@two.of.a.doge used to be just Bmo & Soo, super sweet fear-based Singapore Specials. In September 2023, Mummy Soo found an uncanny addition in the form of a Koda, a 1 year old abandoned Border Collie! Coincidentally, their best friends also adopted a pomsky puppy, Pickles, to add to their pack of older Husky and Corgi. Both puppies needed basic training asap. They needed/wanted to play with their older pack as soon as possible, and we needed commands to conduct those play sessions safely.
Collie’s (and Huskies too) are serious work-lines who have a higher than average need for daily physical and mental stimulation, on top of socialisation. The consequence of not meeting their daily needs is a frustrated puppy that can be destructive and overwhelming to live with. They are highly inclined towards high prey drive for smaller animals, herding instincts, reactivity, biting. The greater the power comes greater responsibility.
We started Koda off on one-on-one drills, manifesting his work drive, which comes so naturally for him. Teaching him was a breeze, individualized drills allowed us to make his drills extra difficult to drain his big brain. As he kept getting lost in the focus of drills, we found ourselves re-calibrating his drills at least once a day simply to make it challenging enough for Koda!
Very quickly, Koda graduated in to socials and play. His inquisitive and playful nature scored him countless playmates in our pack. As clients who are already friends, we paired their puppies on most weeks; allowing them to be distractions for each other during work, while best playmates during play. We mixed in play and drills together to get them really used to playing one second, ignoring each other the next.
Koda has been working with us for a year now, has fully graduated to our packwalks, and still works alongside and plays with Pickles weekly. Their owners get to enjoy two best friends who are able to switch on their play mode or work mode on a verbal cue.
It’s been a heartwarming year of transformation for Lola, 1y8m Cockapoo! A year ago, right on schedule for her terrible-twos (6mos - 1.5yrs in woofyears), her excitement-related struggles includes zoomies amongst other dogs making new friendship was impossible, 0-10 zoomies on grass making potty training was impossible, obsessed with all forms of cloth rug/matt, her nose is stuck on the floor on walks, commands don’t exist outdoors. Puppy training was not translating to everyday situations, and it was getting more intense more frequently.
Lola started with weekly daycare session, change of leash set up, as well as home consults as well so Mama could practise with us. We tweaked her drills constantly according to her learning pace: through-train MENSA GEP pace. 🔥
Lola loves every bit of her drills. While excitement is her natural disposition that probably won’t change, it was fueled by her insatiable need for daily mental and physical challenge. Drills was the very activities that closed that loop for her. She found her calling, her flow, her balance.
She started executing perfect drills in our center, perfect outdoor drills, perfect Loose-Leash zero check walks, then perfect packwalks. Somewhere along the way she dropped her grass zoomies just ceased to exist altogether!
And then the day came; one of the older dogs neighbor that she was obsessed about but growled at her as a puppy, started to grow curious of her now that she consistently brings a new calm energy. Today, they are bumsniff buds of the estate.❤️
In 2024, Lola dons the fanciest dresses and executes the cleanest, most consistent outdoor drills. She walks in perfect heel through throngs of humans and dogs outdoors, executes perfect duration place command in the most distracting cafes. She’s still the same playful pup that revels in intense horseplay, but now she can switch work mode on right in the middle of craziness. 😎💯
Drop us a line today, our September intake is almost f
Happy Birthday Singapaw! 🇸🇬🐾
We will not do well if you bring us to Esplanade & Promenade area today between 5pm-10pm! Fighter planes and Fireworks are not fun for us!
Bring us for a walk in the afternoon, then go out for a human day without us!
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Moony (Golden Doodle) started at 1.5 years old, she was a strong puller, reactive to dogs, and over excitement. Moony lives with two older King Charles Cavelier sisters. One of them is blind so she can only scurry to navigate to the world. The other is Poppy, naturally fast and commanding with her barks. We decided to also train Poppy in order to get effectively get Moony trained.
The trio makes a cute mess, they are all over each other in a scurry for food or attention all the time, it’s always about the fastest dog wins. And because it looks so endearing, humans encourage it by giving attention. The addictive nature of intermittent reinforcement of behaviour-reward was in proper display.
