A helping hand to improve the life of your hound. Help At Hound is dedicated to using the most up-to-date, scientifically supported training methods.
I offer force free dog walking and training services.
A little update on us! We’re back in Adelaide but unfortunately at this stage Help At Hound will not be reopening. I’m diving into more work at the RSPCA for a while, but may eventually find time to come back to training your pups 🐶
This pic is from our time in Tassie, my two dogs were little legends during our travels and coped so well with all the chaos. Couldn’t ask for better companions ❤️
Hi everyone, heartbroken to be sharing this but Help At Hound is now closed for the foreseeable future 💔 I have had to make a very difficult decision to move away from Adelaide for a while, but it’s not forever. Thanks for all your support and for letting me get to know you and your wonderful dogs ❤️
Wesley 🥰 I met this handsome boy in one of my group classes at Adelaide Pet Dog Training and am helping out with some Day Training sessions whilst his human has an injured wrist. He’s lovely on lead when there’s no distractions, but has a tendency to jump towards people, other dogs and balls, which is hard to manage with one hand! So we’re working on keeping calm with those distractions around ⚽️
Hiya 👋🏻 just a quick FYI post to let you all know I have reduced my availability down to Tuesdays and Fridays, which you may have guessed by how quiet my stories have been (or if you’ve tried to book in and couldn’t on the day you wanted). There’s a few reasons for this, not the least of which being that I’ve started working at the RSPCA shelter - pics of some of the sweet babies I’ve been hanging out with. Plus, need some work life balance and time to spend with my own pups yknow? Anyway, I’m still training and accepting new clients, just on a more part time basis for now 🦮
Quentin at 6(ish) months ❤️ we were lucky enough to do a mini photoshoot with whilst she was on a quick trip to SA and I am so so happy with how the photos came out. Such a handsome and goofy boy!
Marmalade 🍊 this lovely little pup joined me for a Day Training session today, where we worked on her recall and leash skills. She’s pretty good at both until the distraction of dogs, birds or particularly interesting people come along! So I’m teaching her how to observe those interesting things and move on calmly 🦮
It can sometimes feel impossible to enrich your dog, your life is probably already busy enough without spending hours creating a sensory garden or taking them on adventures. But just tweaking your routine slightly, maybe adding a few minutes here and there, can make the world of difference. Take some of the things you already have to do with your dog - feeding them, exercising them, and playing with them - and think about what alterations you can make so they're more enriching (there's a couple ideas in the image of this post!). It's also great to take some time when you have it to prepare enrichment in advance that you can give to your dog when you're on the go - frozen food toys are a great way to do this.
Summer is coming to a close and with that comes cooler weather, which means Help At Hound's Adventures are coming back! I've missed my time hiking with your hounds over the past few months and can't wait to get back to it from March. You can head to my website to book a meet and greet if we haven't worked together before, or you can snag one of the adventures now if we have 🌄
We often talk about 'setting you up for success' in dog training, but what does that actually mean? For me, it's a combination of preparing the teacher (that's you, human!), preparing the learner (your dog) and managing your training environment. Doing all this means that you'll have the least errors in your learning, making it more enjoyable for both you and your pet, and will likely speed up the learning process. Check out the images for my 5 tips on how to set yourself up for success! 🐕
The time has come for me to update my pricing and make some slight changes to my service offerings. These come into effect in two weeks time, so if you want to take advantage of my current pricing then book in soon and pay in advance!
Important changes to note (other than price changes)
🐶 Basic Skills consults are now known as Follow Up Consults, as I am now teaching more than just basic skills!
🐕🦺 Training Walks are now Day Training, because I can work on behaviour in and out of the home whilst you're busy
🚗 I have reduced my included travel to 15km
Happy New Year everyone! 💫
Thank you all for your support over 2022, it was an amazing year getting to live my dream of working with dogs 🐶 I’m excited to continue to grow the business and diversify my service offerings over 2023!
