Dog Person: Andrew Garn and Possum

Hi, Humans! Greetings from Orlando, where I’ve been on vacation with my family for the week. We aren’t big on going to theme parks, but you can’t be in the area without seeing throngs of people wearing Mickey Mouse ears. This always makes me laugh: Disney is the master of human training: No one is better at using positive reinforcement to train the behavior of emptying your wallet. The trick is that they have a selection of rewards such that there is something to appeal to almost everyone — and the animals they’re training literally dress up like mice!

(And yet, Walt Disney himself condoned plenty of punishment-based animal training on his sets. Go figure.)

We did go to one park: Sea World! We went three times, actually; my seven-year-old said her favorite thing this week has been feeding the stingrays. They feel like Wellingtons from the top but when you give them a sardine, their mouths tickle your hand in a way that feels like horse lips.

Feeding the stingrays!

We saw the orca show and dolphin shows — both just wildly amazing feats of positive reinforcement training.

I told my kids that I was quoted in the obituary of one of the first people to train dolphins and they were… completely unimpressed.

I’m pretty sure I’d like to become a marine animal trainer one day, but not sure how to juggle that kind of career with parenthood…

IN OTHER NEWS…

My book, How To Train Your Dog With Love + Science, is being offered at a three-for-the-price-of-two discount right now on Amazon, and the regular price is also been reduced, which means you can now get three copies for just over $20!

If you’ve read the book, you know that it’s a great introduction to helping people understand that HOW you train your dog matters in a way that is about more than keeping your sofa from being peed on; it is meant to help guide people’s choices when it comes to dealing with their dog’s behavior for the rest of their time as dog owners so… please consider stocking up so you have a copy on hand next time you have a friend who gets a new dog!

Speaking of free books, this week I will be choosing one paid subscriber at random to receive a copy of The New York Pigeon: Behind the Feathers, a beautiful homage to the humble city pigeon - it totally changed how I see them, and inspired me and my daughters to take on pigeon feeding as a regular after-school activity.

Feeding the pigeons! A cheaper activity than feeding stingrays!

I’ll announce the winner next Friday.

Why I am giving away a book about pigeons when the subject here is supposed to be dogs? Because its author is the subject of today’s edition of Dog Person!

Andrew Garn is a photographer and is also my neighbor— we both live near Stuyvesant Park in Manhattan, east of Gramercy Park and north of the East Village. It’s because of him that my girls and I have become, well, pigeon people.

Andrew Garn and Possum in Stuyvesant Park. Photo by Nina Roberts.

(This interview is a version of a conversation that was originally published in the local magazine, Irving).

So tell me about your best friend in the category of dog.

Possum is from a rescue called Stray from the Heart in Jersey. She’s a Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever— brought up from a shelter in Mississippi. She’d been adopted but then returned to the rescue six months later. It was during the pandemic, and she’s what was available so I took her! She’s great but kind of a special needs dog—more cat than dog. She’s okay in the apartment, but she barks at other dogs on the street and then looks up at me like, “You see! I told you there is danger everywhere!”

**That must make it hard to walk her.
**I take her out at 6:30AM, when no one is out. Otherwise, she gets tense and then I get tense. She does well walking with her best friend, a dog named Ruby who lives two blocks away. Our favorite route is through Stuyvesant Town, over to the river.

**Was she the dog you moved into this neighborhood with?
**No, when I moved here I had a rescued Llewellin Setter named Platypus—I have a marsupial naming convention going. People at the dog run used to say he was like Jesus Christ! He was a perfect dog, loved everyone. I’d take him to openings —everyone would pet him, kids would crawl under him. He lived to be 16.

Platypus as Jesus, by Andrew Garn (via @newyorkpigeon)

**And he is why you moved to this neighborhood, no?
**Yes! I have an interesting relationship with East 15th Street, where I live. My grandfather came from Kiev—youngest of twelve. His siblings raised money to send him here alone at 14. He moved to a rooming house on 15th and Second. Then, 65 years later, I went to Stuyvesant High School, when it was on 15th.

Before here, I lived in the East Village but didn’t like the Tompkins dog run—it smelled gross. So Platypus and I would come to Stuyvesant Park with a friend and his dog. This was the early 2000s. My friend made gates out of PVC pipe and tried to get the neighborhood to formally make a dog run, but the park’s board hated the idea. At one meeting, someone exclaimed, “A dog run will bring people from other neighborhoods!” And I thought, is that a bad thing? I joined the board, and soon my social life centered around it, so I thought, I should move near the park.

Watch the video in the original post on Substack →

Andrew and his late dog, Platypus, made the local news in 2019.

**And now, of course, there is a legitimate dog run—no PVC required.
**Yes! I organized the first dog run cleanup to show the park’s committee what wonderful people dog owners were, and how they cared for the park. Then I did a survey of who was using the park. Dog owners were using eight percent of the space, but made up twenty percent of park users. Numbers told the story. I gave the survey to the Commissioner of the city’s Department of Parks and Recreation, and the city allocated $100,000 to make what is now the dog park. But I don’t really know anymore; Possum can jump the fence.

**Were you always a dog owner?
**No. I grew up on the Upper East Side. My brother and I desperately wanted a dog. We’d stage demonstrations in our apartment—put up signs, bang pots and pans—all to sway our parents. They finally relented and we all got in the car to go to a breeder in New Jersey to get a Maltese. But we had a family argument on the way, and my dad turned the car around!

**That’s heartbreaking! Well, if I had to describe you to someone, I wouldn’t say you’re a dog person. I’d say you were a pigeon person!
**Indeed! Although I wouldn’t keep one as a pet. But I do have favorites in Stuyvesant Park. Did you know there are two separate flocks there? There are 150 pigeons now—three times as many as before the pandemic. I think it’s because people started feeding them more during lockdown.

**Makes sense—it’s an inexpensive outdoor activity. How did you first get interested in pigeons?
**Twenty years ago, I was birding in The Ramble Central Park. People get really excited about warblers there—they’re skittish, hard-to-spot birds. One flew by and everyone was oohing and ahhing. Then two beautiful pigeons landed near me and I pointed them out: “Hey, look at these!” And everyone tuned up their noses. I thought, “I’ll show them.” So I started photographing pigeons to show how beautiful they are—like fashion models.

The flock at St. George’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan, on the west side of Stuyvesant Park.

**Well, you succeeded. Your book definitely changed the way I look at pigeons! Does Possum have feelings about them?
**She keeps her distance from pigeons. She won’t touch them. Squirrels, though—those are another thing. They’re always taunting her. There are so many squirrels.

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Learn more about Andrew at https://www.andrewgarnphoto.com/

Follow him on Instagram at @NewYorkPigeon

Interested in being featured in Dog Person? Email annie@anniegrossman.com.

(NB: Amazon links in this post may be affiliate links)