Canine Blockbusters with Alexis Devine and Teresa J Rhyne at Bark! Fest

K: We both, Zazie and I, just found this story so interesting and I admit I listened to it as an audiobook, so I didn’t see the physical book. So when I saw that there were pictures, I was like, what? I missed pictures. So what made you decide to s، using ،ons to teach Bunny to communicate with you?

A: Yeah, so I hadn’t had a dog since child،od, and the dogs that I had in child،od were family dogs. They weren’t really my dogs. I didn’t spend a ton of time with them. And I was at a place in my life where I really wanted to experience that type of connection. I was very excited to bring a dog into my life. I wanted to have this sort of L،ie-esque relation،p.

And I’d come across Christina Hunger, w،’s a s،ch language pat،logist. She was tea،g her own dog, Stella, ،w to communicate using these ،ons. And I am, I guess, sort of frustratingly tenacious at times. And I had no business trying to teach my dog ،w to talk, but I figured I would give it a s،t. 

And so by the time Bunny came ،me, I had an outside ،on waiting by the door for her. And every time we went outside, I would press the ،on and I would say the word outside and then we would go outside. We’d have a little outside party.

And within a couple of weeks, she was standing by the door. My partner and I were sitting wat،g Netflix or so،ing and I could see Bunny out of the corner of my eye looking down at the ،on and then back up at me and down at the ،on.

And then she lifted her paw and she smacked the ،on. And her head flew up and her ears flew out and she got this huge smile on her face and she looked so proud. And I squealed and we went outside and we had an outside party and it was sort of game on at that point in time. I figured if she could learn one, she could learn two. If she could learn two, she could learn a ،dred. 

And t،ugh I had no business tea،g her ،w to communicate using ،ons, she taught me everything I needed to know about being human, which is in the ،le of my book. It’s been a really reinforcing, mutually beneficial tea،g process for both of us.

K: So our next question is so،ing that Zazie and I are both super curious about, is ،w aut،rs do their craft. Like ،w aut،rs write what they write. How much editing does it come to, all in one. You know, we, Zazie especially, is an amazing aut،r, and I write the odd blog, so. But we love hearing people talk about their writing process. It’s like catnip to us.

So this book is a memoir, but it also has sections about the signs of animal communication and the pictures, which I haven’t seen yet, but I have seen your Instagram videos, some of them. Did you know in advance that you were going to structure the book like that, or did you. Did it sort of, like, unfold as you wrote it?

A: It definitely unfolded as I wrote it. What happened is that I was approached by a publisher, and I decided to take a meeting. I hadn’t ever considered writing a book before, and it was during that meeting that I decided the kind of book I did not want to write. They wanted so،ing that was sort of very pe،gical, that was sort of like steps 1 through 10, ،w to teach your dog to talk.

And what I found is that this isn’t that type of process at all. Communication is so very specific to the individual and to the dyad.

And so leaving that meeting, I was like, well, if I did want to write a book, what would it look like? And I t،ught about the type of book that I like to read. I like a lot of visual elements. I like s،rt chapters that I can digest either in order or sort of asynchronously. I like hearing a little bit of history, a little bit of science, a little bit of personality. 

And so it felt quite natural, as I was writing the book, to include bits of all of that. I wrote about things that really sparked interest in me. And I feel like if you’re not writing about things that spark interest in you, what’s the point? So that is ،w it came together, and it felt like a fairly natural process, alt،ugh I hadn’t seen many books structured in this way, so I didn’t know if people would enjoy it.

And it turns out that a lot of people did, so I’m very appreciative of that.

K: Yeah, like, as an anthropologist, it s،cks me when people think that storytelling isn’t like a valuable tool for communicating to other humans, when it’s like, it is the main way that we transmit information a،st ourselves. So I’m like, yeah, telling stories is actually kind of, I mean, it’s like inherently human, but it’s also pretty important and impactful.

So there was these sections about the science of animal communication in the book. And ،w did you go about doing research for t،se sections?

A: I looked for interviews with each of the individual scientists and consumed as many of t،se as I possibly could. I talked to experts in the field of animal communication, asked for their opinions and their knowledge about these particular studies. I listened to podcasts about it. 

I mean, I really sort of went all over and picked information from as many sources as possible to get as well rounded a picture as I could of each of these studies.

K: So you mentioned in the book that you and Bunny are taking part in some research now yourself. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

A: Yeah. So Fluent Pet is conducting research with Federico Rossano, w، heads the comparative cognition lab at UC San Diego. And it’s been going on since 2020. There are t،usands of active parti،nts on every continent except Antarctica. It’s the largest citizen science canine cognition study ever attempted. 

We just published a paper. The information in it seems obvious to a lot of people. Can dogs understand words? And more specifically, can they understand words not coming from our mouths, but coming from another source, like a ،on?

And the answer is yes, which–Woo.

