four million ani-mals, he recently founded the“Home for the Holidays”adoptathon. Tr

oy Snow, courte

sy of B

est Friends and the photographer

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At the helm of the MorrisAnimal Foundation, theworld’s largest nonprofitorganization fundingresearch studies to protect,treat and cure animals,Patricia Olson wields amighty big carrot for good.But that’s not all. Dr. Olson’slegacy includes establishingprograms that foster thehuman-animal bond andaddress pet overpopulation,including co-founding theNational Council on PetPopulation and Policy, acoalition of organizationsworking to reduce the number of animals eutha-nized simply because theyare homeless.

There are plenty of veterinaryguidebooks out there, but ittook Nancy Kay to compileone with essential and lastinglessons on how to be an effective advocate for yourdog’s health-care needs.Speaking for Spot, Dr. Kay’sprimer on everything fromhow to know if your pet issick and finding the right vet, to knowing when to saygoodbye, not only empowersguardians but also operatesas a touchstone for many veterinarians.

Douglas Slatterliterally wrote the books onsmall animal surgery. HisFundamentals of VeterinaryOphthalmology and Textbookof Small Animal Surgery havebeen used and referenced bythousands of vets.

We know that dogs’ kneesblow out all too easily. Whatwe didn’t know was that agood fix wasn’t available untilthe 1990s, when BarclaySlocum developed andpatented the tibial plateauleveling osteotomy (TPLO).

The compassionate care ofcompanion animals has been greatly enhanced by the work of trailblazerRobin Downing, a leadingvoice in veterinary pain management and advocate of a preemptive approach to the control of pain.

Before Cynda Crawford(along with Edward Dubovifrom the College of Vet -erinary Medicine at CornellUniversity and others) identi-fied the canine influenzavirus—a.k.a. H3N8—it wasthought that dogs weren’tsusceptible to the flu.

A controversial figure, W. Jean Dodds has none-theless persisted in question-ing many “established truths”of veterinary medicine, pushing the envelope on vaccine safety and efficacyand the diagnosis and treat-ment of thyroid disease. Shealso established and runsHemopet, a canine bloodbank. In the on-going RabiesChallenge Project, she isresearching the period of efficacy of rabies vaccines.

You’d think being a renownedveterinary cardiologist anddiscovering the cause and curefor a fatal heart disease in catswould be enough for one life-time. Not for Paul D. Pion.In 1991, Dr. Pion beganbuilding bridges amongnotoriously competitive vetsthrough the VeterinaryInformation Network. Withmore than 42,000 participat-ing colleagues, scores of data-bases, message boards,conference rooms, et cetera,et cetera, VIN is consideredby many to be the most com-prehensive online resourcefor and by veterinarians.

When he wrote Home-Prepared Dog and Cat Diets,leading gastroenterologistDonald Strombeckcreated a first-of-its kind vol-ume on alternatives to com-mercial pet food and madecanine nutrition understand-able to the general public.

The experience, commonsense and insider knowledgethat made Marion Nestlethe go-to expert on dietarypolicy for humans reached thedog dish with her compellinginvestigation of the 2007recalls in Pet Food Politics.

Clarence Rawlingsled a team of researchers atthe University of Georgia’sCollege of Veterinary Med -icine in adapting minimallyinvasive surgical techniquesfor use with companion ani-mals, reducing traditionalsurgical complications andimproving outcomes.

BARK 100

HEALERS Bringing their high-level skills to improve the well-being of our canine companions, these men andwomen put compassion into action.

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groundbreaking books, hechallenges the “animals asproperty” notion and arguesfor incremental recognitionof their separate interests.

Katrina RescuersOn the front lines of animalwelfare since 1980, JeffDorson has been known torisk his life undercover. Inthe aftermath of HurricaneKatrina, he and the LouisianaHumane Society he helpedcreate rescued some 1,700pets from the floodwaters.

Therapy Dogs–9/11When Rachel McPhersonbegan producing a therapy-dog documentary, she fell inlove with her subject, turnedoff the cameras and createdThe Good Dog Foundationinstead. McPherson’s non-profit promotes these furry

miracle workers, as well asproviding training, certifica-tion and support. After 9/11,Good Dog teams came tothe aid of families of victims,survivors and rescue work-ers. Based on that model,Good Dog created a disasterresponse course, and wasdeployed for families in needin the wake of HurricaneKatrina.

VolunteersJana Brunner has a passion for shelter pets andvolunteers as many as 40hours a week to the HumaneSociety of Greater KansasCity, taking photos to post onPetfinder.com, designing andmanaging their website, cre-ating promotional materials,organizing offsite adoptionevents and supportingHSGKC financially. She’s been

at this for 14 years, and herefforts have saved thousands.

Dog SportsRetired biology professorCharles L. “Bud”Kramer shook up theAKC’s Obedience regime—unchanged since 1937—byoriginating the livelier,freestyle Rally Obedience, as a club-sanctioned answerto the Agility boom.

Search and RescueRetired teacher WilmaMelville founded theNational Disaster Search DogFoundation, which has expo-nentially increased the supplyof FEMA-certified SAR dogs,many of whom were them-selves rescued from shelters.

International HumaneGwen Davis isn’t afraid totackle the big issues. Afterearning her DVM from theTuskegee School of VeterinaryMedicine, she founded thePuerto Rico Animal WelfareSociety to offer low-cost ster-ilization and rescue stray dogs.

Dog Park ActivistsWe join the dogs of Redmond,Wash., in a bark-out to JudyTrockel, a resolute voice inthe grassroots group ServeOur Dog Areas, which foughtto retain Marymoor Park’soff-leash dog area and is itssteward today.

Animal LawAs science demonstrates continuities between humansand other species, law profes-sor Steven Wise addressestheir legal implications. In

EXEMPLARS

BARK 100

For the longer listing, see “Best &Brightest” online at thebark.com!

And to shelter staffers everywhere: You are all the best & brightest. Thank you for the work you do and the lives you save.

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Each one standing for many, these individuals and thousands like them manifest a spirit that inspirespeople to go beyond the ordinary on behalf of dogs.

Right: Matt A

llison; Far right Jana Brunner (4)