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Today I would like to introduce my pet dogs. Currently, I have a total of eight canines involved in my life.

・Den (Labrador Retriever, 10 years old, ♂) who lives with my mother.
・Lenny and Arnie (English Golden Retriever, 13 and 11 years old, both ♂) live with my wife’s family.
・Five dogs that live with my family.
　・Eto (American Cocker Spaniel, 4 years old, ♂)
　・Louis (English Cocker Spaniel, 3 years old, ♂)
　・Coco (American Cocker Spaniel, 10 years old, ♂)
　・Lara (American Cocker Spaniel, 9 years old, ♀)
　・Ann (American Cocker Spaniel, 8 years old, ♂)

We have 8 dogs, but only a retriever and a cocker spaniel. However, each of them has a strong personality, and we can spend delightful days with them. I want to tell you about them and how I feel about living with them.

1. Den

First of all, I would like to introduce Den, who is my first dog. I met Den when I was a college student. I had been committed to baseball since I was a child, and my goal was to become a professional baseball player in the future. However, I couldn’t come true to my dream because I injured my left knee. At the time, I was so depressed that I lost the meaning of life, and I think I was at the bottom of my life. I was really frustrated. My family did lots of things for me to cheer up, and one of them was that my mother decided to live with a dog as a family member. That is why I met Den. In the human world, there is a saying Give&Take. It means that when you give something, you receive something, and conversely, when you receive something, you give something. However, when we look at the relationship between humans and dogs, humans give to dogs physically (and emotionally, of course). For example, they walk the dog, feed them, dispose of their excrement, bathe them, and many other things. On the other hand, dogs do not give humans any physical thing or service However, we can take emotional feelings from dogs, such as happiness. I think this is really great. I also recovered from a setback by receiving love from my den over time. Den’s presence made me realize pets’ powerful impact on humans and inspired me to want to do something for pets in the future.

Please read more about my encounter with Den in the following article.

テクノロジーでペット業界の課題解決を–インドで動物病院、日本発ベンチャーA’alda Pte CEOに聞く(Japanese only)

We have a great deal of love for Den. However, as this is my first dog, we did not have sufficient knowledge, and I have some regrets as to whether we were able to create the best environment for Den. However, it can’t be helped to regret the past, so I would like to continue to cherish my time with Den. I have been so busy lately that I have not been able to go to my parents’ house as often as I would like, so I decided to make time for them properly.

2. Lenny and Arnie

Lenny and Arnie are brothers who live with my wife’s parents. Their personalities are entirely different. Lenny is our oldest dog, so we realized the importance of senior care through the experience with Lenny. 2 years ago, my wife took Lenny to the animal clinic because she felt he had a strange walking posture and a decreased willingness to walk. Then, the vets couldn’t make a definitive diagnosis and told us that it was inevitable because Lenny was a senior dog. However, We felt cruel and sad, when he was not able to walk properlyproperly. So we got a second opinion from another vet. The vet made a definitive diagnosis and treatment policy for him. For example, we gave him medicines that are effective for the nervous system and treatment and rehabilitation, such as massage using near-infrared rays. As a result, he could walk as energetically as before within about a month. He is now 13 years old and can walk without any problems. The number of senior dogs in Japan will increase rapidly. However, few veterinary hospitals can fully cover senior care. You feel unfortunate when you see dogs unable to walk satisfactorily. Of course, I do not know if all dogs will be able to walk like before with senior care. But I want everyone to know that there are actually many things we can do for senior dogs.

We want to create an environment where all senior dogs can receive proper care at veterinary hospitals nationwide, centering on the Dyplus facility.

【公式】Dyplus西麻布｜ペットのためのメディカルサロン｜獣医師たち専門家があなたとペットの豊かな生活をトータルデザイン(Japanese only)

3. Eto and Louis

Eto and Louis are dogs that live with us. Eto is an American Cocker Spaniel and Louis is an English Cocker Spaniel. Both are from different breeders. Eto was a tranquil dog and never barked at all. However, since he was one year old, he had difficulty with other dogs, especially those bigger than him. Also, when he was two years old, he tended to leave food, so I added his favorable, like chicken, which caused him to gain some weight. My trainer introduced me to E-Dog Learning, which mainly offers dog fitness services. In addition to the diet program, I have been taught about pet socialization to improve the relationship with other dogs. We still go to E-Dog Learning once a week. As a result, Eto has become a lean, sporting dog and is much less aggressive towards other dogs. We have learned the importance of dog fitness and that we can improve dog’s aggression if we work on it patiently. We have also had Mr. Tominaga of E-Dog Learning come to our Dyplus for on-site lessons. We want to hold this event again regularly.

e-DogLearning |ドッグスポーツ＆ドッグトレーニング専門のオンラインサービスサイト(Japanese only)

Louis is the following dog to join our family after Eto. Louis is gentle and does not attack other dogs, but he is a super active dog who needs to expend a lot of energy or get stressed out. We had quite a bit of trouble with him at first, but now that we have found dog sports, we have happy dog life. We have learned the importance of understanding the breed and its characteristics. If we do not understand the characteristics of each species and the individual dog, people and dogs will be unhappy. Through the dog sports and training of Eto and Louis, I realized that the relationship between people and dogs is a big issue that we must seriously consider.

Please check out my past blog about the episode with Louis.

The relationship between people and pets（A’ALDA CEO Masamichi Okuda）

4. Coco, Lala, and Ann

Coco, Lara, and Ann are the dogs that we collectively adopted last April. Ann is the biological child of Coco and Lala, and we welcomed them together as a family. Originally, Lara and Ann were going to be adopted by another family, so we planned to take in only Coco. However, Anne was actually once adopted by another family but returned for various reasons. We thought it would be challenging for the new family and the dogs to separate three dogs that had been together all this time, so we decided to protect them all together. At the time of their adoption, they all had a severe skin disease that caused pus to come from their entire bodies. Food allergies and environmental factors had caused complications, so we treated the skin disease mainly with medicated baths, ointments, and diet. Even now, they have not completely recovered, but thankfully, they have been able to recover to the point where people are surprised when they know they were from shelter dogs.

Even if you think of all shelter dogs together, the situation is completely different depending on whether they are puppies, dogs that have been treated and socialized at shelters, or seniors with diseases. Fortunately, we run animal hospitals at my, so many people help me and I have the knowledge about pets care so that I can get by for now. However, whether all people can be mutually happy life with shelter dogs is questionable. The shelter dog problem is a huge problem for the industry and absolutely must be solved. However, I feel that it is not right to raise our voices to adopt a shelter dog irresponsibly. This is something I have learned from living with shelter dogs. Thanks to the efforts of shelter groups and volunteers, the problem in Japan is improved little by little compared to the past. We, as individuals and as a company, will try our best to have an influence and contribute to solving the shelter dog problem from all aspects.

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