RIGHT CLICK OPEN IMAGES TO ENLARGE

KWENTUHANG PETS ATBP ON RADIO FIRST ANNIVERSARY

               

RIGHT CLICK OPEN TO ENLARGE

        

Coast Guard Aspins Make History - magazine article

RIGHT CLICK OPEN TO ENLARGE

                 

SEE RELATED POST:  ASPINS REWRITE K9 HISTORY

Aspins rewrite K9 history

ASPINS, the Philippine native dogs, are finally making history.

Two aspins have graduated with 25 other purebred dogs from the Philippine Coast Guard’s (PCG) K9 school and will be joining the roster of security dogs guarding the country’s ports against smuggled narcotics and bombs.

CGK9 Cola

They proudly trooped to the stage with their handlers to receive their diplomas during a ceremony honouring them at the PCG base camp in Taguig last week.

The PCG is an armed and uniformed unit attached to the Department of Transportation. It is tasked with securing maritime public transport like ships and ferry boats. Detecting drugs and bombs as well as search and rescue operations are part of its job description.

PCG dog handlers also learned water rescue, survival, swimming, scuba diving and first aid. But they first had to go through a rigid screening process.

“We first check to see if they are animal lovers so they would be concerned about the dog who would be their daily companion. They also have to be physically fit and unafraid of being bitten,” PCG Commander Allen J. Dalangin said.

But the dogs were taught only bomb and narcotics detection. “They are not trained to attack because that would be dangerous for the passengers,” he clarified.

Next year, they will begin training dogs for rescue as well as tracking human scent which is necessary in the search for survivors during a calamity.

The aspins, named Cola and Fiona, successfully passed all tests for the one-year Coast Guard K9 Handlers Course together with a Jack Russell named Joyce, 5 Labradors, 16 Belgian Malinois, 1 German Shepherd, 2 Golden Retrievers.

Though they looked friendly, not all the dogs can be hugged and stroked, Dalangin explained. It all depends on their personalities. The Belgian Malinois, for instance, are considered the best security dogs but they can be unpredictable and moody with strangers.

Author with CGK9 Joyce

The K9 graduates all stood at attention beside their handlers during the two-hour ceremony but a few decided later to skip the formalities and do what dogs do best.

One Golden Retriever stood on his hind legs as if prodding his handler to play or seek shelter from the heat of the sun. Some dogs lay on the concrete driveway, noses on their handlers’ boots and hind legs apart.

Of the 27 graduates, 20 are bomb sniffers while 7 are trained to look for illegal drugs.

“We have a quota of producing 20% narcotics detection dogs for every batch and we are trying to increase this to 30%,” Dalangin stated.

The bomb sniffers are chosen according to their behaviour, he said.

Hyperactive dogs who excitedly scratch at boxes and containers when they sniff something are trained for narcotics detection because a bomb might go off if there is too much movement around it. For this kind of work, dogs that can calmly sit down once they smell explosive devices are preferred.

Cola and Fiona are the first aspins in Philippine canine history trained to detect bombs. Foreign breeds are traditionally used to detect explosives and illegal drugs because they are known for their intelligence and observation skills.

As an example, Belgian Malinois Narda topped the class because she impressed PCG officers with her 100 percent accuracy rate in narcotics detection. “Belgian Malinois are highly intelligent, very vigilant and observant, and they have high intensity and high endurance,” Lieutenant Commander Famela Aspuria, who is also Officer-in-Charge of the CG Veterinary Service, said.

The aspins were donated by civilians after they heard CG officials announce on television that they would be accepting and adopting local dogs.

PCG officers believe training native dogs would allow them to cut their canine food budget and save on money spent in purchasing foreign breeds. The local dogs are also expected to be more adjusted to tropical weather and therefore be less prone to disease.

CHK9 Fiona

The K9 school accepted 38 dogs at the 

start of the training program last October. Eleven dropped out of the program for various reasons. Three Aspins, namely Pacman, Charice and Arnel, flunked this year because they lacked focus and were a bit moody.

But PCG officials are giving them a second chance and the siblings will be joining the next batch of trainees.

