Research Faculty Spotlight: Erica Feuerbacher
Erica Feuerbacher combines cutting-edge research, innovative teaching, and community partnerships to improve animal welfare while helping people better understand and communicate with the animals in their care.
June 30, 2026
Erica Feuerbacher
Professor, Applied Animal Behavior & Welfare – School of Animal Sciences
What are you working on now?
We always have a variety active projects. Right now, one of my doctoral students, Yasmeen Gomez, is assessing cooperative care techniques for companion animals, including different ways to train dogs to file their own nails using a scratchboard. Because so many dogs find traditional nail trims stressful, teaching them to file their own nails can make the experience less so by turning it into a game.
We are also launching a dog scent detection project to evaluate whether community-based dogs, working with their owners as trainers and handlers, can detect Pierce’s disease, a bacterial infection that affects grapevines and trees and can cause significant damage to agriculture and forestry. Because Pierce’s disease can be difficult to distinguish from other causes of leaf damage, we are interested in whether dogs can help identify infected plants.
I also serve as committee chair for many of our students in the Online Master of Agricultural and Life Sciences (OMALS) program who have a concentration in Applied Animal Behavior and Welfare. Their research projects cover topics ranging from dogs’ toy preferences to scent detection performance and techniques for socializing fearful kittens.
Dr. Erica Feuerbacher and Webjørn demonstrate scratchboard training for nail maintenance.
What’s the most inspiring or enjoyable part of your work?
I love being able to improve the lives of animals and the people who care for them. That encompasses everything our lab does through research, teaching, and extension.
I’m fascinated by animal behavior, so research is especially rewarding because it allows us to better understand how animals learn, communicate, and make decisions. Just as importantly, I get to share those discoveries with students, animal professionals, and the broader community.
The Applied Animal Behavior and Welfare through our OMALS program was specifically designed for working animal behavior professionals who have careers where they are and can’t relocate to earn a Master’s degree, but do want to expand their knowledge and skills in this field. It’s incredibly rewarding to see students apply what they’ve learned in their own careers and communities, extending the impact of our work far beyond campus and the surrounding area.
We also engage through public outreach and animal training and welfare organizations, such as shelters, to disseminate our work and knowledge on animal behavior and best practices for handling, training, and enrichment. For example, we work with our local shelter, the Montgomery County Animal Care and Adoption Center (ACAC), to help them assess dogs in their care and develop suitable behavior plans to benefit the dogs. My own animals bring me so much joy and fulfillment, so being able to help improve how humans and animals interact is incredibly meaningful to me.
"I love being able to improve the lives of animals and the people who care for them. That encompasses everything our lab does through research, teaching, and extension."
What first sparked your interest in this field?
I have always been an animal fanatic. Growing up, my parents were so generous and let me have just about every animal I could get my hands on, from rabbits and guinea pigs to horses, goats, sheep, and potbellied pigs. I loved watching how animals interacted with each other and their environment.
I knew animals were my passion, but I didn’t want to go to veterinary school. What really drew me into this field was getting a working-line German Shepherd puppy and becoming deeply involved in dog training. I was completely hooked and wanted to understand everything about how dogs learn and communicate. That curiosity ultimately led me to animal behavior research.
Did you always plan to study this, or did your path evolve over time?
My path evolved, for sure. As an undergraduate, I earned dual degrees in biology and Spanish and conducted ecological research. My final research project was investigating how pollen and nectar honeybee foragers differed behaviorally and physiologically (which was published). Due to that project’s success, I joined an insect flight lab at UC Berkeley. While I enjoyed the work, I found myself spending my free time reading about dog behavior and training rather than insect physiology and fluid dynamics.
I later joined the behavior department at Peninsula Humane Society and became a Certified Professional Dog Trainer. The more I worked with dogs, the more I wanted to understand the science behind behavior and learning. That led me to a master’s program, then a doctoral program studying dog behavior, a faculty position in Montana, and eventually to Virginia Tech.
One thing I’ve learned is that careers rarely follow a straight line. Pursuing the questions that genuinely interested me opened doors I never expected.
How does your work connect with the world outside of academia?
The basis of all of our work is helping people improve their interactions and communication with animals. This means helping owners, trainers, veterinarians—really anyone interacting with animals—understand their animal’s behavior, helping them humanely and effectively train their animal to make the human-animal relationship more harmonious, and helping owners and shelters understand their animal’s needs and how to meet them.
For example, work by recent doctoral graduate, Dr. Rebecca Thompson, investigated methods for assessing pain in horses, with the goal of helping owners and veterinarians recognize and treat pain earlier. Research conducted by OMALS students has explored topics such as reducing anxiety and stress during veterinary visits and improving animal care practices in shelters and zoo settings.
Beyond our work directly investigating dog, cat, and horse behavior, we are also investigating how we can partner with our dogs to solve community issues; our work on training community-based spotted lanternfly detection dogs marries our lab’s love of dog behavior and training with our community’s needs to solve environmental issues. I love this sort of project: we get to see folks partner with their dogs to address their community’s needs, and it provides valuable enrichment for the dogs. This work has so many potential applications to real-world issues and I am excited to expand it!
Our work applies the science of animal behavior to real-world challenges faced by animal owners, trainers, veterinarians, shelters, and other professionals.
"Our work applies the science of animal behavior to real-world challenges faced by animal owners, trainers, veterinarians, shelters, and other professionals."
If you could give advice to your younger self about this field, what would you say?
First, I would have told myself that this field exists.
Part of me wishes I had discovered it sooner, but I’m grateful for the experiences that led me here. My time at UC Berkeley gave me a strong foundation in physiology, sensation and perception, and evolution that continues to inform my work, while the Bay Area introduced me to an incredible community of dog trainers and behavior professionals.
I would also tell my younger self not to worry about having a perfectly linear career path. The unexpected opportunities and detours often end up being the experiences that shape you the most.
