Fiber Animals for the Backyard and Hobby Farm Raising backyard fiber animals is rising in popularity, as more and more people seek traditional textiles for yarn-focused crafts like knitting, crocheting, and weaving, as well as spinning, embroidery, needlepoint, needle felting, wet felting, and fiber dying. This book offers an essential reference for anyone who is considering their own production of animal fibers. Author and fiber farmer Chris McLaughlin provides a comprehensive introduction to raising livestock for wool. With practical information for the aspiring beginner, Chris helps you to decide which species will best serve your own lifestyle criteria and needs. Inside Raising Animals for Fiber · Comprehensive guide to raising sheep, goats, angora rabbits, and alpacas · Practical information on housing, fencing, feed, grooming, shearing, plucking, basic health care, breeding and birthing. · Comparison of popular breeds and how their fiber differs from breed to breed. · Frank discussion of the energy and commitment that it takes to raise livestock, and how much room and land each animal species will need. · Essential biosecurity practices to prevent spreading pests and infectious animal diseases. · Advice on hand spinning and crafts to utilize your homegrown fiber.

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The experts at Kennel Club Books present the world's largest series of breed-specific canine care books. Each of KCB's criticaly acclaimed Comprehensive Owner's Guides covers everything frombreed standards to behavior, from training to health and nutrition.

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An excellent introduction to the remarkable rat, written by the world-famous Rat Lady, Debbie Ducummum, Rats offers expert advice to all keepers of these popular fancy pets. Held in high regard in Ancient Egypt, major Asian societies, and discriminating homes in America, rats are the most intelligent rodent on the planet and enjoy playing games with their keepers. As with all editions in the Complete Care Made Easy series, Rats offers readers information about selecting the right pets from good sources and acquiring all of the home essentials (for rats: cage, toys, bedding, and furnishings). The book discusses food options and the importance of feeding a rat a healthy, low-cal, low-fat diet based on fruits, veggies, and legumes plus recipes and menu tips. The author also covers the important considerations of rat proofing the home for keepers who opt to give their pets free run of their dwellings. The chapter ?Beginning Your Friendship” discusses rat socialization, handling, grooming, cleaning, and interactions with children and other pets. The health of a pet rat is covered in the ?Health Care” chapter that includes choosing a veterinarian, the first vet visit, spaying/neutering, the weekly health exam, plus handling common rat maladies and dealing parasites and emergencies. The real f-u-n begins in chapter seven, ?Fun Activities,” in which the reader can learn how to train his or her rat to walk on a leash, enrich his rat’s life with entertaining games, and learn party tricks to impress visitors to the rat’s home. True rat lovers will enjoy taking their rats to shows?just like dog shows?to show off their rat’s conformation and natural beauty. The chapter ?Show Time” offers advice on preparing for shows, classes at shows, and competing for ribbons. The final chapter on breeding offers rat enthusiasts advice about reproduction, the birthing process, and handling pups. Glossary, appendices, and index included.

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Professional search and rescue workers consider Susan Bulanda’s Ready! Training the Search and Rescue Dog ?the bible of Search and Rescue (SAR),” the most sought-after book of its kind detailing canine search and rescue. This second edition, expanded and revised with new color photography, provides readers with the necessary training methods for dogs in various SAR disciplines, including wilderness, evidence, cadaver, water, avalanche, and disaster searches. The author, an experienced SAR professional, details the goals, target skills, and potential problems at each training level of every SAR discipline. Ready! provides descriptions of every type of search, including specific training methods to accomplish each SAR discipline. Professional and volunteer SAR workers will profit from the Bulandas’ expertise on training the dog to alert, managing the search mission, choosing and socializing a SAR dog, and how to train dogs for specific commands (such as bar, turn around, go to an object, check, slow, crawl through and others). Readers curious about the fascinating work of the SAR canine will enjoy the general chapters about the history of SAR, an explanation of how dogs use scent to locate people or objects, and the functions of the SAR dog. This highly specialized training manual offers precise direction for SAR workers for every possible kind of mission, identifying the goals, target skills, methods and problem solving for each type of search. Color photographs and line drawings help to elucidate difficult concepts explained in the text. A resources section and index conclude this 264-page volume.

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Man's best friend receives top-billing in Realistic Dogs. Written for intermediate to advanced carvers using power carving tools, Realistic Dogs will show you how to capture the unique personality found in a variety of dog breeds including: Short-haired Dachshund, Lhasa Apso, Golden Retriever Puppy, Pointer, Boxer, Great Dane, and more.