The three dogs, together with their siblings Manny and Pacquiao, were catapulted into instant celebrity status last year after the PCG announced that they were being eyed for security work and were undergoing puppy training at the base camp. This kind of training encourages them to go after the ball being held or thrown by a puppy handler.

Aspin Manny, who was about 3 months old at the time, didn’t seem to have the heart for the game. He would often escape from the puppy pen to go exploring in the garden.

Manny and Pacquiao have since been adopted by Coast Guard personnel. Charice, Arnel and Pacman are still at the base awaiting their next chance at training.

Their mother, Azumi, was adopted by PCG personnel two years ago at the Manila Harbor. The five pups inherited her short legs, stocky build and long nose.

Azumi, meanwhile, had another litter of 7 puppies. One died, five were given away because they lacked “the ball drive”, and one is currently in the puppy training program.

The PCG has so far trained 126 regular working dogs composed of 100 explosive detection and 26 narcotic detection canines.

(VERA Files is put out by veteran journalists taking a deeper look at current issues. Vera is Latin for "true.")

===============================================

This was published at Fit to Post The Inbox at yahoo.ph on Oct. 19, 2011.

Also published at Vera Files website

See related post: ASPINS TRAINED FOR BOMB SNIFFING

(If you like this article, please share it on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or others. Thanks.)

'Aspins' Trained for Bomb Sniffing

SEE VIDEO (CLICK here)

by KHRYSTA IMPERIAL RARA

VERA FILES

EVERY day at 6:30 a.m., Pacman goes to his training area for a 30-minute run. Egged on by his trainer, he goes through his morning routine with the focus and determination of a top-seeded athlete. But this Pacman doesn’t spar with his coach. This Pacman chases his trainer around instead.

Pacman the puppy is bound for stardom, just like world-renowned

boxer Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao. And Pacman the puppy may never know it, but in the future, human lives will depend on him.

Pacman the puppy is one of five aspins or asong pinoy (native Filipino dog) at present undergoing puppy training so that, in a year’s time, he could sniff bombs and narcotics in passenger ships and ports. He is one of 90 dogs in the kennel of the Philippine Coast Guard: Forty of them are under training, while the rest will undergo screening before starting doggie school next month.

The PCG, an armed and uniformed service attached to the Department of Transportation and Communications, is tasked with securing sea-going public transport vehicles like ships and ferry boats. Part of its job is detecting explosives and narcotics for which it used to procure foreign breeds like the German Shepherd, Labrador, Belgian Malinois and Golden Retriever.

But since budgetary constraints do not allow the purchase of these expensive breeds, PCG personnel have resorted to breeding and training their own and accepting donated canines. The only budget allotted is about P5,000 spent monthly on each dog for food and other needs. The cheaper table food is not an option because the dogs might go after provisions in passengers’ bags.

Native Filipino dogs were never considered before for security work because they are “independent, survivors and can be mean if feral” or left abandoned in the streets, said Lieutenant Commander Famela Aspuria, veterinarian of PCG’s K9 unit.

But experience gained from the training of mixed breeds told them it just might work.

“Intelligence is not based on breed. There are mixed breed and native dogs that are intelligent,” Aspuria said.

The training of aspins is the brainchild of PCG Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo and PCG K9 Unit Commander Allen Dalangin, who keeps 20 dogs at home.

“The commandant is under pressure to provide 200 dogs for ports all over the country and the idea to train the aspins came up during several discussions,” Dalangin recalls.

Seventy-two active working dogs are now deployed with their handlers in 30 K9 detachments along the nautical highways and ports in the country’s primary destination spots. K9 teams also check the vessels plying the Pasig River route as they enter the Malacanang area.

Native dogs, the PCG top brass thought, would be easier to feed and maintain. They would be more resistant to local diseases and are used to tropical weather. Small dogs would also be able to enter cramped spaces like the cargo compartments of buses on board sea vessels.

As luck would have it, the petty-officer-in-charge of the PCG detachment in South Harbor Manila had adopted and raised a native female puppy abandoned by a Superferry passenger three years ago. The passenger had to leave the pup behind because he had no quarantine clearance to bring her to the Visayas.

