Dog Talk ® (and Kitties Too!)
DOG TALK® (and Kitties, Too!) originated on the only NPR station on Long Island, WLIW-88.3, where it has been on the air for 13 years and numerous consecutive shows. This Gracie® Award-winning show (for “Best entertainment and information program on local public radio”), is produced and hosted by pet wellness advocate Tracie Hotchner. Each show features Tracie’s interviews with authors and pet experts from around the world, discussing far-ranging topics involving practical and philosophical issues regarding our relationships with dogs and cats.The show broadcasts from the East End and reaches all across Long Island, into Southern Connecticut and Westchester.The show's theme song is "Mmm My Best Friend" by Sophie B. Hawkins from her album TIMBRE.Podcast also available on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon podcasts, and Audible.
Episodes
892 episodes
The Little Girl & Her Fluffy Little Pekingese Who Rule the Dog Show World
#973A: Kennedy Green was the #1 Junior Pekingese handler in the USA in 2025 (having just turned 12), working with Dr. Kelly Fishman, an integrative sports medicine veterinarian, who both talk about what it takes to keep Lincoln, a special breed...
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29:07
The Legacy of the DNA Sequencing of Tasha the Boxer at the NIH
#973B: Elaine Ostrander, a canine genomics expert, was on the team that sequenced Tasha’s genome, the first purebred dog studied twenty years ago. She and her colleagues at the NIH have been studying the DNA of many dog breeds since then, disco...
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30:34
The Sacrifice of Beagles for Humans
#972B: Brad Bolman’s book “Lab Dog: What Global Science Owes American Beagles,” takes the long view of the Beagle dog, chronicling its whole history as a breed and how people turned what they had bred as a hunting companion into a “lab rat” to ...
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29:51
Jane Goodall’s Legacy for Us All to “Keep on Caring”
#972A: Marc Bekoff, the renowned ethologist, talks about his long personal and professional relationship with the late Jane Goodall, and how important it is that we hold on to her messages of hope and perseverance in caring about animals and th...
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29:06
Wolves and German Shepherd Dogs
#971B: Greger Larson, the Director of the Paleogenomics & Bio-Archaeology Research Network at the School of Archaeology at Oxford University, returns to discuss whether wolves were ever introduced into the breeding of German Shepherd Dogs —...
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30:29
“Dogsitivity” — Does That Describe Your Dog?
#971A: Dog trainer and author Ineke Vander AA in Belgium discusses how she developed her scientifically-backed theory of “highly sensitive” dogs in her groundbreaking book “Dogsitivity: a Guide to Living With Highly Sensitive Dogs.”
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27:31
The Challenges of Prescription Drugs
#970B: Dr. Doug Mader explains the different ways that pet owners can fill prescriptions for and why they need to understand the value of backup support if their pet has side effects from a drug or gets better before all the pills are taken. Is...
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27:21
The Man Who Wanted to be a Hippopotamus (at age 3)
#970A: Jonathan Balcombe, a biologist and ethologist with a doctorate in animal behavior, has studied and written books about all manner of non-human creatures: “Pleasurable Kingdom,” “Second Nature,” “The Exultant Ark,” “What a Fish Knows” and...
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31:54
Sherri Franklin — Muttville’s Patron Saint
#969B: When Sherri Franklin first rescued old dogs from the San Francisco city shelter and brought them to her own home, nobody wanted senior dogs. Now, two decades later, she is stepping down as the leader of Muttville, arguably the nation's m...
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29:15
Cat Mummies for Sale in Ancient Egypt
#969A: Greger Larson, Director of the Palaeogenomics & Bio-Archaeology Research Network of the School of Archaeology at Oxford University, tells the amazing true history of how cats found their way into human society in Egypt, where travele...
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29:11
Free Living Dogs in India Deserve to LIVE
#968B: Sindhoor Pangal in Bangalore India — anthrozoologist and author of "DOG KNOWS: Learning How to Learn From Dogs" — laments about the current crisis for the "streeties" — also called Free Living Dogs — who are facing wholesale exterminatio...
