Life’s Ruff for Homeless Pets (your help is needed!)

Life can be rough for shelter dogs. Thousands of dogs enter shelters every day, many because of behavior or training problems that could have been fixable. Marine Mammal trainer Chris Dignan is on a mission to help shelter dogs by educating pet owners and promoting positive training methods. Life’s Ruff is an entertaining and very creative stage show that features regular dogs and their owners performing cool tricks. However, the show is more than just entertainment. It also has a three part education mission:

• To raise awareness about shelter dogs and promote adoptions,
• To encourage pet owners to spay and neuter their pets, and
• To promote positive training methods and the benefits of training

Shelter Dogs in the Spotlight

Last year, Chris wrote, produced and directed “Life’s Ruff.” Now, this wasn’t any sort of ordinary play with professional actors. The cast was eight (untrained) pet dogs and their owners. After three months learning how to perform fun tricks on cue, the dogs and owners were ready for the big stage. The show they put on in an 80-seat Chicago theater had a simple, but important goal–to spread information about homeless animals and demonstrate the power of positive training. Click here now and you can see a video clip with some footage from the show.

How You Can Help (2 ways!)

Chris and his team are gearing up for a second season of Life’s Ruff. They are currently fundraising and have a little over a week left to raise about $5,000. The money helps pay to rent the theater, purchase props and tech equipment, and marketing. You can check out their fundraising campaign here on kickstarter for more information about the show. You can help in two ways:

1. Donating. Every little bit helps! (Click Here Now)
This is one of the coolest, most creative ways that I’ve ever seen to promote positive training and shelter dog adoptions. If you think so as well, I hope you’ll donate a small amount to their fundraising campaign. (Donate $25 and they’ll even give you a free T-shirt!)

2. Spreading the word about Life’s Ruff.
Mention Life’s Ruff and their kickstarter campaign on your blog, e-mail your friends, or post the link on facebook. Surely you have a few friends who would want to help shelter dogs and promote positive training methods!

Have you checked out the video link yet? If not, click here to watch it!

P.S. If they don’t get enough pledges to meet their fundraising goal–they get ZERO money because of the way the fundraising campaign is set up. So please help spread the word!