Oh, the agony of finding good day care! You want the person who cares for your precious darling to be warm-hearted and yet able to shout ”OUT!” in an authoritative manner. You want opportunities for friendship and sniffing. You want plenty of chewable cow hooves. You want clean cages.
You have it at A Dog`s Life, at 2276 N. Clybourn Ave., where dog trainer Amy Robinson offers what she believes is the only dog day-care program in Chicago.
There, on weekday mornings, owners drop off their pooches for a day of socialization with their peers.
The dogs bound out of the cars and greet their friends inside the building by panting wildly and sniffing each other before everyone settles into their cages. Owners smile indulgently, then drive off to work.
The little ones will stay all day, alternating time outside in the fenced yard with time inside cages, until their owners pick them up after work.
”It`s a little inconvenient,” said Richard Oleff of the North Side, who drives about 10 minutes out of his way to drop off his dog, Zoie, before heading off to his job in Northbrook as a sports and special events producer, ”but I don`t really mind it. If she`s happy, it`s so important to me.
”Me and my fiance just live for this dog,” he said. ”She`s kind of our tester child.”
Robinson began offering day care, obedience training and boarding in this former paint factory in October. She accepts dogs for three-day-a-week or two- day-a-week sessions, at a cost of $12 a day. She has seven regular day-care dogs, and her facility has a capacity of 14, including boarders and obedience trainees.
Busy dog owners say there is a tremendous need for day-care programs for dogs that would otherwise be left alone all day.
”I got desperate,” said Denise Omernick, whose 6-year-old Weimaraner, Zeke, had taken to occupying his time by eating soap, shampoo and, once, a pound of Crisco.
Owners say they feel bad about leaving their dogs while they go to work.
”I don`t have enough time to spend with her at this important time in her life,” said Barbara Stacy, assistant principal of a North Shore junior high school, who brings her English cocker spaniel puppy, Lucy, to day care three days a week.
”It`s basically guilt,” Oleff said. ”I felt guilty about getting the dog and not being there all day.”
He has found day care an ideal solution. ”I know she`s having a good time,” he said. ”I don`t feel guilty at all.
”I can play with her as much as I want, but it just doesn`t seem to give her the same effect as playing with other dogs.”
In day care, Robinson said, dogs get far more stimulation than they would from a dog walker. ”Most dog-walking people have about five minutes, and that`s all,” she said. ”The dogs get to relieve themselves, but they generally don`t get exercise. They get interaction with other dogs, but it`s such a short period of time.”
Socialization is a major component of dog day care. Robinson alternates indoor and outdoor time throughout the day, taking the dogs outside in the fenced yard for 45 minutes, then back into cages for an hour of watching her train her obedience student dogs.
”I only let out about five at a time,” she said. ”They have more fun that way, and there are enough toys to go around.
”I try to match personalities out there. I`ve got puppies with puppies, small dogs with small dogs, so they have a good time and one dog doesn`t dominate another.”
As they get to know one another, the dogs form friendships.
”Zeke likes Lucy,” Omernick said. ”He really likes the girls.”
Zoie, a six-pound poodle/Shih Tzu mix, is close with Robinson`s dog, an 80-pound Rottweiler named Maura. ”Zoie hides under her legs,” Oleff said.
”Maura is incredibly gentle. She wouldn`t hurt a fly. My dog will jump on a couch and smack Maura with her paws.”
”Betty`s best friend is Zoie,” reported Ingrid Goodman, an insurance underwriter who takes Betty, a tiny, fluffy white bichon frise, to day care on Tuesdays and Thursdays. ”Even though there are a million dogs around, they just play together constantly.”
In fact, she said, the canine friends turned somewhat cliquish at a holiday open house Robinson held for her clients.
”Poor Lucy wanted to play with them, but they wouldn`t let her,”
Goodman said. ”I just felt so sorry for her.”
The friendships are strictly platonic. Most of the male dogs are neutered. When Robinson does have a non-neutered male on the premises, she does not accept a female in heat.
”Socialization is play. It`s not doggie sex,” she said. ”We`re very careful. There`s a big enough pet overpopulation problem.”
Day care can have lasting positive effects. Lucy has grown more sure of herself, Stacy reported. Zeke has become more interested in other dogs and less interested in squirrels, Omernick said, and has ”mellowed out.”
”I think it gives them more self-confidence,” Robinson said. ”If dogs feel at ease enough to play, they`re generally happy.
”It`s like when a kid first goes to nursery school or preschool, when it has only had a sibling to play with before,” she explained. ”All of a sudden it has to interact and have fun with the others. It`s pretty hard not to.”
Day care also has ancillary benefits for owners. ”My dog plays hard. She has a good time. And she is absolutely exhausted when she gets home. All she does is sleep,” Oleff said. ”It`s great for me.”
Out in the yard, Betty, Lucy and several other dogs chased one another and wrestled. Lucy found a rope bone on the ground and trotted around holding it in her mouth and wagging her tail.
A Labrador retriever puppy pushed the petite Betty onto the ground and batted at her playfully. But the play started to turn rough. The puppy started barking. Betty`s legs stiffened. Robinson stepped in and picked Betty up.
She does not allow playing to get out of control.
”People say, `Don`t they fight over toys?` ” she said. ”Well, they really don`t.”
Sometimes, dogs are afraid of other dogs in day care. ”The first few times Denise`s dog came, he didn`t want anything to do with other dogs,”
Robinson said. ”And he`s a big boy. So I put him out with smaller dogs that I knew wouldn`t do anything to him. Dogs that wouldn`t put a paw on his head, which would scare him. Now he runs around like a maniac out there.”
Other dogs get upset when their owners leave. ”Zeke whines,” Robinson said. ”But once she leaves, he settles right in. It`s almost his act. I almost perceive that he wants her to know that he`s needy.”
Some dogs are like clingy children. Goodman has been urging a neighbor to bring her golden retriever to day care, and the other day even offered to drive the dog. ”I was going to be doggie day-care car pool,” she said.
But when the owner tried to lead her dog into Goodman`s car, the dog rose on her hind legs, placed her paws on her owner`s shoulders and refused to budge.
”All of a sudden, she had separation anxiety,” Goodman said. ”She just put her arms around her mommy.”
Other dogs, however, give their owners short shrift once they see their day-care dog friends.
”When I go to Amy`s, she ignores me,” Oleff said of his dog. ”She`s playing with the other dogs. It`s like, `Oh, he`s here. I guess we`ll go home and eat now.` ”
The fond owners are well aware that they dote about as much as adults who live with other utilizers of day care.
”I don`t have children of my own,” Goodman said, ”so this is how it comes out.”
