Reflection of Canine Handling Skills- Artefact B

Since joining Writtle University College in September I believe that I have improved my handling skills greatly. Having a practical session every week working on a different practical element was really helpful and it enabled me to expand my knowledge on how to correctly and safely work with dogs in many situations.

Although I have had experience from working in a veterinary surgery and doing Animal Management at college, there were still gaps in my knowledge and I learnt a lot more about safely and correctly handling dogs. An example of this was when I was training to do my OSPE. When doing this I learnt that when you go to let a dog out of a crate you must first approach slowly but confidently and then introduce yourself and any equipment you are going to use. When you are comfortable with the dogs behaviour you can open the crate but make sure that one knee is securing the door so that the dog cannot escape. This sort of knowledge will help me in future if I was to work with dogs in a kennel environment such as a vets or a dog groomers or a physiotherapy centre to help me to safely work with and handle dogs.

The reason why it is so important to know how to handle animals correctly is because of the animals welfare. According to the Animal Welfare Act 2006 an animal must not be put under unecerssary stress which can be quite hard to avoid in a kennel environment. Knowing how to correctly handle a dog and minimise their stress levels in-turn, maximises their animal welfare and ensures that you are following correct legislation.

The previous example was just one of the many things I have learnt at Writtle University when handling dogs and I’m sure that in Semester B there is still a lot more I am going to learn.

Below is a picture of Marlowe who I worked with in a lot of my pratical sessions.

References:

Legislationgovuk. 2006. Animal Welfare Act 2006. [Online]. [02 Dec 2019]. Available from: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/45/section/6

Avma. 2010. Animal Welfare: What is it?. [Online]. [02 Dec 2019]. Available from: https://www.avma.org/resources/animal-health-welfare/animal-welfare-what-it