The dog, named Azumi after the lead character in a Japanese manga series who happened to be a young woman trained as an assassin, is the mother of the five PCG pups. Their father, according to Dalangin, was a stray dog, known in Filipino as askal (short for asong kalye), roaming the area.

After they were weaned off their mother’s milk, the five pups were taken to start training. A few days ago, mother and babies had a happy reunion at the base. In two weeks, the puppies will join 35 other dogs who will pass the screening test and together they will comprise “Class 7” of the K9 unit.

The more refined among the Class 7 dogs will be taught to sit when they find explosives, while the rest will learn to scratch at containers hiding illegal substances. And the only reward they will seek is their handler’s praise and pat on the head.

Azumi’s pups are all named after Filipino celebrities who have hit it big overseas. Four-month-old Pacman and siblings Manny and Pacquiao are all named after the world’s best pound-for- pound boxing champ, another brother Arnel after Arnel Pineda of the American band Journey, and only sister Charice after Charice Pempengco, now a guest star on the hit American TV series “Glee.”

Oblivious to the curious eyes of onlookers, the fat and short-haired young canines carry on with their half-hour daily puppy training, which is actually more play than work. They need no second prodding as they make a mad dash for a plain red rubber ball that their trainer swings and bounces around.

The trainer makes it more exciting for them by uttering commands in an encouraging tone and praising the ones that manage to grab the ball with their teeth and hang on to it. Their level of “ball drive” will indicate their potential as bomb or narcotics sniffers.

Four months from now, this harmless ball and others like it will be laced with the odor of bomb components and illegal drugs like opium, hashish, marijuana, shabu and heroin to sensitize the dogs’ noses to their smell.

“We are not breed-conscious,” Aspuria said. “Mixed breeds perform just as well.”

Cola, for instance, is a black, white and brown Beagle and aspin mix. She’s barely 8 months old. Donated only a month ago, she is still in the conditioning phase but has constantly surprised her handler with her amazing ability to find at first try the ball hidden under one of the overturned pots, or “pot search” in Coast Guard parlance.

Cola’s owner donated her to the PCG because he thought she had special skills that could be tapped. Back home, she would steal his socks, hide them and then retrieve them for him.

The K9 unit is rooting for Cola. But if she doesn’t make the grade, then she’ll just be sent back home or maybe given a second chance. Flunkers are allowed to go through another year of dog schooling, and if they don’t make it the second time, they are either sent back to their owners or adopted by PCG officers.

But for now, Coast Guard personnel are letting the puppies be puppies. They eat puppy kibble three times and play twice a day. The adult canines, on the other hand, are fed twice daily.

“I’m still adjusting to the aspin puppies because they behave differently from the foreign breed pups. But looking for their potential is a challenge for me,” Seaman 2^nd Class Ryan Philip Ventura, trainer of the pups, confides. “It’s good to train our native breed so we can show people what they can do.”

Dalangin, meantime, has no second thoughts about the project he has initiated. He is convinced that like their namesakes, the aspins will do their country proud. “We just have to start them off at an early age,” he stated.

====================

Published in The Philippine Star Sept. 21, 2010 and other Manila newspapers (Manila Times, Malaya, etc.)

Also published online at YAHOO - http://ph.yfittopostblog.com/2010/09/20/coast-guard-trains-aspins%E2%80%99-to-sniff-bombs/

at GMANEWSTV: http://www.gmanews.tv/story/201602/coast-guard-trains-asong-pinoy-to-sniff-bombs

at MALAYA: http://www.malaya.com.ph/09202010/news10.html

at VERA FILES: http://verafiles.org/main/focus/coast-guard-trains-aspins-to-sniff-bombs/

and other sites.

CAT MAMAS

Cats are like people. And oftentimes, they think like people.

It is simply amazing to see how mother cats act just like human mothers. I’ve observed my cats for 10 years now and I have seen that each female has her own ideas about mothering. But the unique ways with which they prepare for motherhood, give birth and raise their kittens really remind me of different women with children.

