Liv Better Dog Training

07/02/2025

Welcoming our newest Middle School Mutts students - Bella, Scrunchion, Olive, Leo, and Millie! We have 3 returning Puppy Preschool graduates and 2 new besties in this group! They're sweet as honey and so, so smart! 🐶🐶 We started with some luring, shaping, and capturing, and finished up with some games to build focus and engagement! Over the next few weeks we'll introduce some new skills like Place, Leave It, and Wait and our perfect little turnips will also learn how to recall on cue and how to walk politely on a loose leash. Lots to learn over the next few weeks, but if week one was any indication, I just know they'll be picking everything else up in no time! 💚💙💜

07/01/2025

Thank you so much for your nominations, friends! We're proud as HECK to be in the voting round! 🥹🎉

I’m keeping my fingers and toes crossed for our 6th win, but I am just the most grateful to be nominated again by you, our Liv Better fam, my wonderful clients, friends, and colleagues! Your votes are what got us here, but they also help guide others within the community to work with us. Voting is an easy way to support and recognize the local businesses you think are offering quality services in our community and help us grow and build clientele for the year ahead.

Each email address is allowed one vote, per business, per category to keep things fair. We have lots of incredible competition in our pet community, so your support is always very appreciated! If you want to see your favorite dog trainer take home the CommunityVotes 2025 award, click the link below and find us on the list!

https://stjohns.communityvotes.com/2025/03/pet-and-pet-care/pet-training

From the whole team here at Liv Better, thank you, thank you for being the very best and for supporting us so enthusiastically! We appreciate each of you more than you know! 🐾🐾

06/28/2025

Happy Saturday from our new Middle School Mutts students! We have some sweet familiar faces to welcome back and a couple of new friends that we're enjoying getting to know! Say hello 👋 to Toast, Leo, Clover, Sprocket, and Willow!! They're a fun group of smartie-pants-cutie-patooties, and we love having them in class!

06/26/2025

✨️ Puppy Social ✨️

Our Puppy Social is a 45-minute drop-in class that is aimed to supplement our Puppy Preschool program! The focus of this class is to take advantage of the crucial socialization period and help provide you an opportunity to safely and positively expose your puppy to other furry friends, and to a variety of novel sights, sounds, smells, and surfaces! This helps puppies gain experience and confidence that can help prevent future behavior issues down the road!

⏰️ Time: Thursday, July 24th at 6:30pm

💰 Cost: $40 (cash or etransfer)

✅️ Requirements: Pups must have 1 parvo-distemper vaccination and at least 1 dewormer at least seven days before the social. Ages 9-20 weeks.

You can attend a Puppy Social prior to or concurrent with Puppy Preschool or Private Puppy Coaching. Liv Better clients get priority booking, but all puppies are welcome. Please email [email protected] for more information! 💚💙💜

06/25/2025

Another group of sweet potatoes joined our fam! 💚💙💜 Introducing Harvey, Archie, Daisy, and Rowan! 🐶🐶 Over the next few weeks, we'll introduce some focusing games to build engagement and begin laying the foundations for their impulse control skills like 'Leave It', 'Wait', and 'Place'. The class will also learn how to teach a reliable recall and how to walk politely on a loose leash! Their humans have lots of learning to do, but with consistency, patience, and positive reinforcement training, they're bound to make improvements quickly! Stay tuned for updates!

06/25/2025

Class is full** 🎉 Registration is now open for our next Puppy Preschool class set to start on Tuesday, July 31st at 6:30pm! 🎉

Our Puppy Preschool Program is designed for kiddos under 18 weeks of age. We require all dogs in our group programs to have at least one round of vaccines and a dewormer prior to starting.

This program covers essential skills like safe socialization, confidence building, body awareness, handling, soft mouth exercises, and more! The skills are fun to learn and easy to implement. The program will benefit puppy parents who want to promote positive interactions with people and other dogs, curb naughty behaviours like excessive nipping, chewing on furniture, stealing food, trash, clothing, etc. Puppy Preschool is jam-packed with information and includes weekly handouts to help keep the whole family accountable week to week with the homework. Class sizes are small, and we always have a training assistant present to ensure you're getting the most out of class time.

Classes run for 45 minutes every week for 6 weeks and cost $300+tax. Classes are held at our new training facility located at 124 Glencoe Drive, Mount Pearl. If you're interested in joining us for a super fun 6 weeks of learning, please email us [email protected] to register!