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A follow up to their extensive and introductory painting book, Alcohol Ink Guide, which teaches all the beginning techniques for those exploring alcohol ink, artists and instructors Laurie Williams and Sherry Williams return with this instructional resource for creating truly realistic art using this versatile medium. Learn and master the four main alcohol ink painting techniques that include blending, masking, creating a barrier layer, and painting on both sides. From there, tutorials are provided for painting skin tones, fur, stones, rocks, and water, botanical effects, trees, and animals. Also included are 10 realism projects to practice and put together the skills learned into stunning works of art. The authors have years of experience working with alcohol inks, mastering the brushes, blenders, masking, control, and layering that enables artists to create magnificent realistic art, from portraits to landscapes, still lives to photo realism.

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Take a walk among owls, flamingos, cheetahs, butterflies, and so many more beautiful animals! Reflections: Birds and Animals Coloring Book is filled with 32 stunning designs to color into life, some designs even spanning across as a full-page spread! With a few colored examples to get you inspired before you begin coloring, capture the essence of each animal as you relax and let your creativity flow! Pages are perforated for easy removal and display.

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Hundreds of thousands of military veterans seek treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) each year. Service dogs have been used for many years in the civilian sector to help their disabled owners perform necessary tasks in daily life; likewise, the organized use of therapy dogs to bring comfort and companionship to hospital and nursing-home patients dates back more than four decades. Reporting for Duty explores the unique and special bond between wounded warriors—especially those suffering from PTSD—and their service dogs and discusses the vital work of therapy dogs who visit VA hospitals and military rehabilitation facilities.Author Tracy Libby tells the true stories of disabled veterans who have been touched, assisted, and enriched by the dogs in their lives, and the new lease on life is reciprocal: many of these service and therapy dogs have been rescued from shelters and specially trained for their jobs. A portion of proceeds from the sale of this book will benefit a veterans’ service-dog organization. INSIDE REPORTING FOR DUTY: •True stories of physically and mentally disabled veterans who count on service dogs for assistance with daily tasks. •An explanation of PTSD and how it affects military veterans. •How therapy dogs and service dogs are selected and trained for their jobs. •Rescuing shelter dogs to train for therapy and service work. •How the military is training dogs to accompany soldiers on deployments. •A look at the bond between people and dogs and the positive effects it has on both

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To guarantee that rescued dogs stay in their new forever homes, Tracy Libby’s The Rescue Dog Problem Solver seeks to make the story of every adopted dog a predestined success. While most dogs wind up in shelters due to no fault of their own, many rescue dogs develop unwanted behaviors while living with their previous owners. To ensure their success with their adopted dogs, rescuers must be prepared to handle and confidently resolve behavioral problems that arise through proven positive-training methods. This eye-opening problem-solving guide, filled with empowering stories of rescued dogs that defied the odds, is dedicated to the success of every rescuer and his happy, healthy companion dog.

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Author Nona Kilgore Bauer begins Retriever Madness with a chapter called ?Know Your Retrievers,” and few know their retrievers like this expert author, trainer, and breeder. Bauer introduces the readers to the six retrievers recognized by the American Kennel Club, among them two of the most popular companion dogs in the world, the Labrador Retriever and the Golden Retriever, along with other superb overachievers: the Chesapeake Bay Retriever, Flat-Coated Retriever, Curly-Coated Retriever, and Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever.Geared toward readers who are interested in working with their retrievers in their bred-for capacity?hunting water fowl and upland game birds?Retriever Madness is the perfect primer to getting started in the field. The book offers advice on selecting a puppy with hunting potential, giving future owners insight on how to evaluate a puppy’s birdiness, independence, prey drive, and personality. The chapter on bringing the puppy home gives recommendations for basic training equipment, including leashes, collars, dummies, whistles, starting pistol and the like.Amateur retriever owners who hope to hunt with their dogs will find excellent advice for training for the puppy’s first twenty weeks of life, the most critical period for training any puppy. In addition to the basic commands (sit, down, stay), the author also explains the release command, whistle commands, forward and backward heeling, and wait.Four chapters are devoted to beginning field work, presenting diagrams and step-by-step instructions and covering such topics as puppy marks, throwing, water retrieves, steadying, force-fetching, marking, executing blind retrieves and more. The author offers remedies to commonly encountered problems in the field as well as a complete glossary of terminology that all readers will find helpful in understanding the lingo of the field retriever.

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An exciting Kid Scoop activity book to keep kids engaged, playing, and thinking all day long! With hundreds of crazy cool secret codes, rebus puzzles, brain teasers, and so much more, these entertaining activities align with educational curricula to keep kids engaged as they learn. Author and former teacher, Vicki Whiting, is the founder of Kid Scoop, an award-winning weekly activity page that promotes standards-based learning. Parents and teachers around the world use Vicki’s fun activities to stimulate academic success and a joy of learning. With this expansive collection of exercises, kids aged 5-10 will spend hours learning loads of fun facts all about animals as they complete hundreds of exciting activities!

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