I Understand, Whiskers, but You Can't Do That on the Sofa
'Pet Communicator' Is Busy Assisting Vexed Owners
By Katherine Shaver
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 15, 2007; Page B05

Diane Roadcap stared intently at 2-year-old Beatrix as the Welsh corgi leapt around a Bethesda living room.
"She's showing me a ghost, like Casper the Ghost," Roadcap said. "She's telling me she has a lot of fears. Let me tell her she doesn't have to do that."

Beatrix's owner, Maris Wicker, looked on hopefully. She had tried an obedience class and a private trainer, but nothing had worked. Beatrix kept attacking other dogs, including Wicker's other Welsh corgi, Uma.
Finally, Wicker spent $175 to hire Roadcap, an "animal communicator," or pet psychic, to ask Beatrix why she attacked -- and to tell her to stop. Roadcap stared at the corgi for a few more seconds and then looked up again at Wicker. "She said, okay, she'll be better."

For those whose eyes have begun to roll, consider this: Roadcap is in such demand among Washingtonians convinced that she can speak with their dogs, cats, horses, rabbits, ferrets and pot-bellied pigs -- alive, lost or "passed over" into death -- that her weekday schedule is booked for weeks, she said. Want her to speak with your Siamese on a Saturday? You'll have to wait until July.

The American Veterinary Medical Association takes no position on the validity of pet psychics, and there certainly is no shortage of skeptics. One animal behavior expert said she believes that most don't read animal minds as much as the body language of humans hungry for their beloved pets' thoughts.

Television caters to that urge: "Dog whisperer" Cesar Millan "rehabilitates dogs and trains people" on his show on the National Geographic Channel. Animal Planet offers "K9 Karma," featuring doggie yoga, described as "the path to enlightenment for humans and their pets." The Internet abounds with pet psychics offering to do readings over the phone.

Three Washington area veterinarians say Roadcap has helped their patients, and her clients say she knows things only their animals could have told her. They pay a minimum of $145 for an hour-long visit, depending on the number of animals and the distance Roadcap must drive from her Springfield home.

Wicker, 54, a retired lawyer and professional musician, said her husband initially scoffed at hiring a pet psychic. But she said he, too, was struck by what Roadcap knew about Beatrix and Uma, such as the fact that they receive treats of cheese on Sundays.

One week after the appointment, Wicker said, Beatrix's attacks had stopped. "Beatrix has been much, much calmer," Wicker said. "I don't think she's a fake," she said of Roadcap. "I think there's some sense she has that allows animals to try to communicate."
Roadcap, 52, said animals speak to her in symbols. If she sees prison bars, the cat is tired of being cooped up. A suitcase: A trip is coming up. A bottle of beer: Someone in the house is drinking too much. While "speaking" with animals, she often closes her eyes, nods and murmurs "I see" or "I know, sweetie, I know." She doesn't need to meet with animals, she said. Photos have "energy," too.

She said she's known about her psychic powers since she was 5. She was playing near her home in Page County, Va., she said, when Blackie, her Doberman pinscher mix, said, "Move now." When she looked up, she said, the dog was standing between her and two snakes. Her mother chalked up the story to a vivid imagination.

Roadcap said she continued speaking with Blackie and animals at the zoo but didn't tell many people. "I didn't want people to think I was different or weird," she said.

She said she spent much of her adult life as an office manager for an Alexandria dentist and "surviving" while raising her son alone after her husband died in a car accident. Then, in 1998, while visiting a friend in Luray, she helped rescue an elderly couple from a burning house. She said she also rescued the couple's two terriers by sending them a message to come to her.
 

"I knew my work was to be with the animals," she said.

She quit her job and began to build a business, mostly through word of mouth. She said she now has two or three appointments a day.
Janet Smith, 42, an acupuncturist from Northwest Washington, said friends laughed when she hired Roadcap to persuade her cat, Cameron, to stop urinating on the furniture. Roadcap told her that Cameron was resentful and depressed and "had a lot of abandonment issues."
"He had a lot to get off his chest," Smith said. "Once he did, he stopped."

Lewis Fargo, an engineer in Lewes, Del., said his analytical mind wanted proof of Roadcap's psychic abilities. He found it, he said, when she told him that his basset hound, Holly, complained about him tossing her off a dock. He said he hadn't told Roadcap about his botched attempt to teach the dog to swim. Roadcap also told him about his deceased grandmother, noting correctly that her name was Margaret.
"I still don't get it, and I almost still don't know why I believe it," said Fargo, 72. "But what else do you do when she comes up with stuff like that?"

Bonnie Beaver, a veterinarian and professor of animal behavior at Texas A&M University, doesn't know Roadcap but said she believes that most pet psychics simply follow the leads of humans, making educated guesses based on an animal's behavior and then following up on those that elicit positive reactions.

People's body language and eye dilation change when the psychic guesses correctly, Beaver said. A cat that has been urinating on the carpet may "tell" an animal communicator that his litter box is dirty, when that's a common reason for a cat to stop using it.

"They're just playing on the public's strong desire to get information from species who can't talk to us," Beaver said. "I'm very skeptical in the majority of these cases."

Roadcap's observations sometimes are quite general. She'll remark how an older dog or cat is complaining of stiff hips or a bad back. She'll say a cocker spaniel is having a problem with his ears, a common ailment in the breed. She often starts out saying the dog or cat feels well cared for, which seems obvious for pets whose owners are paying to try to talk to them.

But Jordan Kocen, a veterinarian at the SouthPaws specialty clinic in Fairfax, said Roadcap's ability to tell him what's troubling some of his patients helps him treat the animals. "I don't understand how it works," Kocen said. "But if someone is a charlatan, they don't last long. There are too many savvy consumers out there."

Harold Alterman, a traveling veterinarian from Alexandria who performs acupuncture, said Roadcap helped him with Elizabeth, a cat who tried to shake out the acupuncture needles. Rather than have to sit on her owner's lap, Roadcap said, Elizabeth wanted to be left alone. Alterman said he did, and the cat stopped fighting the needles.

"It's all anecdotal, but people are satisfied, and that's all I care about," Alterman said. He doesn't understand how Roadcap works, he said, adding, "There are a lot of things we don't understand in the healing profession."

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