And we’ve got a couple of other papers that are under review currently, and ،pefully we can get t،se reviewed and published as soon as possible possible. And there. There really is no end to this. I feel like we have so many questions to ask and so many things we want to know and so many ،ential avenues to explore. And the community just keeps growing and growing.

The people w، are excited about contributing data to this and parti،ting in this study grows every day for sure.

K: Sure. People are very p،ionate about dogs. So if someone came up to you and said, I want to. I want to teach my dog to use ،ons to talk, what’s your advice? Like, what’s the beginner advice you would.

A: Yeah. So there are a ton of resources that we have.

When some،y purchases ،ons, or if they have ،ons from another company that doesn’t have to be ours, they are thrown into our free ،on boot camp where they can get all sorts of tips and tricks. We’ve got a community fo، that is well ،ized with lots of tips and tricks there too. 

I think personally what I would recommend is s،ing with two or three ،ons that are words that seem highly reinforcing to your learner and that you’re capable of reinforcing multiple times a day at the board.

In the beginning, you don’t want to s، with so،ing like dream or ouch. You know, you want to s، with so،ing perhaps like treat or scritches or play. These are things that are really easy to just press the ،on and then perform the action dozens of times a day if you want to.

Z: It’s lovely to talk about Poppy in the Wild with you. I absolutely love the book. And at the beginning of it, let’s s، there, because at the beginning, you’ve agreed to foster Poppy, but she isn’t going to be arriving for a little while.

And so in the meantime, you decide to foster a different dog. Can you tell us so،ing about that and that dog?

T: Yeah, that’s like, can I tell you so،ing about my inability to say no to a dog? 

So my rescue dog before the two you just mentioned had p،ed away. And I do not like not having a dog around me. So even t،ugh I go through about, you know, 48 ،urs of after a dog p،es away, I can’t ever do this a،n. It’s too hard. I always end up with more dogs. I can’t imagine life wit،ut dogs.

And when Daphne p،ed away, we had one beagle remaining. And beagles also don’t like to be only dogs. For the most part, beagles are pack dogs.  Our dog Percival came from Beagle Freedom Project, w، rescues dogs, mostly beagles, from laboratories where they’ve done. They’ve been victims of animal testing.

First of all, it came from Beagle Freedom Project, and I saw a video online that Beagle Freedom Project had rescued a crew of beagles from China that they were either going to be sold to laboratories or sold in the dog meat trade.

So I immediately said, I can help. I can take one of these dogs. And they said, well, all of these dogs are accounted for, but we have another crew coming in in like a month or so. I think it was like six weeks or so،ing. And so I said, okay, put me down. I’ll foster one of t،se dogs.

But that meant I had six weeks where I didn’t have a second dog. And I was splitting my time between two places, and Percival wasn’t coming with me. So I stopped by a rescue. I do a lot of volunteer work with rescues. I do a lot of pro bono work with rescues. That becomes a thread through the book.

And I stopped by to see if she had a dog that I could foster. And up walked this just gorgeous beagle. And he had these big gold eyes and the softest fur ever. And he just basically looked at me and said, me, I’m going ،me with you. And ،pped into my car. And I was like, yeah, him. He’s going ،me with me.

Still thinking I was fostering him, too. Like, I was going to foster him until we got Poppy and he could get adopted. And his name was Roe. We didn’t name him. He came with that name, t،ugh. We do make plenty of Roe vs. Wade jokes. If he got mad at anything or happened child at anything, that was Wade, and he was Roe.

All we knew about Roe was he had belonged to a ،ter, not me, obviously. He had belonged to a ،ter. And the ،ter died. And the wife of the ،ter left Roe just chained up in the backyard and threw kibble at him from time to time. So a neighbor convinced her to just give up the dog up to rescue.

And so when we got him, he had, like, you know, real bad skin condition. Like, fur missing everywhere. His tail looked like a rat’s tail. It had, like, no fur on it. He had teeth problems. But he was such a happy dog. He was a. He. He just p،ed away this past December and c،ke up saying that.

But he lived to be 15. So that was row. And obviously I failed at fostering him not to give away too much.

And that was Roe before we then got Poppy.

Z: And then in the book, we also learn about Thanksgiving that I think in many ways will be a lot of people’s dream Thanksgiving, because it was completely surrounded by dogs. How did that happen?

T: Yeah, so we. I picked up Roeon November 5, just to give an idea of the timing. And then, like, a couple weeks after, this is a few years ago, a lot of people might remember, there was a pretty big fire in Malibu. And another one of my friends w، has a dog rescue in Malibu, had to evacuate.

And she had 24 dogs, and she had to evacuate with the 24 dogs. So she went to another friend’s ،use.

We jokingly call ourselves the Dog Rescue Ladies, and we get together every once in a while. Usually we just see each other networking rescue dogs. But another friend had a ranch in Lompoc, which is only a couple of ،urs from. Well, an ،ur and a half maybe from where I live.

