For one Butler County entrepreneur, man’s best friend turned out to be a major source of inspiration.

Richard Wallace recently started Bark ‘n’ Bones by offering dog bones flavors in everything from apple pie, beef cheddar, gingerbread, and mint to peanut butter, peanut butter and bacon and peanut butter and banana.

Wallace also whips up batches of peanut butter cinnamon treats, blueberry apple dog donuts, and chicken and cheddar treats

All Bark ‘n’ Bones dog treats are “human grade,” homemade and preservative free, Wallace said.

“There’s no mass production,” he said. “We roll, cut and decorate each one of them by hand.”

Growing up as a child, Wallace was always a dog lover.

“I was so much into dogs that my parents said all throughout my life that one day I was going to open up my own business and it will have something to do with dogs,” Wallace said. “As any young child, when I heard that I just thought that my parents were crazy and that I was going to be an astronaut.”

As Wallace grew older, he realized that his dreams of working for NASA probably wouldn’t pan out, but his parents continued to encourage him to open his own business.

“When my parents died, I was unemployed and I had no one in my life but my dog,” he said. “She was the only one that gave me the strength to make it through everything.”

After several weeks of grieving, the only thing that Wallace said he could think about was his parents’ predictions for his career.

After a few short-lived ideas, Wallace started to make homemade dog treats at his Hanover Twp. home.

“I said to myself that if I could make just one dog happy by giving him or her one of my treats, that would put a smile on my face,” he said.

Wallace said he started slow, coming up with his own natural ingredients because he wanted to make the business his own.

“I didn’t want to look in a cookbook or some website for help,” he said. “Needless to say, it took some trial and error to get everything just perfect.”

The next step was to see if the product would even sell. Wallace started hawking his wares at the Butler County Farmers Market, not sure if he would sell even one.

He sold out on his first day, then again in successive weeks.

“I had people coming back from the previous week saying ‘My dogs loved your bones, and when we ran out they were mad at us,’” Wallace said.

Tracie Johns who found Bark ‘n’ Bones via Facebook, said she always has purchased healthy treats for her two Shih Tzu dogs, Rosie and Chance.

“This is the first time I’ve ever got treats that they actually cry for,” Johns said. “They do like a barking cry every time that I get them out of the fridge.”

For more information, visit www.barknbones.net or email barknbones2012@gmail.com.