I’m back in action as of tomorrow and still have bookings remaining for this week. Why not get you and your pup in for a consult and start 2023 by improving your relationship and enriching your lives together? 🐾🥳 Send me an email if you’re keen!
Have nice holiday season everyone! I'm off to spend some time with family tomorrow and will return in the new year. I'll still be checking my social media and email occasionally but will be slower than usual to reply!
QUENTIN 😍
Officially introducing my little guy. A somewhat unplanned addition to the family, Quentin is a 9 week old koolie pup from . He is the most wonderful boy already and I am so very excited to watch him grow! He’s my first puppy, so it’s going to be a learning experience for us all - expect content on puppy raising 🤗
Our greyhound Boof is doing very well so far, better than I ever could have asked of him. Fingers crossed things continue going smoothly and they become best friends 🤞🏻
Important Info! Training Adventure bookings are now closed until the new year. If you haven't seen my stories, I'm getting a puppy very soon! I'll need a little extra time to care for him and get started on his training. Bookings will open back up once we are through the hottest part of the year so I can ensure your pups will be safe from heat stress, burnt paws, and snakes 🐶
Once the warm weather decides to come back to Adelaide, we're bound to start seeing more snakes 🐍 I have already seen a few on my adventures. Here are my top tips for keeping your pups safe around snakes:
1. Keep them on leash! This is by far the best option - keeping them close to you means they'll be much less likely to run into a snake sheltering in the grass or behind a rock 🪨
2. If you're going off the street and into a park or for a hike, try to stick to nice wide trails which aren't overgrown. This will help you see the snake before your dog runs into it, and make sure the snake can slither away safely once they know you're coming 🌲
3. Go out when its cooler! This will not only reduce your chances of running into a snake, it'll keep your pup safe from heat exhaustion 🌥
4. If you're walking your dog off leash or on a long line, make sure you have a reliable recall and emergency stop. This will mean you can call your dog away from a snake if you see one ahead, or stop them from coming back towards it if they have already passed by without noticing it 🛑
They're finally back! Very excited to offer a group hike again after a couple months without them. This one will be following one of my favourite trails in the Sturt Gorge Recreation Park. It's just under 6km and usually takes me 1.5-2 hours to do, and isn't too difficult! It mostly avoids river crossings but there is definitely a chance of getting wet feet so wear boots instead of runners!
Just a couple of changes to previous hikes - group size is now limited to 10 and there is a small fee of $15 to secure your spot. Hope to see you there!
helpathound.com.au/group-hikes
We talk about consent with humans a lot, but did you know you should be performing consent tests with dogs as well? These are really useful to ensure that a dog is actually happy with the situation they're in, and not doing it because they feel forced.
Now of course, the unfortunate reality is that we can't always seek consent from our dogs. Certain situations arise like medical care and grooming which are essential, no matter how the dog feels about it. But we can make these situations less impactful by getting consent when it is possible, and practicing cooperative care.
Did you know that when I'm not working on Help At Hound, I'm probably working with COVID Detection Dogs? Yup! 🦠
I started with this project in early 2022, and have helped train the dogs up to deployment and now handle them in deployment at the Lyell McEwin Hospital. We're doing a research trial initially, but hope we get successful results so we can continue to train more dogs for this role and deploy them into more diverse environments!
If you want to learn more, send me a message and I'll link you to the University website with all the information you need about the dogs and the research 🐶
If you're familiar with positive reinforcement training, you're probably familiar with using a marker like a clicker or 'Yes!' when your dog does the right thing. But have you ever thought that you should tell your dog 'No' when they do the wrong thing, not in a harsh way, but just to communicate thats not what you want? That would be using a no reward marker - swipe through this post to learn more about them and whether you should use them or not.
August Special!!
I recently revamped my training adventures, and wanted to celebrate by bringing them in at a discounted price for August. These adventures first and foremost focus on decompression and fun, but of course include training time as well. Check out all the important information on my website and fill the form to book your meet and greet!