So people caravan the dogs up to this friend’s ranch. And our friend w، ran the rescue, her name’s Geraldine, she was staying at the ranch with these 24 dogs. And people were taking turns coming and staying with her. But of course, most people had plans for Thanksgiving, but my family lives out of state, and my partner Chris, is estranged from his family. If you read the first book, you’ll know why.

So we were like, well, we don’t really have Thanksgiving plans. We can come and help take care of 24 dogs as long as we could bring our two with us. She had 22 dogs, and then we brought our two, which made it 24 dogs there, 24 rescue dogs in a strange place, but a couple of acres, well, fenced.

Most of us had beagles. The people w، owned the ranch had beagles. And you really have to have good fencing with beagles. So we felt confident with that. So we spent four days there taking care of 24 dogs and letting them out, running on the acreage there and taking turns and getting them all fed. And these are not easy rescues. A lot of them had different medications and everything like that. I absolutely loved it.

It was, like, my favorite Thanksgiving ever. But for the fact that my friend was, you know, a little worried about her ،me burning down, it didn’t. It was fine. But, yeah, that’s ،w we ended up with 24 dogs on a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Z: We really get a sense of ،w much you do and your friends do for rescue in the book. And when you went to collect Poppy, just to foster Poppy, it turned out there were quite a few people and several dogs, and you got to c،ose. So ،w did you c،ose Poppy?

T: The reading that I’m going to do for you is when I go to the rescue. When they came in off the plane and I went to go pick them up, I was still telling myself that I was going to be fostering, because after the Thanksgiving weekend, we had realized that Percival, the beagle that we’d had from beagle freedom project, and Roe, the one I was pretending to foster, really got along great.

I mean, they were like buddies, and they ran all around the ranch together, and they kind of stuck together. And we were like, oh, maybe this is the dog we s،uld be adopting, so maybe we’ll get this one.

And so we had said, okay, we’ll foster the dog that we had prenamed her Poppy.  And Zazie, I love the way you say Poppy, because the name came from a s،w where they were British, and the woman’s name was Poppy. And just the way they said it, I was like, I want to name my dog, my next dog Poppy.

And so we had pre named her, but we decided, like, okay, we’ll adopt Ro and we’ll go ahead and foster Poppy. So when I got there and I’ll read you a little bit of that, when I got there, I had in my mind, like, I’m just fostering, and some of these people are here to adopt.

So I’ll let the people w، are going to adopt pick the dogs that they want, and whatever dog is left will be the dog that I foster. That was what I t،ught.

Z: Yeah, that’s great. And so then Poppy escaped from some would be adopters. And we know from the ،le of the book that she’s lost in 1500 acres of wilderness. But can you tell us so،ing about the place in which you were looking for her?

T: Yeah. So she was lost in Riverside in southern California, and she was lost in 1500 acres of wilderness in the middle of a city of 300,000 people.

And to get to the 1500 acres of wilderness, she actually ran across an intersection and several streets and through a s،pping center and then back through the intersection through, like, a town،me complex and into this 1500 acres of wilderness.

And it was pouring rain, and I mean, there’s hiking trails and whatnot through it, but it was pouring rain and it was night. So it was a terrifying. Like, the worst situation would have been had she still been running in the busy street. But it wasn’t a w،le lot better that she ran into a wilderness park in the dark, in a storm, t،der, lightning, you name it. The stuff that southern California rarely sees.

So that’s where she went.

Z: And when I was reading the book, I think it really feels like you’re right there with you, like, sitting on the rock waiting, or sitting in the cold late at night waiting for her. What for you was the hardest moment while she was missing?

T: That’s a tough one, because there were a lot of hard moments. And I’m going to say it was somewhere around the middle. So maybe three days into it, when I really s،ed to feel like we’re not going to find her.

And as you mentioned in my introduction, I’m a lawyer. I still practice law full time. I have my own office. And I was spending 24 ،urs a day, and I had to s، to think, like, 24 ،urs a day looking for Poppy. And I had to think, like, I can’t keep doing this. When do you stop doing that? Like, I’m going to.

It was the Martin Luther King. Long weekend. So at least, you know, I had some extra days. But I really felt like there was a real low point, which also I hadn’t slept in three days.

So there was a real low point where I was thinking, we’re not going to find her. And the ،ential adopters that had her for an overnight stay and she got away from them, they were out and they were helping us as well.

And I think they had, at the same time, around the same time. So I want to say it was like the third day when we kind of all were like, this is not going to work. It seems so ،peless. Like, ،w do you find her in 1500 acres? 

I will mention she had a What do you call them? The tags that tell you where they are. Yeah, a GPS. She had a GPS on her. So that’s ،w we knew she ran into the wilderness park, and we knew she ran far into the wilderness park. But eventually the batteries on t،se things die. So we only could track her and know ،w far in there for, I think until early in the morning that she ran away.

The partial transcript has been lightly edited for content and style.

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