Small Pets

Halloween is fast approaching! And why shouldn't your pet get in on the haunting fun too? For inspiration (and a few laughs) see our photo album of pets in costume from 2006 and the latest from 2007.

Don't forget to e-mail us a photo of your pet dressed for the big night. We'll post the photos for everyone's enjoyment, and we'll pick a prize winner, to be announced next month!

October groaner: What do positive trainers say when they go door-to-door on Halloween night? "CLICK OR TREAT!"—of course!

The finding of a parrot with an almost unparalleled power to communicate with people has brought scientists up short. The bird, a captive African grey called N'kisi, has a vocabulary of 950 words, and shows signs of a sense of humour.

Read the full post for more, and hear an excerpt of the parrot talking with his teacher!

Medicating a sick pet is a source of frustration for many owners. On the Clicker Bunny and Critters mailing list, a list member needed to give oral medication to an unsocialized frightened bunny who had recently joined her family. She was using a syringe to squirt the medicine into her bunny's mouth, but the process was a struggle each time.

From the Bird-Click mailing list comes a fabulous breakdown of clicker basics. A new trainer wanted to know if she was capturing the right information in her training journal. The thread that followed provided not only a critique of the information she recorded, but made an in-depth examination of how she could maximize her training sessions.

Joan Orr, author of Getting Started: Clicker Training with Your Rabbit has launched a new website all about clicker training rabbits. Besides featuring her new book, it has links to articles, discussion groups, adoption, videos and more!