Cooperative Care. Fitness. Enrichment. Massage. Helping you make your dog's day better Are you puzzled by your dog's behaviour?
Cooperative Care | Fitness | Enrichment | Massage
Helping you make your dog's day better
Your Whole Dog is owned and operated by me, Annie Thorne, your Wellington-based canine wellbeing partner. Are you looking to enhance their physical wellbeing? Are you looking to advocate for your dogs' physical and behavioural health? I'm here to help you make your dog’s day better. We'll combine ethical rew
ard-based training, fitness, massage, and enrichment in an integrated approach. This approach, founded on the belief that a happy, healthy dog thrives
- when they are understood,
- when they are confident in their surroundings,
- when they are comfortable in their bodies,
- and when their needs are met. My mission is to strengthen the bond between dogs and their humans. We start by supporting your dog's emotional and physical health. Let's work together to create a harmonious household where both you and your canine companion will thrive! Professional qualifications:
Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partner (KPA-CTP),
Family Dog Mediator (FDM)
Certified Canine Strength and Conditioning Coach (CSCC),
Certified Professional Canine Fitness Trainer (CPCFT),
Certified canine massage therapist, kinesiology tape practitioner and cold laser therapist. Fear Free Certified Professional (Trainer)
Low-Stress Handling Silver Certified. Professional memberships:
Association of Pet Dog Trainers NZ (full),
Pet Professional Guild (full),
International Association of Animal Behaviour Consultants (supporting),
International Association of Animal Massage and Bodywork/Association of Canine Water Therapy
21/12/2024
Another episode of I Practice what I Teach!
Your dog is much more able to contentedly settle and chill if they’ve had their needs met.
How do you know what those needs are? By having a conversation, by trialling and evaluating different options, by getting to really know them.
Bouncing around shredding cardboard and rope toys is much more preferable than bouncing around and leaping on people or bothering us whilst we eat. And meets the need of releasing the energy beans.
Result ⬇️⬇️⬇️
19/12/2024
I talk a lot about “management” during consults.
Proof I practice what I teach 😆
By putting a barrier between mum and the dogs, they can say hello in their ridiculously excited manner and everyone stays safe. Win win.
13/12/2024
"It's surprising what you can achieve when you start chucking food around."
- Annie, most days
🍪 🐕🐾🍪
Send a message to learn more
11/10/2024
Apparently my dog is my resume 🤔
Erm, okay then. Here’s mine 🫣😬😆
If you want to keep your dog nimble and mobile* during their senior years, hit me up. I’m here for you, apparently it’s my specialty 🤦♀️🤷♀️🤣
*individual results may very, no ethical trainer will guarantee results.
27/09/2024
It is said that when you support a small business someone does a happy dance. It's true! And, when you buy a ScratchPad for Dogs nail scratchboard from me, TWO people do a happy dance as there's a ripple across the world and Jen dances too.
Jen, the founder of ScratchPad for Dogs, is a pioneer. The first scratch boards on the market. She's - quite literally - changed the lives of countless dogs around the world and driven the practice of dog-directed, dog-friendly nail care. Imagine. Incredible.
So, you can imagine, I was gutted to hear from her today advising me that she's closing the business. Rising costs are making it unsustainable. That and the mass Amazon-ification of, well, everything. Gutting.
Thanks so much for all the supportive and understanding messages - they were very much appreciated.
A medical emergency was exactly that - an emergency - and not something that I could have planned for. I realise that delays are not welcome, but 🤷♀️
I'm happy to report that I am now back home. I still have some recovering to do, so things will still be a bit slow for the next couple of weeks. Bear with.
11/04/2024
Your Whole Dog is in the midst of a medical emergency
If you’re waiting for anything from me - email replies, lesson notes, ,appointment reschedules, shop orders - I’ll be catching up once I’m back home
22/03/2024
This is such an important message. And one that I will repeat and repeat and repeat!
In fact, so strongly do I feel about this, I now include a full gait and posture assessment as a standard part of all initial consults. Yep, all of them. So it doesn't matter what it is you hire me for - from loose leash walking to aggression, you bet, we do an assessment.
If your dog is healthy and has beautiful movement, well, that will make the training plan a breeze!
And if they have lameness and compensatory movement patterns, or something just looks a bit off? Well, we figure that bit out alongside some initial management and safety.
The dog is always right. We should learn to listen to them once in a while.
‘My dog is naughty/bad/untrainable/dominant/stupid’
I hear this most weeks on intake forms. Usually I get pretty excited to see these cos I know I’m gonna get to change a dog and owners life!
