Connect with our Pet Chat team. Firstly, to my left. Dr David Tabard, good afternoon, sir. Another cotton shirt. Yes, absolutely. Beautiful weather. Nice cotton shirt weather. And as we move across, Cheryl Shaw, good afternoon. Good afternoon. And, of course, we kick off with Broach Watch. Okay. A little parrot there. Is that a parrot or parakeet? Yeah, well, this is the spring weather is when we start seeing all these baby lorikeets around us. That's completely true. All of the baby birds are coming out. Is that a topic? Well, it's the bird count next week. Oh, yes, of course. Yes, we all need to get involved. And we all talk. We do. We support bird count every year. Yes. Great to be involved. It is. All right, Cheryl, to talk about all of that, plus whatever is on your mind, pet-wise, it's a bit of a bird's life today, Cheryl.
It is. It's next week. It's the week of the National Bird Week. And during that period, we have a bird count that's held every year for the last 10 years. And it's called the Aussie Backyard Bird Count. And it's a big community event where they ask people to get involved and participate in counting birds. So I've been doing it for a few years. But the 10th year is pretty, you know, it's great that it's been going for such a long time. But in the results of what happens, they count, they get...
citizens to go out and count birds. And you may count them by seeing and counting the numbers, or it may be from hearing the sounds of the song of the bird, and you count what it is. Now, there's an app you can go on and get, and it's a free app, and it will help you to identify birds. You don't have to be an expert in this area, so anybody can do it, from elderly right through to young people, and make a bit of fun out of it. I know Kimberley always gets involved. Have you participated, David? Oh, yeah. Every year. Every year? He's got the app. Oh, you've got the app on the phone here? Downloaded the app. You've downloaded it? Yeah. Now, there's opportunities for people to win prizes as well. Oh, now I'm...
Very excited. Is this this app for this year or last year's? No, you're correct. I need to update my app. Okay. So we need to update that app. And one of the things that is really interesting, why they do it, it's a citizen science event, and why they do it is to see what birds are living in what areas. Now, we've had a lot, last year there was a lot of rain and a lot of birds did move out of the areas they were in. Previously, we've had droughts and birds have moved. And what they want to achieve out of this is to register how many birds are in certain areas and if they are migrating to different areas and how they can get along with people in the environment that they're living with and sharing with the humans. So what you do, you go out and you spend 20 minutes. So it's just one 20-minute session.
and you can do this in your backyard or you can go to a park, you can go to the beach, you can be on your boat. It doesn't really matter where you're doing it and you just count the birds that you see or hear and then you submit your entry of what the count was and go from there. But interestingly, the bird that has held number one spot for the most counted birds for the last 10 years has been the rainbow lorikeet. And so, hence your brooch. That's it. Well done. Yes. So the rainbow lorikeets, they are everywhere and they're quite noisy birds so they're an easy one to count and to see but they are beautiful. But I found also very interesting that in the top 10...
birds from the last year's count, the house sparrow was in. No, I haven't seen a house sparrow for such a long time. Right. Do you have them in your area? Well, see, this is the thing and the beauty of the app is if you don't know what the bird is, the app actually helps you to identify the bird by its size, shape and colour. And you just put that into the app as a pick list where you can select those things. It knows the area that you're in and then it gives you a description and some pictures. And so you can actually go, oh, well, that's the difference between, what have I got here? The Australian painted snipe?
and the Australian Pied Oyster Catcher. Oh, he sounds nice. Well, and of course all the birdwatchers out there are like, how could you make a mistake between those two? It's just because alphabetically they come together. But I think one of the good things about it is you don't have to be an expert. Well, that's it. And I think that's a really nice thing, that people can get involved in this and feel that they're doing a community event. And it runs from Monday through to Sunday. And so, you know, just select some time, go out and count some birds and be part of this wonderful event. Pet Chat is the name of the game. Cheryl Shaw is here, as is Dr David Tappert. Good afternoon, Catherine Madawi. Your dogs and lawn not getting along so well. What's happening? Yeah, no, I just, you can't be there all the time, you know, to catch them doing...
