Thanks for all your support, and congratulations to our winners! We raised a wonderful £146 for Sinead’s big challenge in aid of Prospect Hospice 🐶♥️
We have one space available on our Hoopers course, starting at 12 tomorrow in Old Town. It’s a 4 week course and costs £75. Hoopers is my fave - so much fun! Perfect if you’ve promised to try something new with your dog this year. If you’re interested, drop us a message ☺️🐾
Today at 6pm right here on Facebook, join me (Amy) and our pals Sarah at Barkshire Dog Training and Clare from Insight Hounds to talk all things festive!
We'll be chatting about what we do with our own dogs to get them ready for the festivities, looking at some fun doggy games and recipes, and giving you some top tips to keep your pooches safe and happy at this time of year.
Come and join us! 🎅🎄🐾
We 🧡 Hoopers!
Here’s just a few of our superstar Hoopers pups yesterday! 🤩 They are all making brilliant progress, and having so much fun learning! 👏
Nothing warms our hearts more than receiving videos of you guys enjoying training with your dogs at home. We loved this update from Lando’s humans this week:
“Thought you might like to see how he's getting on! He's really been amazing with his loose lead walking, much more engaged, and as you can see here, his sit & wait is his party trick 🤣”
Great work Lando! What a clever boy 🤩🐾🧡
🧡 LONG LINES 🧡
A must-have piece of training kit for any new puppy or dog owner - I’m a huge fan of a long line! 🤩
You should not be letting your dog off lead unless you’re confident in their recall. If they’re prone to running off to say hi to other dogs, people or animals 🐑 then you need to keep them on a lead until you’ve done a bit more training. They could run in to a dangerous situation and get themselves (or someone else) hurt, and it would be your fault as you weren’t in control.
Owners are often (understandably!) nervous about letting their dog off lead for the first time. I often get asked “how will I know when my dog is ready?!”. Using a long line on walks will provide you with loads of opportunities to practise and then test your recall around distractions, while giving you the confidence to give your pooch freedom to explore safely. What’s not to love?! 🐾
Please be sure you’re confident handling a long line safely. This video may be useful: https://www.battersea.org.uk/pet-advice/dog-advice/how-use-long-line-lead
Enrichment Live chat
With Barkshire Dog Training, Insight Hounds and Swindon Dog Training
🧡 RECALL 🧡
What does recall mean to your dog? “Come back to me now”? “Time to go home”? Or perhaps “the party is happening by me and you sure don’t want to miss out on it”?
Which of those would YOU be most likely to respond to? 🤔 Me personally, I hate being told what to do! But if there’s someone invites me to something fun, I’ll be there in a flash.
By reframing how our dogs interpret our training cues and tapping in to their individual motivations, we can make their responses much more consistent and fun for you and your pooch! Win, win! 🙌🐕🧡
#dogtrainingswindon
#positivereinforcement
#recalltraining
This is Bertie (aka the cutest little bundle of fluff you’ll ever meet). Bertie is showing us just how many life lessons a puppy can take from the humble cardboard box:
🧡 Problem solving - “how can I get to that treat?”
🧡 New experiences: surface under paws, new smells, new sounds (everything sounds different when you’re a tiny puppy in a box!)
🧡 Curiosity pays off!
🧡 Awareness of how his back legs move separately to his front legs (something that does not come naturally to dogs!)
🧡 Confidence building - when we first showed Bertie the box he was a little more tentative (and if you watch his body language, he still is!). But with each new experience, he’s learning that the unknown is not that scary.
So, when thinking about introducing your puppy to new things, it doesn’t have to be people and dogs. How can you think outside the box (or in this case, inside the box)? 😂📦
