DOG TALK® (and Kitties Too!) on 
DOG TALK® features Tracie's interviews with authors, pet experts and animal welfare advocates from around the world, discussing practical and philosophical issues regarding our relationships with dogs, cats, other pets, wildlife and the natural world.
The show broadcasts from WLIW FM 88.3 in Southampton, the only NPR station on Long Island, reaching from the East End 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.
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Scientific Proof of how Acupuncture Works
#975B: Dr. Bonnie Wright — one of only 200 board-certified veterinary anesthesiologists in the U.S. — is also an acupuncturist, who explains the medical science behind the centuries-old practice of acupuncture in what she calls “evidence-based acupuncture.”
A Luminous Thriller Set at a Sheep Dog Trial
#975A: Patricia McConnell is renowned for her ground-breaking theories of dog training in her famous book “The Other End of the Leash.” Now she has aimed for the moon — writing fiction for the first time in her 70's — and opened up a whole new world in the glorious novel “Away to Me,” a murder mystery set in the world of sheep herding dogs.
The Grand Tradition of Dogs in Grand English Country Houses
#974B: Every Anglophile (British or otherwise) loves the magazine "Country Life,” which takes readers inside grand country estates across the UK. The publication’s Deputy Features Editor, Agnes Stamp, talks about the huge delicious book she has created called “The Country Life Book of Dogs,” which brilliantly juxtaposes views inside these houses and the dogs who live there — in life and in art.
“There’s a Mushroom for That!”
#974A: Holistic veterinarian Dr. Robert Silver has spent decades studying and using functional mushrooms to treat many pet ailments — just as Chinese medicine has employed them for human healing over centuries. His book “There’s a Mushroom for That!” gathers his lifetime of knowledge about mushrooms and cannabis for other veterinarians and pet owners to reference.
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, discovering which genes are responsible for what physical and health characteristics, allowing them to guide dog breeders in making decisions to avoid naturally occurring diseases, knowledge which is valuable for human disorders, too.
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 of toy dog, in top physical condition, to compete in the 150th Westminster Dog Show.
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 be turned out in the tens of thousands for research.
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 the planet, especially through the Roots and Shoots program of the Jane Goodall Foundation.
“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.”
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 — which was adamantly opposed by early breeders around WW II in Germany. They were purists against hybridization with wolves — although it would have been to the dogs’ health advantage.