I've only got a small little backyard, like an interior yard. I'm not an acre, but I've got this other small yard. And it's just been burnt to bits. It's everywhere. And I heard there was a rock you can put into their drinking water, and I was wondering, does that work? Is that a success force or not? Yeah, that's an interesting question, Kath. I've heard about the dog rocks, and what they're supposed to do is neutralise the ammonia in their urine. It's certainly worth a try. You just place a couple of the rocks into the dog's water bowl, and when they're drinking that water, it's helping to just lessen the amount of ammonia in the urine.
And so what, you just bought them at a pet shop? Yeah, a lot of your vets and pet shops have them, so it's just a matter of buying a bag. They come in a couple of different sizes, but if you start off with a small bag, and they last quite a long time, so it would be worth trying it. Oh, I heard about it, and I wasn't sure whether it was just a fallacy or actually work. And my other question was, I've got two little boys, they're just five months and a bit old, and when is the best time to have them neutered? I thought maybe they'd leave it a bit longer until all their waterworks were sort of...
matured and sorted and everything, so there were no later problems there as well, or is it six-month age anyway? Certainly for male dogs. There have been conversations. controversy is probably going a bit too far, but conversations and differing opinions and evidence for some breeds to have delayed desexing for female dogs, but for male dogs generally, we're going to stick with that kind of five to six months of age. Yeah, they've developed really quickly, and I was just wondering, probably they're born on the 3rd of May, so they're right up there as far as age is concerned. I think, well, they're probably ready. And there's also... They're not a problem, so just a few things I was interested in.
No worries. Appreciate that, Kath. Thank you. All right. Best of luck with everything, Kath. 49216216. Now, we did have Megan, but Megan dropped off a bit there. Dave, this is a question for you since you're all over this bird app. I've just updated. It's just updated the app. It's still circling around or it's updated? No, it's updated. It's not asking you to log in again, is it? Because that's always a problem. It's asking again. Anyway, how do we identify birds by sound? Is that a thing you can do on the app? I've had to update my app.
Because the last one... But you did this last year, didn't you? No, but it didn't have the bird sound on there. Oh, right, right, right, okay. But I remember a version a few years ago which did have, when you touch the species of bird, it gave you a recording of the sound, so I'll have to double-check. Yes, how cool is that? But generally, if you look at, you know, size of the bird, you may not be able to get a really good picture. Like, you wouldn't see them, but you could hear them, and you go, oh, there they are, but they're small, and they're green, right? Maybe they had to take the sounds off because they'd actually inadvertently recorded like a mating call or something, and then the birds would just come over to you.
I don't know, but it's worth checking out. And go and have an explore. So when you actually do download the app, it asks you to register so that we know where the data's coming from and so that you're not registering multiple accounts, for instance, as well. That's a good tip from Mr. Technology over there. Dr. David Tabrett. How do you turn it on? Good afternoon, Gayle at Head & Greet. Your six-month-old Jack Russell is biting away there. That's a story, yeah? Yes, it is. Well, not hard. Now, she plays with her mother, and her whole life has been one big play game.
And so she bites her mum. But when you want to say hello to her, I have to keep saying softly, softly or quieten her down. I'm wondering if it's because she's still teasing. She has these huge spikes. You know, we're tempted to call her Dracula while the other ones are growing. So I'm wondering if it's because she's still teasing. She's not biting down hard. And to her, it's just part of the game. But I don't know how to stop her.
So, a couple of things. Because I'm worried that she'll keep doing it when she's a little bit older. You know what I mean? Oh, I'm certain that she'll keep doing it when she's a little bit older. Why? If we don't do some things differently. That's right. First question is, did you do puppy preschool with her? Sorry, puppy? Preschool? When she was about three or four months of age? Oh, no, no. Okay. We've been going to training class. Oh, okay. For, you know, walking and doing things like that. But, no, they were rescue dogs. Oh, I see. Okay, yep. And so we bought her and we got the mother and one of the...