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29:28
Dr. Elsey’s New Year's Promise to Your Cats
#968A: Dr. Elsey started his company on behalf of cats, who cannot speak for themselves. He innovated litters to solve Out-of-Litter-Box problems and then created a revolutionary food called CleanProtein to meet their health and nutritional nee...
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30:46
You do Know Your Cat is Not Actually Your Baby, Right?!
#967B: Rebecca Van Laer's memoir “Cat” is a slim little book that speaks volumes about the life the author spent as a child feeling closer to cats than to humans and explores how her relationships with her cats have been the through line in her...
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29:26
The Miraculous Transformation Wrought by Books in Prisons
#967A: Tracie shares her awe and admiration for Dwayne Betts, who, as a result of being incarcerated as a teenager, discovered the power of reading in prison. He came out to become a lawyer and a published poet, founding Freedom Reads in 2020. ...
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30:52
Early Spay/Neuter — What Would Happen if You Desexed Human Children Before Puberty?
#966B: Dr. Lisa Radosta, one of the rare board certified veterinary animal behaviorists, discusses the issue of early spay/neuter and how it affects both physical and emotional development — and what is lost when a dog does not have the opportu...
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29:48
A New Way To Be Your Dog’s Best Friend
#966A: Katya Lidsky, author of “Be Your Dog’s Best Friend: the Benefits of Mutual Bonding and Relationship Building,” discusses what we can learn from our bond with dogs to improve our interactions with humans.
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30:07
We're in the Golden Age of Octopus Appreciation
#965B: Sy Montgomery’s fourth book about octopuses (yes, not “octopi!”) “Secrets of the Octopus,” is filled with stunning National Geographic photographs and brimming with anecdotes and scientific discoveries about the multitude of abilities an...
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28:41
1,000’s of Beagles Used in Lab Experiments
#965A: Melanie Kaplan wrote “Lab Dog: a Beagle and His Human Investigate the Surprising World of Animal Research” after adopting Hammy, a Beagle “retired” from being a research subject. She wanted to find out how tens of thousands of Beagles we...
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26:51
Fly Burgers, Anyone?
#964B: Dustin Crummett is the Executive Director of the Insect Institute and co-author of research that questions the economic, environmental and animal welfare concerns of farming insect protein for pet food.
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30:04
How the Law Can Help Animals
#964A: Sherrie Hines is an animal welfare lawyer — and professor at the University of Georgia Law and new director of the Practicum in Animal Welfare Skills (PAWS) — discussing legal solutions and remedies in cases involving dogs and how they d...
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29:19
Dogs With “Baby Faces” Are Suffering
#963B: Taylor Waters from the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, who also teaches animal law and policy at the Vermont Law & Graduate School, worries about the "infantilization of animals” and the public desire for breeds like French Bulldogs...
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29:44
An FBI Dog Saving Birds in Hawaii
#963A: Jen Danna — writing "Deadly Trade" as Sara Driscoll — takes the team to Hawaii in her newest thriller in her FBI K-9’ series, which is focused on protecting endangered birds from deadly poachers.
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29:30
Let Street Cats Plan Your Next Vacation
#962B: Travel writer and cat lover Jeff Bogle wrote the book “Street Cats & Where to Find Them: the Most Feline-Friendly Cities and Attractions Around the World,” to inspire cat lovers to plan a trip to almost anywhere in the world to inclu...
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29:17
NYC’s Urban Dog Calendar
#962A: Sean Sheer created his blog UrbanDogNYC about living with dogs in NYC ten years ago. The calendar shows all the places and events to which dogs in the city are welcome, as well as dog-centric events for humans. Sean’s articles about many...
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30:09
Their DNA is the Crystal Ball to the Future of Horses
#961B: Internationally celebrated DNA specialist Ludovic Orlando wrote “Horses: a 4,000-Year Genetic Journey Across the World,” illuminating his collaboration with hundreds of other scientists worldwide to discover where, when and how hor...
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29:03