Planet of the Dogs: In the Pack at King's Kastle

Visiting King’s Kastle is like opening the door to a parallel universe. Dogs lay on couches without reprimand. They trot on treadmills, dutifully working off their excess energy. A television is kept on all day long to provide background noise and the sound of human voices. A big hangar door is wide open to the outdoors, an acre-large playground for racing about, dog-to-dog interaction, scratching, playing, whatever it is dogs do.

There are 58 canines at King’s Kastle in Windsor this day, and for the humans visiting, it’s like the Planet of the Dogs. Two "field supervisors" are ever-present with them, keeping the dogs safe, watching their body language, cleaning the area and monitoring the dogs' health and well-being. They are the "alpha dogs," Colleen Combs says, and humans should always be the alpha to their dogs.

“We create a very holistic approach for the animals, based on what we have practiced for the past 10 years,” said Combs, founder and alpha of King’s Kastle. “We approach it on a communal level. We bring 50, 75, 100 dogs together in a pack, all breeds, all sizes. And they’re much happier.”

A pack? If visions of the blood-thirsty, vengeful wolves of the recent film “The Grey” come to mind, put them aside. These animals are affectionate or stand-offish, curious or disinterested, energetic or lazy, depending on their personalities. Although entering into their realm was a bit off-putting at first – Combs liberally squirted the barking hoard that greeted my son and me from a water bottle, a harmless but effective means of animal control – once the barking and crotch-nuzzling subsided, we were pretty much left alone.

“King's Kastle has some dogs that are up for adoption but we are not necessarily an adoption and rescue facility,” Combs told us. “King’s Kastle was developed a decade ago to rehabilitate problem-behavior dogs. And it’s developed into being what it is today, offering rehab, socialization, boarding, and day care.”

Dogs can be taken into the facility on a day care basis, at $20/day, or overnight boarding at $40. A full rehabilitation period is usually 30 days, and costs $1500, with the requirement that the dog owners themselves take at least four hours of on-site training.

King’s Kastle has come into visibility recently with the problems at the , kicked off by the public dispute between former HAS executive directorand local restaurateur over one dog in particular, Cash – the mastiff/pitbull who became the face of the Healdsburg Animal Shelter’s troubles over the past half year.

“Volunteering at King’s Kastle is the best part of my life,” said Keane. “It’s so different from what I do, I’m here cooking dinner and dealing with all these little details, and I go down there and I’m one-on-one with a dog. It’s amazing.”

Keane, who says he wants to work with animals when he retires from his restaurant business (in Healdsburg, he owns and manages , and the short-lived ), had to do some service time at Healdsburg Animal Shelter to fulfill requirements for his dog trainer program.

“I started realizing that locking dogs up in a cage in a shelter is not the best way to work with animals, for them,” said Keane. “It’s the model that’s there, it’s not anyone’s fault that it exists, but it’s basically there’s certain dogs that physically can’t be locked up.”

Although the first dog Keane took to King’s Kastle was Jakey, a black border collie, with Keane. “In my heart, I knew this dog was a good dog because I saw how he interacted with people,” he said,  “and I saw that what happened with him was kennel aggression - over time he got freaked out in that kennel.

“So I get him down there [to King’s Kastle] the first day, and they got him back into his little isolation area… And after about 15 minutes Colleen said okay, you can come see him now.

“I went out there and he just went ecstatic when he saw me – I hadn’t been able to see him for about a month or so because of the lawsuit and that bullshit, he started wiggling and jumping and he started to relax.

“Within about a week, you could see his whole demeanor change, he was a different dog, and it was a different world for him.”

While Combs started King’s Kastle 10 years ago – the original facility is in Cloverdale, and the Windsor location has been serving the area only for the past year – her new endeavor is Green Dog Rescue Project. “Thousands of animals are being euthanized daily due to overcrowding, over breeding, and mis-diagnosis,” reads the website description. “Green Dog believes these animals are 'recyclable' and should be kept out of our landfills.”

Naturally, the issue of euthanasia is a hot one, and evokes a strong response from Combs.

“Our true belief on why so many dogs are euthanized in shelters or become non-adoptable is because they’re separated. That’s not a psychological or social approach to these animals, that’s not how they’re naturally designed,” she says.

“There’s no reason they should be in individual compartments. Even if they have to sleep them in kennels, that’s fine, but their entire daytime life should be spent in a communal yard.”

But separating dogs – keeping them in separate kennels, even if they can see and hear one another – isn’t that the standard in animal shelters, I asked?  “Absolutely. That’s why we want this global change. And that’s what Green Dog Rescue Project is about, is trying to make an industry change to animal shelters.”

Several people have publically wondered whether Combs would be a suitable replacement for Seal, or a potential board member, or if her techniques of animal rehabilitation would be welcome at the beleaguered Healdsburg Animal Shelter.

It’s a subject Combs has clearly thought about, and as with most of her answers, her opinions are firm and articulate.

 “I don’t necessarily think it would be in our best interest nor in the best interests of , the climate of what’s going on. But I do agree that the shelter, entirely, from top to bottom physically as well as the operational aspect of things, needs to be pretty much torn down and rebuilt.”

Even the new building? “As far as it’s set up. We could certainly keep the building but the way they operate, it’s a very solitary and divided approach for the animals.

“The best capacity for Green Dog to offer the community of Healdsburg is possibly to consult with them, train with them, and help them develop.  Instead of resurrecting a dead system, and an ineffective system, maybe we can help them give birth to a brand new one.”

Combs worked with HAS in the past, before Seal came on as ED, doing pro bono assessment training. But she’s hesitant to get into details about what ended that relationship.

Inevitably, the question of Cash came up. Cash was kept alone in a compartment at HAC for six months, a period of time that one HAS worker said clearly hurt the dog – “I watched him get worse week after week,” the volunteer said. “The animal shelter was a terrible place for Cash.”

And now? “We love that boy! He’s a riot,” says Combs. She takes us to a large play area to meet the controversial dog, who is active, inquisitive and affectionate.

The 120-pound dog is chasing tennis balls and snorkeling around the underbrush. He’s big, yes, and it’s easy to see how he could be “intimidating,” as several people have said. He came to the Healdsburg Animal Shelter from family living in a one-bed apartment, with two new children in the family.

“He’s here if anybody wants to meet him. That way you can visually see what I’m referring to and why we believe and have a conviction that this is the right way of doing things.”

“She’s just brilliant, what she does,” says Keane.

NOTE: In full disclosure, I should mention that my daughter Nicole Kallen recently started work at King’s Kastle in Cloverdale, as a field supervisor.