And so we've got one of the puppies. And so she's had her mother to play with. You have no idea how fast they are. They fly around the garden like you wouldn't believe. Yeah, they're terrors, aren't they? They're not barky with neighbours or anything, which is great. And the mother is the gentlest soul ever. But the daughter, as I say, her whole life is one big play game. And apart from tapping her on the nose, and I'm not trying to be vicious or nasty about it, but it's the only way I can stop her and sort of looking at her and say, no, and she'll find it. But she doesn't, she still forgets that the next time you see her. The first thing she does is she wants to say hello. She wants to be friendly.
But she doesn't realise that her teeth are sharp. So you're absolutely correct. This behaviour has emerged from play behaviour. And that's normal. However, it's not acceptable. And so we do need to stop it. Now, the problem with taps on the nose and rousing on her and things like that is that she has the intellectual capacity. And I know some dogs are smart, but she has the intellectual capacity of a two-year-old and probably less. And so we're going to get into trouble. The other thing is that you're reacting after the event.
Okay? And so whenever you do behaviour change, it's far better to change the circumstances before the behaviour occurs. So you need to realise when that's happening. Now, you've already said there's play behaviour and it's, you know, you're talking to her or you reach down and then she runs up and gives you that nip, which, right, she's not drawing blood and things like that, but it is inappropriate behaviour. Oh, no, she's not drawing blood. She's not nipping you, it's just she's mouthing you. Mouthing, yes. For want of a better word. Yeah, rather, she's not actually biting, she's mouthing, but she's got sharp teeth and I think, if I don't stop it now, she's going to keep going. Yeah, so...
A couple of things. And the reason I asked about puppy preschool is because with my dogs, when we went to puppy preschool, which was three, four months of age, this was one of the lessons. And so it's useful to just simply see if we can introduce this type of lesson where we get the dog does that. We want to let out a very loud yelp, like the person yelp, and that will startle the dog. Okay. They usually will let go. And that's the point when you give them a treat because then it's, they're responding and they're actually sitting back. Okay. And then the other episode is like,
any sort of play behaviour, just as soon as you start to see her behaviour go towards that mouthing, distraction, like get her to do something else, give her a toy to go and play with, or just get her to sit for you. And as soon as she does that, she gets a treat. And so we want to change the circumstances and you want to create a reward structure for her that is based around good behaviour rather than punishment for what we term bad behaviour. Gail, best of luck there. And good afternoon, Joan, at Cave Speech. Similar situation, I'm guessing. You're a 16-year-old. Yours is drawing blood, though.
Yes, not on me yet, but he's certainly dug his teeth in, but on my husband he has, drawn blood a couple of times. Oh, no. Yeah, so we've only had him probably four weeks, and we inherited him from a couple that couldn't keep him. And so he's, I think he's 16 or 17 weeks old now. And, yeah, so the play is biting, and he bites quite hard, and he gets right into his back teeth, and he just doesn't have to stop him. And one of the things, with both Gail in the previous call and your little dog, as I said, this mouth behaviour is the normal way for the dog to experience the world.
But again, inappropriate. Now, you do have a bit of an advantage compared to Gail's situation because your dog is a lot younger. And I guess the question is, how much do you really love your husband? Are we annoyed about the blood being drawn? No, the question is, the next step is getting into that training situation. And if you haven't already, 16 weeks is still of an age where you could be doing puppy preschool. And I would 1,000% encourage you to make sure that you get along to puppy preschool.
not just for these kind of lessons which is what you learn but it's also the social structure and the social behavior and seeing other dogs behave in a more appropriate way will help your dog to behave in a more appropriate way okay okay you should be able to get it under control pretty quickly because of the age and getting into that puppy preschool. All right, best of luck there, Joan and Gail. More calls on the way. Good times, great music and pet chat right now at 2NEWRFM 103.7. Cheryl Shaw is here. This is Dr David Tambert who's almost worked out his new app that he's updated, the bird app. You figured it out yet, mate? You messed around with it a minute ago there. I had to turn off airplane mode. Why won't this app update? Effectively, my phone's turned off. Good afternoon, Denise at Rutherford. You've rescued a feral cat and having trouble getting it wormed down. That's the story yet?