Here’s is a list of the various kinds of feline female behavior I have observed through the years:

NATURAL MAMA

This cat is the ideal mama. No one, neither elder cats nor concerned humans, teaches her how to take care of the babies yet she does it like a real pro. She gives birth alone, without any fuss or sound, and instinctively knows that she has to eat the umbilical cord and sack like her cousins do in the wild (no Lamaze lessons, no nurses, wet nurses nor doctors to assist at the moment of birth). She then grooms the newborns, lets them suckle and never leaves them for the first 24 hours.

TEEN MAMA

cheira and toy

Like human teenage moms, cats less than a year old usually make bad mamas. They just aren’t mentally and emotionally prepared to be mothers. My white Persian cat Cheira got pregnant when she was just 7 months old. When she gave birth, she did not know what to do. She left the kittens in a corner and refused to nurse them despite my repeated attempts to force her to lie down and let them suckle. Needless to say, the babies lived for just a day. But when she gave birth again a year later, she knew exactly how to care for her babies.

PROTECTIVE MAMA

Mama cats are very protective of their offspring. Like their wild cousins the lions, tigers, cheetahs, etc., they feel the need to protect the babies against predator species or, as in the case of my cats, from the other adult cats at home. In the wild, male lions kill cubs to eliminate competitors for food and females. So the mother lion keeps on changing dens to make sure her pups will not be found. My cats still follow this instinct. A few weeks after giving birth, they always move their kittens to a different area or room.

PROUD MAMA

These mothers are so proud of their kittens that instead of sticking to their maternal instincts and hiding the babies, they bring out the litter and place them in an open area for all to see. It worries me when they do this a day or more after giving birth. My cat Mignonne is guilty of this. She enjoys the attention when the rest of the family come to check out her babies.

THE KIDNAPPER (OR KITTEN NAPPER?)

Kidnapping – or in this case, kittennapping - occurs when a cat is either about to give birth or has just given birth. Strangely, the mothers of the kidnapped kittens do not raise a fuss except for another white Persian, Xerea, who scolded her kitten and refused to let him suckle for a day when he (the kitten) agreed to stay with his aunt Bast and did not try to escape. When they are kidnapped, the reluctant and often screaming little victims are taken by the scruff of the neck by the expectant or new mother and brought to her chosen den. Perhaps the expecting mom is so excited about her coming babies that she gets impatient and decides to mother someone else’s kitten. The kidnapped kittens are then expected to babysit or teach the newborns a few things.

THE TEACHER

Ishtar, a pewter-colored Persian, trains her daughters to care for the babies. She makes them stay and watch over the kittens while she socializes with the other cats or inspects the house. The daughters usually don’t mind as long as they, too, get to suckle even if they are already six months old or more.

COLLABORATING MAMAS

I first noticed this apparent agreement between feline mothers to cooperate and share responsibilities some seven years ago when sisters Mau and Bast gave birth at the same time to a litter of 3 kittens each. The sisters took turns eating so that one of them would always be with the kittens. They groomed and nursed each other’s babies.

Last year, the phenomenon was repeated when Filipino (or American Shorthair) cats Spider and Pouncival gave birth weeks apart. I had rescued Spider two years ago from under the back tire of a Pajero parked along Times Street in Quezon City. Pouncival, on the other hand, just walked into my garden one day and refused to leave. I gave her away to a neighbor but every morning I would find her back in my garage in time for breakfast. Like Bast and Mau, Spider and Pouncival care for each other’s litter, groom each other’s babies and watch over them.

PEOPLE-FRIENDLY MAMA

Not all cats become attached to people. Some keep an independent attitude and do not wish to be petted nor stroked. But Barbie is quite the opposite. She always wants to be near me and makes sure that her babies become close to me. In fact, she moved her babies from under the bed to under the bedside table so they would always have easy access to me. Thus her three babies Aslan, Simba and Pocahontas grew up climbing in and out of my bed and even sleeping with me. But not all my female felines teach their kittens to be close to me.

SEEKER OF HELP

ARTEMIS and her kittens

Some cats even go further by literally asking for help when they need it. Eleven-year-old Artemis always experiences a delay in kitten delivery. Her stomach gets so big and heavy that sometimes she doesn’t want to stand anymore. When it’s time to give birth yet her babies won’t come out yet, she comes to me for a healing. So I place my hands on her stomach and give it Reiki energy. Or I gently stroke and massage it. She loves it and usually wants to stay all day on the bed. The babies come out usually a day or two later.

