About

I started In It for the Long Dog as a means to express my ideas on raw feeding, training, and experiences with my first dog – Mr. Crowley, the greyhound. It’s a personal blog where I explore all areas of biology to understand how our pets, and selves, truly work down to the cellular level. With my Bachelor’s in Biotechnology, I’ve translated my education into proper nutrition and health for both Crowley and me because, really, I’m in it for him.

Follow our adventures:

The Author: Kate Villalta

Animals have been my focus from day one. After watching Free Willy at 2 years old, my parents had to suffer nearly a decade of “I want to be a marine biologist” before I moved onto competitive horse riding. The next decade was spent absorbing all aspects of horse care, training, and nutrition that went into today’s competition horse. I rode until college forced me to hang up my spurs for the academic world.

In September 2015, I entered Fanshawe College’s Honours Bachelor of Applied Technology – Biotechnology (BAT) program, and that is where I honed in on my niche for QA/QC procedures and technical writing. The program evolved my understanding of essential nutrition intake and metabolism in multicellular organisms, and I developed tactical research skills through many sleepless nights gathering resources for papers. Graduating in 2019 left me with a drive for delivering critical knowledge in a manner anyone can understand.

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The Muse: Jt’s Mr. Crowley

Mr. Crowley (registered Jt’s Mr. Crowley) was born May 16th, 2015, to SE Tali Aspen by KC and All. Crowley is a retired racing greyhound. He raced 105 times from Florida to West Virginia before retiring in August 2019 with Camp Greyhound Adoption Program. I adopted Mr. Crowley in October 2019 as my first dog. Crowley is an incredibly sweet, intelligent dog who loves the outdoors as much as I do. He adores people (other dogs, not so much), his walks, and his food.