Shelter Enrichment

by **Amie** » Sat Aug 18, 2012 8:08 am

We do a lot of things to keep our shelter dogs happy, but I'm always looking for more!

In addition to the regular walks, many of our dogs get obedience training, nose work, clicker work, and foster camp.

I'd love to hear what your shelter does, especially new ideas for in-cage enrichment (work-to-eat toys, etc)!!!

by **Meatman** » Sat Aug 18, 2012 8:21 am

Good ideas!

by **Celesteandthebullies** » Sat Aug 18, 2012 2:09 pm

We have our Camp Love-A-Pet program, that's limited to 16 dogs per camp, but still a great thing for the dogs!
http://www.havenhumane.net/camp-love-a-pet.asp

Every Tuesday night we have a STAR (Socialization and Training for Adoption Readiness) training program. Where volunteers/members of the public come in and work with shelter dog. When I was able to go regularly we'd take a lot of dogs out every night (normally one at a time) and bring them into a large class room where everyone was sitting in a circle and worked on things like sitting for rewards/attention, sits, eye contact, zen (leaving food alone until released to get it), and a lot more. From what I've been told we're now having the more experience people take dogs out and the newer people are separated into groups that follow one of the experienced STAR trainers. They watch them work with the dog, explain things, etc.

We also have the ROP kids who come in and work with dogs for school credits.

Along with the regular walking, training, shaping, and working on "problem" behaviors.