Yes. I got him from the Cat and Dog Rescue Centre. He was very feral. He's starting to come around a bit, but I still can't touch him. He's still not that such thing. But no matter what, I've tried to give him to worm him. He's got a nose, I think, stronger than a dog. Oh, yeah. And he'll flick his tail and run off.
So how long have you had this kitty for now? Since April. Okay. Well, that's not too bad. So you're getting a little bit closer. Yes. I buy them the treats and I give them one every day at lunchtime. I adopted a little female with him, but I can pat her. She's very good. I can't pick her up, but she lets me pat her. And they will come and lick this treat.
off my finger and i've tried to put tablets in that um but he sniffed them out yeah that's not going to work there is um some products that we've used in the past and i'm a little bit out of practice with uh general preventative medicine particularly for feral cats um but there are wormers designed for kittens that are a paste that you can actually put onto their coat like on their paw and squeeze it on and then they'll sit and groom it because they don't like things being on their coat and they'll ingest it that way. And I'm wondering, I might double check with some of the other vets who work on the show and give you an update on the Facebook group or something for between you are, but about some of the more recent preventatives that we use, whether there's any other products, because I'm just drawing a bit of a blank at the moment. But the worms that you get as a paste might be worthwhile. And I think over time, look, it's important to obviously maintain good health by using those preventatives and things like that. But you've also got to make sure that...
Everything else is working well, and I don't want anybody to have blood drawn or scratches or cause any sort of psychological trauma to you or the cat. Well, that's what I was trying to avoid. No, we don't want to do that. I don't want it to traumatise him anymore, because I asked the place where I got him from. They said they catch them with a net. Now I'm not going to do that to him. No, but that doesn't even solve the problem, because it's one thing to have them restrained, and I've been in the circumstance where we've tried to worm a cat, and if they don't want it, you're not going to get it down. No.
It's just going to cause more grief for everybody and possibly quite significant blood loss. So let's not do that. But have a look at the worming pace. And I do know that there's some, as I said, we put them on the coat for cats. And if it's on his coat, he'll lick it off. He might not swallow very much, but maybe that'll help. And I'll see what other information we can find. So keep an eye on...
onto our Facebook page and we'll get some info for you. All right, we'll see what we can come up with. Thanks so, so much, Denise. Best of luck. And we've got a couple of minutes left, so if you have a question for our team, Cheryl Shaw and Dr David Tabbert, who's finally got that app working, but I'm very proud of you. Oh, thank you. You've got aeroplane mode off. You'll be able to walk out into the car park identifying birds all over the place. Yeah, I know. Magpie. There's a kookaburra. There's an owl that sits on the step, on the walkway on the outside, on the fire escape steps, yeah. Well, I'll come back next Monday and record it. There's one. We've got our first bird. Good afternoon, Glenn at East Maitland. It looks like your cat and some other cats have got some territory issues. What's the story? Yeah.
Cat's about nine-year-old, and it's always inside. Yep. But just lately, cat, and then it urinates against it. So do you only have the one cat, Glenn? Yes, only one. Okay. And he's inside all the time, you said? Inside, yes, all the time. How many litter trays do you have? Just one. Get another one? Get another one, yeah. And is your cat peeing elsewhere at the moment, or is he just stirred? No, he's got another litter tray. Okay. Because there's a couple of ways to tackle this problem. But the first one is get another litter tray, have it somewhere else in the house. My rule is one tray per cat plus one. So one cat, two trays, two cats, three trays. So that's the first thing. Second thing is get some felly way.
that you can get from pet stores in your vet. Feliway is a pheromone derived for cats that is a calming effect on your cat. Now, it comes in a couple of different forms, as in you can get a spray bottle or you can get this room diffuser that you plug into a PowerPoint and it'll just fill the room. You can't smell it, but it'll help your cat to stay calm. So that's all the inside stuff. Outside...
There's limited stuff you can do. Obviously, cats don't tend to respect the fence and the boundary. So it's usually around persuading the cat to go elsewhere. If the cat is constantly on your territory and causing trouble, and I'd have to check the local laws, but you can report it to council. Yep. And it is a problem cat. So that if you, you know, if the cat's got a collar or something, you could find out where it is and perhaps suggest to the owners that they need to make sure the cat stays inside at night. But otherwise, I would also consider talking to council. Yep. When I open the door, my cat, but as I say, it could be...
