Your Team When Behavior Issues Crop Up

hi and welcome to the first of the many training

sessions with finicky cat sitting in behavior.

My name is Beth Pasic, and I'm the owner and

founder of Finicky Cat Sitting in behavior.

When you're looking to have someone help you with your

cat behavior issues, there's a number of people who are

actually on your team.

The first one being on your team is going to

be your cat center the next, maybe a cat behavior

consultant. The next one might be your vet, and after

that it may even escalate to seeing a vet veterinary

behaviorist. And we're going to talk today about the role

and position what you should expect from each member of

your team.

If you happen to have a professional Catt center, it's

important to understand that there are two kinds of pet

sitters in the world.

There is your generalist pat center, and there is your

specialist. So let's take a look at who might be

your generalist, your generalist pet sitter.

These are going to be the people who have a

wide range of skills and abilities.

They are typically dog focused, with some training in caring

for cats as a basic pet sitting service.

Many of them are going to be certified by Pet

Sitters International or the National Association of Pet Sitting Professionals

mouthful there.

But both those organizations work to certify their pet sitters

and offer ongoing training and education in pet care.

Their basic skills in working with a wide range of

pets from cats, dogs, snakes, lizards, chickens, lots of lots

of skills, but their general skills.

They're not really in that specialist range.

Your next person that you probably be looking for might

be a professional cat sitter, your pet professional cats that

are a someone who specializes in cats and is pretty

much basically cats only they are going to be very

well versed on cat behavior.

They more than likely have been or are volunteers with

a cat rescue organization.

Most of them are going to have a natural education,

an ongoing education in cat behavior.

They're going Teoh also more than likely be able to

handle most of the common medications that cats need to

receive, and they may also include holding pet sitter certifications.

These are your professional cat sitters.

They're very good at identifying behavior problems or behavior problems

that indicate a medical problem for your cat, so you

can rely on them for a very basic core.

Identification of your cats Needs your next person who you

might look to to help you with a behavior issue

would be your cat behavior consultant.

A cat behavior consultant is someone who specializes in preventing,

managing and modifying challenging behaviors in cats.

These are people who have taken it upon themselves to

go even one step further into the cat behavior world.

There's it's really important that you understand that not unlike

the dog training world, the profession remains without any sort

of legal regulations, so that can seem kind of a

scary thing.

But what I can tell you is you want to

look for people who have certifications by some sort of

a recognised professional organization.

That means you can look to the I A B

C, which is the International Association of Animal and Behavior

Consultants. You can look to the care and prior academy.

You can look to naps who we talked about from

the pet sitting world.

You can also look for the to the Animal Behavior

Institute. You can also look for fear free, certified pet

sitters or registered that text.

These are all people who have made a commitment, a

professional commitment to improving their understanding of cat behavior and

approaching it from a science science based perspective.

And, in fact, many of these types of professionals.

They may be the ones that take your your on

boarding information, and they may be the ones that help

work with you when it comes to dealing with your

cat and needing to get your vet as part of

the puzzle to help resolve your cat's behavior issues.

It's important that you understand that your vet complain a

very important role not only in your cat's health but

also in their overall behavior.

And what that consists off is that many behaviors that

owners complain about are often rooted actually in a medical

condition, things like peeing outside the litter box.

Some cases of aggression all can point to medical conditions

that need to be treated, as I say in my

book Understanding Cat Behavior.

This means we cannot correct or modify that behavior without

addressing their medical needs first, and as one review said,

I mentioned the vet way too much in my book,

but when it comes to cap behavior, they are often

part of our part of you, our and your team.

When dealing with behavior issues that may crop up, they

are also able to prescribe or recommend appropriate medications for

your cat, both for the medical reasons and for some

of the more minor behavior issues that may help.

So your veterinarian is a key part and a key

component of your team when your behavior issues crop up.

If, for some reason between your vet and your cat

behavior consultant you can't find or can't resolve your pets

issue, you may be recommended to someone who has a

mix, very specialized training.

And this person is your vet behaviorist.

The that behaviorists especially educated to deal.

I'm just going to read it, especially educated to deal

with animal behavior issues that are extreme and often require

prescription medications in combinations to help resolve the issue.

They also go so far as they have a highly

trained individuals and veterinary technicians on their team that include

actual pet training, dog training and cat training.

So if you find you're being referred to your veterinary

behaviorist, if we do that because it's when the basic

behavior modification isn't working or it's working too slowly or

it's not that the cat is not adapting and holding

on to that information, new modification and information that we're

giving them.

If your cat has an obvious fear, anxiety and stress

level of four or more, which we will refer you

out to a veterinary behaviorist to deal with that and

also with very extreme aggression cases, we will again probably

refer you out.

And that really has to do with the pet needs,

a little more medical help to help get over the

stress and the fear and the anxiety that is causing

them to behave in the manner in which is not

too friendly.

So those are the people who you might find on

your team.

When you have behavior issues crop up.

That's it for today.

Thanks. And we'll see you next week.

But by

Your Team When Behavior Issues Crop Up

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