Editorial Policy

I'm Fiona Ellis, and everything published on Happy Dog Tips passes through my own hands before it goes live. Not a content team, not a rotating cast of freelancers — me, nineteen years as a Registered Veterinary Nurse, six years running home boarding and grooming, and thirty-five years of living alongside dogs, currently a twelve-year-old collie called Skye and a rescue collie cross called Tam. This page sets out how I decide what to write, how I check it, and where the boundaries are. If you'd like the fuller version of who I am and why I do this, that's on About Us.

What this site is for

Happy Dog Tips covers the day-to-day and long-term work of keeping a dog well — grooming, feeding, health awareness, kit, exercise and getting a dog comfortably through a full lifetime, including the senior years nobody quite prepares you for. What it does not cover is training. Behaviour and obedience are a separate discipline, best handled by a qualified trainer or behaviourist, and I say so plainly whenever it's relevant rather than guessing at advice outside my field.

How topics get chosen

I write about what actually comes up — in my old practice, in my boarding kennels, in messages from readers, and in my own house with an ageing collie and a rescue with her own quirks. Some pieces follow the calendar: tick season and adder risk in summer, grit and paw care in winter, Bonfire Night anxiety in autumn. Others follow the questions I got asked most often as a nurse — the ones owners hesitate to ring the vet about, and the ones they absolutely should ring about. I try to be honest about which is which in every health post: what can wait for a routine appointment, and what means going now.

How content is researched and reviewed

Every article starts from what I know first-hand or learned in clinical practice, then gets checked against current guidance, because veterinary medicine has moved on since I left the consulting room in 2016. Where a topic sits outside my direct experience, I say so and point you towards a vet, groomer or trainer rather than filling the gap with guesswork. I don't diagnose and I don't prescribe through this website — nothing here replaces an actual conversation with your own vet, who knows your dog's history in a way no article can.

Sourcing and trends

I'm wary of trend-chasing in this niche, because dog health trends move faster than the evidence behind them. When something new does the rounds — a diet, a supplement, a gadget — I look for what's actually been studied, not just what's been shared, before I write a word about it.

Product recommendations

When I recommend kit, food or grooming tools, it's because I've used it, boarded dogs who wore or ate it, or would genuinely put it on Skye or Tam. I won't recommend something purely because a brand sent it or because it pays well. Some links on this site are affiliate links, meaning I may earn a small commission if you buy through them, at no extra cost to you — the detail is laid out fully in the Affiliate Disclaimer. Broader questions about ads and any brand relationships are covered in the site's Disclosure page, and I'd rather lose a sale than lose your trust in a recommendation.

Corrections

I get things wrong occasionally — a price changes, a study gets updated, a link breaks, or I simply miss something. When that happens, I correct the article as soon as I know, and for anything that affected the substance of the advice, I'll note what changed and when. If you spot something that looks off, please tell me directly at [email protected] — readers catching my mistakes has genuinely improved this site more than once, and I'd rather hear it from you than leave it wrong.

Comments and community

I read comments and I reply where I can, particularly on health posts where someone's clearly worried about their dog. What I won't do is let the comments section become a substitute for a vet visit — if something sounds urgent, I'll say so and point you to a professional rather than diagnosing in a reply box. The full expectations for how people engage here, including what gets moderated and why, are set out in Community Guidelines.

The practical bits

For how your data is handled when you use this site, see the Privacy Policy and Cookie Policy. The rules for using the site itself sit in the Terms of Use, and the general limits of what this content can and can't do for your own dog are spelled out in the Disclaimer. If you're a brand or another site wanting to work together, that route is through Collaboration rather than my personal inbox.

Why this matters to me

I left clinical practice, but I still ring my own vet — about Skye, about Tam, about things I technically know the answer to but want checked anyway. That instinct is exactly what I want this site to encourage in you: read, get informed, then go and have the actual conversation with the person who knows your dog. Any questions about how this site is run, editorially or otherwise, are always welcome at [email protected].