It could be a fair way. There's another thing you can try, Glenn, just on the outside. A lot of cats don't like citrus peel, so you can cut up your oranges and lemons and things like that. Place them around the door or where you know he's urinating and just give that a try. But at the moment, a lot of cats are out mating, so this is a season that they're really, really active and they're quite ruthless at the moment with what they do to other cats. So there is a chance that with the season changing in a couple of months, whatever, that you might find this cat disappears, but certainly want to try the citrus peel. That's a great idea. All right then.
Caden, thanks very much for your time. Good luck. Thanks, Glenn. Yeah, best of luck, Glenn. Got a couple of minutes left. If we can get a straggler or two through, 49216216 for Pet Chat today. But in the meanwhile, team, it's time to have a look at our dog and cat of the week. We'll start with our dog. This is Kai, a three-month-old Ridgeback.
So this will end up being a big dog. Something that Cheryl might be able to take. I'm not taking any more dogs. Needs that exercise. Now, the moment Kai is pretty happy, affectionate, loves people and other dogs, loves the affection that you can give her as well. Needs someone, obviously, with that time to dedicate to training so that we can keep that well-mannered there. And, yes, will benefit from public school, obedience classes, et cetera. Gang, thoughts on these type of dogs? Oh, very popular.
Very popular. But the important thing, which I really love there, is about the emphasis on puppy school and obedience and training, because we do want to make sure, and it's true for small dogs as well, but certainly for big dogs, we want to make sure that we have good habits and good social habits before they settle into a home. Absolutely. And just a quick one on Kai as well, not yet de-sexed. We've got our cat of the week as well, who, interesting name, Katniss. A playful little cat, loves other cats, loves food, isn't fussing. How good is that? You just throw any old cat food down and just take it. Loves a bit of attention, you just can't sort of leap out of that, so it does good stuff. You're not really a cat owner, are you, Mark? I leap out at my cat. Well, that'd give you a bit of a laugh when you said cats just run up the wall. For sure. So, anyway, the point is we've got a nice dog and a nice cat of the week for you. I love the name Katniss. Oh, what a great name.
He's a great name. All right, last one for the day. Good afternoon, Nicole. Your bulldog has a very interesting culinary taste. What's going on there, Nicole? Yeah, he just seems to be eating. As soon as our other bulldog does a poo, our pup goes along and eats her poo, like eats bits and pieces of her poo. It's disgusting. I've tried a few things, spoke to our local vet, but nothing deters him. Normal behaviour.
It's terrible. Everything's normal, right, for dogs? It's terrible. And then he wants to come and give you kisses. Oh, yes. I know, but he's a bulldog. He's gorgeous. How old is he, Nicole? He was one yesterday. Okay. Oh, he's a bit older. Yeah. Because I was just going to say, one of the most important things of doing to prevent this habit is to make sure that you're cleaning up the instant that the dog has gone to the toilet. Because a lot of dogs feel very threatened when there's faeces around. And that's one of the things that they do is, because they are feeling threatened or intimidated, they'll sometimes start cleaning up the area. And it's really important to clean it up as quickly as you can so you can break that habit.
Right, okay. We do pick up as quickly usually as we can, yes. Yeah, yeah. Just hanging around the back with a bag. That'll be good. All right, best of luck, Nicole, and particularly if you're getting those doggy kisses. They're not the kind you want. No, no. Guys, we've run out of time. Cheryl, Cheryl, as always, thank you. We've got a different one for you today, of course, the birds. Yes. And you've got David onto that app. I've nearly registered. Nearly registered. Nearly? Not quite? I'm working on it. He's probably trying to win the prizes. Oh, yes. Oh, you go straight for the prize page, you reckon. That's the way to go. Get involved. Yeah, absolutely. Count those birds. It's important. It starts next week.
Thanks for listening to this podcast from 2NURFM at the University of Newcastle.