Hi dog lovers,

I hope you all enjoyed your holiday weekend. Now it’s time for your dog to enjoy his –   because today is National Pet Day!

1. Love. National Pet Day, April 11th, was founded by Colleen Paige as an act of loving and care for pets. So today is all about giving back to the animals. Give extra love, treats and affection, just to show them how much you care. Today is also the perfect day to donate to shelters, or better yet – adopt. These pets need you, and, trust us, you need them.

After recently partnering with the Escondido Humane Society, DOGTV is committed to helping sheltered dogs with the goal to help them feel calmer, happier and more adoptable.

2. Music.  One of the ways DOGTV is helping canines – either sheltered or at home, is by the use of music that plays during dog television. You’ll be surprised, but dogs do have musical preferences. Scientific research have been made on the effect of music on dogs, and it turns out (are you ready for this?) – dogs don’t enjoy heavy metal! Shocking, right? They also don’t like Jazz music, and even Lady Gaga doesn’t seem to get their tails wagging.

No, our dogs are more sophisticated than that. In all honesty, dogs really prefer classical music, which is played and arranged in a simple way. Dogs enjoy slow, relaxing music, with mainly piano and harp.

One of the things we’ve tested, while developing our programs and monitoring dogs watching television, is their reaction to different music styles, arrangements and tempos. We have also studied Bioacoustics, the study of the perception of sound on animals, and together with our team of very talented musicians and sound designers, we have created an original score you can now hear on DOGTV.

Here’s another idea for you and your dog to do on National Pet Day (Ok, or any other day of the year) – try playing him some relaxing music -and see how he responds to it. I have a feeling he’ll slowly make his way to his favorite bed or pillow and lie down calm and relaxed.

You can try this test with this clip from of our “Relaxation” programs, or you can find some of our relaxing tunes on our free new iphone/ipad app.

3. Super Dogs. National Pet Day is also a chance to show appreciation to how great dogs really are. Sometimes people underestimate the ability of dogs to perceive and understand things, but time after time we learn how smart dogs really are.

It is now known, that dogs have mental abilities of a-2-year -old child. Findings show that dogs know 165 words (similar to a 2 year old child), including signals and gestures. The super dogs (dogs in the top 20% in intelligence) can learn 250 words, which is equivalent to a 2.5 year – old child.

It doesn’t end here: Apparently dogs understand time (past, present), shape, size, and even mathematics. The smartest dogs, if you were wondering, are German Shephards, Poodles and Border Collies. And this Border Collie may just be the smartest dog in the world.

So perhaps Pet Day is a great opportunity to teach your dogs some new words!

4. Stream. Without a doubt, the most popular question we’ve been getting (besides “When is CAT TV coming?”), is how can we get DOGTV?

Due to the fact that currently DOGTV is only available in San Diego (on Cox and Time Warner Cable), we thought that it is indeed unfair that only dogs in San Diego can enjoy it, so we decided to make it available to everyone! So wherever you are in the world, you can now enjoy DOGTV by subscribing to our streaming service.  Now,  DOGTV’s scientific designed programs are available to your pooch whenever and wherever you want. I’m actually amused to see that ever since we launched this online service, how many dogs started using ipads! (check out adorable Lucie).

For all you dog parents out there, I wish you all a happy Pet Day – go out, and do something nice for yourself – and especially for your dog. 

Have a great week, 

Ron