BAST and her kitty

Her sister Bast also had the same idea. She usually keeps her babies hidden and well-protected. But one day, when a good friend who happens to be a doctor came to do acupuncture on our cat, Sam, Bast brought out her three babies and laid them out in front of him. It was the first and only time any of the cats did that to a visitor. We thought it was rather cute and we didn’t know what it meant at the time. It was only after the babies died two days later that we realized she was asking for medical or acupuncture help.

ULTIMATE MAMA

ISHTAR with Mau and Bast

This type of cat gives up whatever little food she has to her kittens. Not all mothers do this. But I’ve seen this admirable trait among some of my cats. When the kittens want more food or milk, Ishtar, Spider and Pouncival give them their share. It’s very much the same for human mothers. My mom does it for me. She buys clothes for herself and then gives them to me if I like them. Now that’s what I call the ultimate mother.

THE CHANGED CAT

Motherhood, I am told, changes many women. I had the chance to observe this first hand with Xerea who used to be a timid cat who feared all the other cats. Xerea made her home in my bathroom perhaps thinking that the closed-in walls would provide her better protection from her siblings who just loved to tease and harass her. She often stayed on top of a tiled wall dividing the shower from the toilet area. For several years, none of our Prince Charming cats could lay their paws on Xerea, our “wall tower princess”. After giving birth to two kittens, Xerea first nursed them inside the bathroom cabinet and later moved them out to my room. More than a month later, she began making excursions to the dining room and kitchen. She must have liked it there because she brought her babies there. Now, Xerea goes all over the house. She has lost her fear of the other cats and she now fights back when they try to boss her around.

Animal behavior indeed mirrors human behavior. Or is it the other way around? And when it comes to mothering, humans do not have a monopoly on love for their babies. Mother cats and other species give the same attention and sacrifice to their offspring. Scientists may refer to it as the instinct to ensure “survival of the species”. But anyone who has the opportunity to observe animals up close will know that this is too simplistic an explanation. Animals are intelligent and they have a way of knowing which we do not completely comprehend. And mothering, for them, generally seems to be a special experience. (end)

============

Published in Mr. & Ms. magazine (May-June 2008) under my column: ANIMAL TOTEMS

(If you like this article, kindly share it through FB, Twitter, Google+ and/or others. )

HEALING ANIMALS – WITHOUT STRESS AND TRAUMA

By Khrysta Imperial Rara

Alternative healing methods are now legitimately practiced in the United States, Europe, Australia, Japan and China. In these places, hospital officials of state-run hospitals ask their patients whether they want to see regular doctors or alternative healers. The same goes for the animals. People can choose either to bring their pets to regular veterinarians or to alternative pet healers. A growing number of pet owners opt for the latter mainly because alternative healing turns out cheaper in the long term. Another reason is that more people are becoming health conscious and they no longer want to fill their pets’ bodies with chemical products (like antibiotics, chemical flea killers, de-wormers, etc…) Many pet owners would rather use natural ingredients and methods to heal their animal companions. Others combine homeopathic and allopathic methods. It all depends on what works best for you and your animal companion.

Healing pets the non-conventional way protects them from traumatic experiences.

A trip to the vet often causes fear and panic to an animal particularly if he or she had been previously subjected to injections, physical exams, blood tests and mishandling by a vet’s assistants.

Alternative healing methods also help humans bond with their animal friends. Everything that lives and exists in this world is composed of energy. Humans and animals are made up of energies, each vibrating at a different level. So when you try to heal a sick pet, he will immediately feel that you are trying to manipulate his energy field and he will love you the more for it.

I rarely go to the vet nowadays because it has become quite expensive. With 14 cats in the house, I have opted for energy healing to cut costs.

I practice several kinds of methods. My favorite is REIKI healing. Reiki, which means universal life energy in Japanese, is a method of healing that uses extremely fine energy tapped from the universal source. Practitioners are initiated so they can gain easy access to the life force. As a second-degree REIKI healer, I just put my hand on the part of the cat’s body that is bothering him and pass on healing energy to him. I can see the relief from pain in the cat’s eyes and actions. It’s either he falls asleep or he suddenly bounces off from my lap, completely energized. The results can be seen immediately or after a few sessions.