So often we write our dogs off as any adjective that fits the above and honestly, I’m yet to meet a dog who fits any of those adjectives (and I have worked with 10k plus dogs over the ten years I’ve been doing this!). I do however week in week out meet dogs with health issues that contribute to their slow progress in terms of training. Did you know dogs don’t show pain or discomfort how we do? We often think ‘oh he isn’t limping or yelping so he is fine’.
Please read the examples below ⬇️
🐾 A huntaway cross who I work with who bit his owner. Reluctant to have his feet cleaned, got spicy over any intense handling, had periods of seeming insanity and relentless barking and being unable to calm down. Huntaways are vocal dogs… but…
Turns out he had hip dysplasia. This dog didn’t limp. He wasn’t lame in any way. He chased his ball and sprinted and jumped and had no issues physically on the surface however under that behaviour was pain.
🐾 A French bulldog. Resource guarding to the extreme. Bit his owners while resource guarding the knot pattern in their wooden floor. Also bombed around without a worry in the world and had no outward signs of pain.
Turns out he had a severe spinal condition causing intermittent excruciating pain.
🐾 A young spaniel owned by a very good friend who was having confidence issues. She would ‘tap out’ of training on the regular and my friend went from ‘this is my ticket dog who will represent my country’ to ‘is this even possible?’
Dog had hormonal issues and likely spikes of hormones left right and centre. A carefully timed spay and she is now grade 6 in agility.
🐾 A friends Border Collie. Owned by a very experienced and talented agility handler and trainer. Regularly ‘checked out’ of training sessions, seemed to not be able to learn things that were moderately straightforward. Described by other trainers as ‘oh she is just a border collie it’s what they are like’.
Turns out she is mostly deaf.
🐾 A black Labrador. Always social and friendly and attended brilliant puppy classes and adolescent classes. Had the best start training wise you can imagine. He started showing some intermittent aggression to his owners in the home and aggression to other dogs out and about.
Turns out he had bilateral elbow dysplasia.
🐾 Young German Shepherd. Always energetic and silly in her behaviour but suddenly got worse. Excessive zoomies, inability to settle, increased reactivity to other dogs, reluctant to get in the car, obsessive destruction at home.
Turns out she had an infection in her va**na that was causing discomfort and exacerbating all those teenage behaviours to the point of being unmanageable.
🐾 My own dog! My NSDTR started missing his dog walk contact early last year. I was tearing my hair out trying to fix it.
Turns out he had a minor iliopsoas strain and some physio fixed the issue for us.
———————————
All these dogs have one thing in common. They are not stupid or untrainable or naughty or dominant. They are uncomfortable and that is triggering extreme behaviour fallout.
None of the above issues would be resolveable with training. All of the issues will be resolveable with training ONLY when the pain is resolved. Some of them will have drastic improvement from the moment the pain or discomfort is managed!
If your behaviourist or trainer doesn’t immediately advise a veterinary visit if any aggression, excessive ‘naughtiness’ or strange behaviour is present, walk away immediately. Even if you think your dog is fine, visit the vets. Ask for a thorough examination and push for a proper evaluation of your dog from nose to tail and potentially blood tests too. If you’re still not sure, get a second opinion.
You cannot train the pain or discomfort out of your dog. Address THIS first and foremost.
20/03/2024
I just had a query about measuring for MediPaw boots, so Wolly helped me make a video ...
I find the easiest and most accurate way to measure for the boots is to have my dog's paw on a piece of paper and draw lines either side and...
13/03/2024
Wolly, doing a stellar job at a Movement Puzzle last winter 😍
He was 12 here, and we use these puzzles as a regular part of our mobility and cognitive exercise plan.
He had a stroke at the end of January, just a few weeks after his 13th birthday, and I have no doubt that all the balance and proprioceptive work we do helped him to navigate and recover that particular episode.
As we edge closer to winter, Movement Puzzles will become a more frequent item on our calendar.
If you're working with me, you can expect Movement Puzzles to be on your plan, too! Or, you can go straight to the source and join Mari's program and participate in all the exercises and monthly challenges alongside us 😄
12/03/2024
TL;DR - check out the shop's sale section!
Financial year end is approaching (way too fast for my liking, how is it mid-March already??), and I have a load of things in the sale section in the hopes I can make the stocktake process slightly less awful.
In a world when everyone is trying to sell you something, including me, apparently, it's worth remembering to be inventive and find ways to use things you have at home.
My cardboard box puzzles and toilet roll shredding games are some of Wolly and Tigg's most absolute favourites.
No plastic, no additional purchase, no landfill, no chasing the shiny and new. Just good old reuse and reduce. And when they're done .... compost or woodburner for the shreds.