At the start, Poppy was barking incessantly pulling at every chance of stimulation. Moony was constantly aroused and unable to calm herself down. Thankfully, both dogs are just as hungry for a challenge in drills. We customised their drills durations to be halved, but double-down on repetitions, just to keep them constantly busy on either a challenge, or resting in place (12 drills instead of 6, 20 times in/out of crate instead of 10). We stepped up on training (twice weekly) for a couple of months to cement a strong foundation. They were categorically more serious cases that needed more foundation work to undo undesirable habits that require conditioning to chip away at.
After months of small wins, we started to see drastic results! Moony no longer pulls on the leash at all times, Poppy was acing her drills, helping to teach other puppies. Poppy stopped barking completely, rests when she’s on sit-stay, or goes to sleep once she’s in her crate.
Poppy and Moony has graduated into our maintenance pack, they come in regularly once a week to get their dose of crucial stimulation from structured activities to challenge their minds and bodies. We are immensely proud of their long term transformation to more calm, balanced and happy dogs.
Thank you very much for your patien
Place command aka forced meditation is the best thing to nurture a calm mind. While the activity is not physically challenging; it is comfortable like a hammock, the challenge lies in controlling the impulse to not respond to their busy minds, but stay still and only get off when the command is given.
A happy, balanced dog must have these regularly: physical challenge, mental challenge aka impulse control, sniffing around and socialising with other dogs. With place command, the mental challenge is at its highest.
In nature, dogs use impulse control to hunt, escape from predators, navigate dangerous terrains, if not they perish to the organic hostile environments.
It’s kind of like humans: with the advent of city life, we lost the natural balance that pre-civilisation offers. Consequently, humans invented lifestyles to create a balance: we’re the only animals that work out for the sake of working out, lift heavy bells off the rack only to put them back after. Because it feels good to push your limits, you’re sharper and more confident when you’re fitter, because we feel more satiated and balanced to the unnatural city lives that we have adapted to.
As hunter-gatherers, we use to simply sweat it out for livelihood, and now as citylings we get creative to achieve a healthy balance. If not, chronic diseases of the body and mind could stem from not prioritising balancing our unnatural lifestyles. And as nature goes, only those who take it upon themselves to do it right, reaps the benefits.
By extension, not everyone will spend time to nurture a balanced dog. But only those who do it right get to reap the benefits.
It starts with Sit stays for 10-15 seconds, but we’ll eventually get your dog to at least half an hour without breaking command. Every dogs’ journey is customized to make sure they get there at their own pace, and we get every dog there, one by one.
Drop us a line to training alongside us today!
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And that’s a wrap to a pawsome year! Our class of 2023 has been a wave of puppies join our regular weekly pack, we’ve been growing our TnT staff team, and it’s been such a swell time evolving with time. 😍
We are a team of behaviour trainers specialising in behaviour issues in domestic pet dogs. All the activities in our structured daycare program is designed to help the most common struggles of domestic dog owners.
We start with an assessment of your main struggles with your dog and set milestones with you. Your dog starts for several weeks on our weekday daycare sessions with us, and we’l pepper in consults with the handlers at home along the way, so we can make sure your dog is proficient before we teach you.
Our goal is to make sure your problem is solved and your dog masters the five basic commands to their highest potential. We send videos weekly and homework for the learning handlers at home. It is our shared responsibility to get your dog to our agreed goals.
After graduating to packwalks and your struggles at home are solved, we move your dog from a training price to a lowered maintenance price, to keep their basic commands sharp and a weekly dose of everything a dog needs: mental and physical stimulation, structure and boundaries as well as socialising and playing.
We customize training drills for every dog to ensure they can learn at their pace. We measure and analyze every training dog’s week-on-week progress We believe that the process matters, and that translates to results when their foundations are strong.
Drop us a line, our 2024 enrolments are open!
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Merry Christmas 2023, from our pack to yours, sending universal love and light across all creeds and breeds and species, one love to rule them all, and we all sleep soundly tonight 🎄❣️
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