Sometimes, I do pranic healing. It’s basically the same principle of energy (prana) manipulation, but this time the pranic healer uses his hands to “sweep away” all negative energies within the animal’s energy field. Pranic healing is an ancient healing art. Animals tend to get impatient, though, so you might have to hold him with one hand while the other does the sweeping. Two of my cats have been healed with pranic energy. Aswad, a black stray cat, was going blind when he was dumped in my garage by some neighbors. His eyes were in a sorry state either because he didn’t get the proper care and nutrients or he had been scratched in the eyes. Veterinary doctors said both Aswad and Tuxedo, a black and white stray cat who had blood oozing from her eyes, were “hopeless” and would definitely go blind. Well, they did not. They recovered their eyesight within two weeks with the help of pranic healing and of course, a lot of love, attention and clean food. Fauna, a sleek jet black stray, was cured by REIKI energy – and Vitamin C. Another vet had taken her x-ray and said she was dying of lung and stomach infection. In 1999, my white Persian cat Horus suddenly started walking like a drunkard. He acquired a glazed look as if he were high on drugs and he could neither jump up nor come when called. The reason? A vet had prescribed a high dosage of antibiotic to stop his diarrhea. Well, the sickness stopped but Horus got even worse. I gave him lots of REIKI treatments and he is now one sweet fat independent cat.

Now, when my cats get diarrhea, I give homeopathic tablets in addition to the usual alternative treatments. Homeopathy cures an illness by treating the whole being rather than just the symptoms. It is holistic. Its medicines come from plant, mineral and animal sources and are used in extremely diluted amounts. The tablets I give my cats are for diarrhea and they are very effective.

My feline friends also love the spinal flush, so-called because it flushes the toxins out from the body. To do it, apply thumb pressure along the canals on both sides of the spine but not on the spine itself. Do this from the back of the neck all the way down to the edge of his body. To balance a pet’s energies when she’s feeling too aggressive or too weak, trace the number eight (8) sideways a few inches from her body. Do this several times.

Quartz crystals can also be a big help. When any of my Persian cats gets sick, I put the appropriate crystal in his or her sleeping corner. Once when pewter-haired Ishtar was stricken with diarrhea and throwing up everything she ate, I placed a pink quartz under her stomach while she slept the whole night. By the time I woke up the following morning, she was busy playing with her two-month kittens.

Often, like people, animals get sick due to stress. They are so sensitive to the energies around them that they easily get affected by negative energy waves. When there’s a lot of anger in the home, pet behavior can turn erratic. Some animals even absorb the negative energies released by their human companions. When this happens, stressed people usually say they always feel better when their pet is around. Problem is, it could be toxic for their animal friends.

Wildlife, or animals who don’t know you, are a different story. Long-distance mental healing would work best for them. When I was still a student in France, I used to spend my afternoons watching the swans as they gracefully glided along the Ill River in Strasbourg. I would give them bread and it came to a point when they would come rushing to shore as I approached the bridge. One day I noticed that one of the swans was limping and having a hard time coming to shore. For three days I did mental healing on him and at the same time I sent him a lot of love energy. I wasn’t sure I was getting anywhere but on the fourth day, he came to shore with the others and even stayed behind as if to thank me.

Sometimes, though, there are animals who can no longer be healed. For some of them, it’s simply time to leave. On such occasions, I just thank the animal for the love and company he shared with me. Often, they come back or reincarnate and end up with me again.

In China, Japan, Thailand, Australia, the United States and Europe, vets already use acupuncture on their animal patients. Acupuncture cures almost all diseases including arthritis and mental disorders. It is an ancient Chinese therapy that requires the insertion of needles into the skin at specific points in the body. Sluggish animals usually regain their energy after an acupuncture session.

There are still more kinds of alternative cures but nothing beat prevention. Exposure to the morning sun does a lot of good for the animals. And of course, lots of love and attention works wonders for them. It’s always the best way to heal – and protect – them from disease.