Recently we experimented with the snuffle lettuce ... a cos and a few bits of Ziwi Peak stuffed in amongst the leaves.
07/03/2024
Another fabulous discussion about not only the benefits of canine fitness, but also the importance of good form and posture.
Canine fitness is a growing trend, and for good reason - we know that movement is a vital ingredient for good health.
Make sure you're working with
- someone who can help you achieve good form, good posture, good alignment,
- someone who can customise a plan to your individual dog and their needs,
- someone who can help you progress that plan safely and efficiently,
- someone who can identify anomalies and refer to other professionals when necessary.
05/03/2024
"It's so often the physical, and not behavioural" - Danika Bannasch, DVM, PhD
I talk about the link between health and pain and behaviour a lot. Like, at almost every consult. One way to assess this is through a gait and posture observation and analysis. Recently I've been doing these at the rate of roughly one a month. Worryingly, I have yet to find that the dog is not lame.
If you are experiencing behavioural challenges with your dog, or you think that something is not quite right, seek professional help. Consider the very real possibility that there's a health issue at the root cause.
Have a listen to this podcast. Both fascinating and confronting. I need to listen again (and probably again).... Most of the dog world knows this mutation as "that risk gene that makes your dog more likely to get IVDD," but in this episode, Danika talks us through the difference between IVDD (intervertebral disc disease), actual disc herniation, and the back pain that all dogs with this mutation suffer.
Danika Bannasch, DVM, PhD is the owner of Pint, the famous UC Davis football tee retrieving dog. She also happens to run a genetics lab, also at UC Davis, where she studies the genetics of inherited diseases in dogs and other animals. She is known for her work associating genetic variants with a var...
20/02/2024
There was some good news in my inbox this morning 😁
I'm now a Certified Canine Mobility Therapist, so if you've got creaky dogs that need a therapeutic exercise plan, I can help 🧘♀️🤸♀️🏋️♀️
Three more (gnarly, comprehensive) modules and I get a diploma 🤞🤞
04/02/2024
Two pre-order 📣📢📣 for you:
Trailblazing Tails leashes and longlines and Doggone Good treat pouches are the next two things on my hit list.
If you have been pondering an order and would like something specific and colour combos are important to you, now is the time to get on it!!
The Trailblazing Tails leashes and lines have multiple options, so please make sure you let me have ALL the details. These are my favourite leashes and lines, and they are fantastic quality. AND, if that wasn't enough, they are handmade by an incredible business that is a staunch advocate for dog-child safety and R+ training.
Canine fitness and movement is for all dogs, not just sport dogs!
Wolly, who recently turned 13, had a stroke over the weekend. I am absolutely certain that all the fitness and movement work we have done and continue to do has helped him work through this particular challenge!
Here's a quick recap of our last few days, and a video of our first rehab activity this morning.
A couple of weeks ago, as Wolly and I were doing his senior dog movement and fitness workout, I thought I might try and post some of it periodically for inspiration. A Workout with Wolly series had a nice ring to it 😁 Wolly getting ready to do pivots as part of his senior dog fitness program That...
25/01/2024
This is such a great discussion, and really highlights the importance of ensuring your exercise plan is doable and effective.
If you need a fitness plan, I'm here for it.
If you need help implementing your rehab plan, I'm here for it.
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If you’re looking for a harness that’s highly adjustable, has minimal restriction of movement, two points of attachment, and that’ll shake and roll with you, then you’ll want one of these …
Blue-9 Balance harness order is going in at the end of the week.
Use the pre-order option to get your specific size/colour combo.
https://yourwholedog.co.nz/collections/blue-9
Your Whole Dog is owned and operated by me, Annie, a Wellington-based dog trainer and walker, who focuses on teaching cooperative care skills, and promoting enrichment strategies.
I have long been an advocate for a multi-modal approach to canine health, training and behaviour, and Your Whole Dog reflects my philosophy that neither behaviour nor health happen in a vacuum and many factors should be considered and addressed when looking at training, behaviour and health challenges. To that end, I am a strong advocate for enrichment and decompression activities.
My training areas of special interest are, primarily, cooperative care and foundations for fitness and rehab, and ensuring that a dog's behavioural and physical wellness needs are fully met.
As a trainer, I use positive reinforcement, and I am both Fear Free and Low-Stress Handling certified. I am currently enrolled in the Karen Pryor Academy Dog Trainer Professional program.
I am a member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers NZ (full), the Pet Professional Guild (full), and the International Association of Animal Behaviour Consultants (supporting).