Meet Ragnar, he's a (nearly) two year old American Staffy mix! Ragnar originally came to me whilst with his foster carer after ending up back in rescue, and I've been so lucky to keep working with him now he's in his forever home 🐶 His humans have put a whole lot of work into his leash skills and house behaviour with some guidance from me, and he is absolutely thriving in his new home 🤩
If you saw my post last week, you know what to look for in positive play, but how the heck do you promote positive play? It’s all about setting your dogs up for success! Swipe through this post for some quick tips on just that 🐶
After a year in business, I thought it was about time to reintroduce myself on here 😊 So hello! My name is Lauren and I am the owner and operator of Help At Hound 👋
I’ve been training dogs for a few years now, starting out with group classes at Canine Behavioural School, whilst studying my BSc. Degrees in Animal Science and Animal Behaviour! I officially completed those at the end of 2021, you can see me pictured on my graduation day 👩🎓
Education is incredibly important to me so I have also completed further courses on training and nutrition, and am constantly researching, attending webinars, and looking for new ideas and perspectives to learn from.
My goal with training is always to get to the root cause of any behaviours your dog and you are struggling with, rather than delivering a quick fix and calling it a day. I heavily focus on making sure a dogs needs are met before working on any training or behavioural modification, because I believe this best sets you up for success 🥳
Help At Hound has taken a bit of a backseat whilst I’ve been working on the COVID Detector Dog Project (more on that in a later post!) but I am excited to continue to grow and work on this little business of mine for the rest of the year and beyond 💫
Meet miss Elsie! 🥳 We’ve been working together for a while now, but I never got around to introducing her. This gorgeous little pup and her Humans came to me because Elsie is quite nervous of new people coming into her home, and makes this known by barking about it. Her humans have been working hard to understand Elsie’s body language and support her in feeling more comfortable with new people, and as a result Elsie is able to calm down much faster than previously and has even started asking visitors for cuddles 🥰
What we interpret as dogs playing may not always be correct. Often times, dogs arguing can look pretty similar to dog playing, so how do you tell the difference? Swipe through for some quick tips!
It can be hard being a pet parent on social media, seeing all the incredible enrichment other people create, feeling guilty that your dog doesn't have every fancy new toy that comes out. This is your reminder for the week - it's OK if you don't have any of that. Enrichment can be ugly and cheap and benefit your pet all the same!
Welcome miss Denzel to Help At Hound! Sister to Merlot, she's a little pocket rocket thats willing to try anything you ask her to do - parkour is one of her favourite activities. She's got a little obsession with balls, so we're using fetch as her ultimate reward in training 🥎
As you'd probably guessed, I unfortunately had to cancel the group hike I had scheduled for last Sunday due to the extreme weather we saw! I have rescheduled for the 19th - if you hadn't signed up because you couldn't make it, theres still spots available if you can make the new date. Head over to my website to book in :)
Welcome Merlot to the Help At Hound family! This handsome boy came to me for help with some generalised anxiety - he was super hypervigilant on walks with his humans and hound sister, and could barely stop to sniff and take in the world. He’s also a bit worried about some other dogs, so we’ve introduced more structure when he is socialising and helped him to understand that not every dog that walks past is going to interact with him.
With training, enrichment, and confidence building through doggy parkour, he’s begun to relax on his walks and is confident that his people will keep him safe.
Heard the terms luring, capturing and shaping in dog training and don’t really know what they mean? Swipe through this post to learn about them!
Adelaide, SA
5043
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A rainy then sunny adventure with Georgia and Riley ☀️
Hello everyone! Thank you so much to all of you have already followed me. Very excited to announce that my website is now LIVE and I am taking bookings for services beginning in August. Please check it out and let me know what you think 😊 Helpathound.com.au . . . . #helpathound #dogtraıner #dogtraining #forcefree #forcefreetraining #positivetraining #dogbehaviour #adelaidedogs #adelaide #dogsofınstagram
Stephen Terrace Veterinary Clinic, St Peters
Stephen Terrace