Please note that Liv Better Dog Training follows the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behaviours stance on dog training and uses positive reinforcement training methods. We do not permit the use of aversive tools or techniques in any of our programs. This means we focus on rewarding positive, desired behavior while reducing unwanted behaviors through prevention and management. We do not use confrontational training techniques, such as verbal or physical correction, and we do not use tools like choke chains, prong collars, or ecollars. You will need lots of treats and a properly fitted harness. If you are not committed to a positive approach to training your dog, then we will not be a good fit for your needs. Please consider this before signing up to train with us.

06/20/2025

🎉 Kickin off the weekend with a Middle School Mutts graduation!! 🎉 Congratulations to Millie, Raven, Bleu, Beau, and Lucky!! Thank you to their incredible humans for trusting us with their sweet, silly doggos and for keeping up with their homework week after week! I'm super grateful for all the fun we've had and the new friendships we've made, and I am already looking forward to working with them again soon! 💚💙💜

06/20/2025

📣 Interest post for our next Training Games class!! 📣 This super fun 4-week program is designed to bring out your competitive side and help you and your dog learn to work better together as a team! We want to help you grow and polish the skills learned in previous classes using a variety of challenging, fun group training games! We're going to iron out the wrinkles, increase the difficulty, and build consistency and reliability with your foundational skills! Class will take place both inside and outside, weather permitting. Set to start on Monday, July 7th at 5:30pm and costs $200+tax

Let the dog Training Games begin, and may the odds be ever in your favor!

To reserve your spot, please email [email protected] for more information. **Please note that this program is reserved for previous clients and is not open to the public at this time.**

06/18/2025

☀️ Kickin off this sunny Wednesday with our newest Puppy Preschool class! Introducing Astra, Junie, Casey, Nova, and Chester 💚💙💜 They're just pure love! So sweet, and so smart, and just the most fun! We've already started some focus and engagement exercises, and this week, we're breaking out our puppy obstacle course to help build body awareness, core strength, problem solving skills, and confidence! I'm so excited to see their little butts in the ball pit and watch them learn to navigate the teeter totter

✨️ Our next Puppy Preschool class is set to start on Thursday, July 31st at 6:30pm and has THREE spots remaining! Email [email protected] for more information! ✨️

06/12/2025

**class is full** 🎉 Registration is now open for our next Middle School Mutts class set to starting Tuesday, July 15th at 6:30pm 🎉

Our Middle School Mutts program (previously High School Hounds) is designed for furry kiddos 4 months and older. We introduce many practical skills like loose leash walking, reliable recalls, place, leave it, drop it, and more! Skills are easy and fun to learn and will help curb common training concerns like excited greetings, pulling on leash, pestering guests, counter surfing, stealing things, destructive behaviours, bolting through doors, running away, etc.

If you're interested, please email at [email protected] to register.

It is also important to note that this program is not a reactive dog class. If you're unsure if this program is suitable for you and your dog, please ask, and we can set up a free assessment to ensure you're getting the best bang for your buck. We LOVE our reactive dog friends and have programs available for them, but they don't benefit from this particular class, and we want all our students to and thrive during and after training!

06/06/2025

We love Gabby! Free training from yours truly to whoever is lucky enough to adopt her! 🩷🥹

Please read this entire post.

Meet Gabby. She is one of the most intelligent dogs we have encountered at the shelter. We have taught her to sit, paw, lie down, place, touch, and stay, and we are currently working on "leave it." She truly embodies the spirit of a working dog. Inquisitive and always in search of entertainment, Gabby needs plenty of mental stimulation along with exercise. She does not exhibit resource guarding or food aggression; overall, she is a happy girl, and we love her here at the SPCA St. John’s.

However, Gabby does come with some challenges. She will require an experienced, calm, and tolerant owner. When Gabby gets excited, she sometimes becomes overstimulated and redirects that energy towards her handler's arms or ankles. This can be quite rough and has resulted in bruising at times. We have been working on redirecting her with toys and treats. This approach is effective but must be applied consistently. While we do our best to support her, we cannot provide everything she needs; we have made a good start, but Gabby needs an owner to follow through with a training plan.

Gabby’s adoption fee has been sponsored, and Liv Better Dog Training has offered a free one-on-one session for Gabby’s new owner. This session is mandatory, and Gabby will need to be registered with a positive reinforcement trainer to ensure her success. Someone has also donated 250 towards positive reinforcement training for her.

Anyone interested in Gabby will need to have multiple meetings at the shelter. We will take her for a walk with you and allow you to observe how she reacts during overstimulation in our enrichment area. We aim to be completely transparent, as this will help set Gabby up for success.

Gabby cannot go home with other animals or young children at this time, but with training and the right owner, this may change.