Dog Savvy

07/23/2024

✨Caption this✨

07/21/2024

One of our client families just texted this of “everyone” watching our online program videos😂

I think it’s so funny when the dog starts to recognize who is on “TV”💙

06/08/2024

💥UNPOPULAR OPINION💥

Please don’t do this with your dog.

It’s often recommended to make your dog wait for their food, put food in slow feeders, and to act like this with their mealtimes.

Its a few things like this that are the BIGGEST contributors to a dog developing food aggression and “resource guarding” (when they growl at you when they have something)

If you’ve been guilty of this, it’s totally not your fault.

This is the kind of training tips you see on TikTok and Instagram ALL the time!

Please also don’t feel judged by our post, we are the LEAST judgy people you’ll ever meet.

We just want to have better information and let you know we can definitely help you if you have a resource guarding dog who is now stressed around/with their food.

www.dogsavvytraining.com

06/03/2024

05/28/2024

Brittany found this awesome Virtual Run organization that supports all kinds of causes…and you do them with your DOG!!

How cool is that!?

We love to give, so we signed up for the Memorial Day 5k benefitting Operation Grattitude.

The dogs also enjoy going on their ‘walkies’ so we thought it would be a great opportunity to have fun with them (even though they dont know, lol) and donate our time and money to a worthy cause who cares for our vets.

Here’s their “race medals” and smiles for Memorial Day 🇺🇸🏅

05/14/2024

Unpopular Opinion:

Don’t get another dog until your current dog is exactly where you want them behaviorally.

We see this a lot.

❌Getting a dog for another dog so they have a playmate.

❌Getting another dog to help with behavioral issues of another dog.

When adding a dog, always make sure your current one is mentally, emotionally and behaviorally stable first.

If not, you’ll be inviting compounding problems.

Whats a compounding problem?

It’s when 1 + 1 doesn’t equal 2, it equals 10.

Which means it can often be very overwhelming to face two dogs that are struggling to learn.

Get the first dog to a place where they are healthy - mentally, emotionally and behaviorally.

This way, everyone can truly enjoy the addition instead of being stressed!

04/15/2024

Dog and cats CAN get along - even if they don’t right now!!

Join one of our programs and learn “The Dog Savvy Baby Steps” that ANYONE can do.

7 simple baby steps to a happier, more enjoyable life with your dog🐶

03/10/2024

03/05/2024

Who’s excited about toenails? Luna!

02/05/2024

Thank you Robin! What an incredible transformation. So glad for you and Jacob and that Kaya is so much happier and relaxed too. Everyone deserved it.🤘☮️

01/09/2024

Ummm, my wife likes purple?😂

12/30/2023

Adventuring in Colorado🌄 Happy New Year from our family to yours!

12/18/2023

THRIVE Program racking up another win!🥇

How bout that for a transformation!! Less than 30 days! 🤯

You guys, our unique process is so simple and easy we routinely have children participate and have fun with the training.

Repair your relationship and enjoy them more!…Super fast.

Dogsavvytraining.com

12/16/2023

When all our dogs choose our friend on game night.🤦🏼🙃

12/03/2023

Thank you Animal Hospital of Georgetown for always taking such good care of our animals.

Having a vet you love and know is so important. We’ve been coming here with all our animals for over 10 years.

And don’t forget to pet George the cat when you come😎

Thanks Dr. Gardial, Brandee, Cindy and staff!!

12/01/2023

I can’t think of a better compliment from a client that our THRIVE Program works so well she felt like she didn’t even need me!

11/29/2023

Why "My dog takes food all the time" isn't good enough and how it's holding you back.

I did a series of videos a while ago and was just going through several of them so I can update some of the teaching.

We update things pretty often, as both Brittany and I continue to learn new things and evolve.

This video is great!

In it, I break down the relationship between your dog's appetite level and the quality of their learning and why it's SUPER important to train with them only within certain windows of opportunity.

In this video I explain how to know when your dog is in their best learning window so you can make the MOST and BEST use of your time.

11/26/2023

If you didn't already know this, teaching obedience takes a ton of time and skill.

I know, that's not what you hear is it?!

Well It takes a lot of time and skill to teach it WELL enough that it would make a real difference in your everyday life.

That's why we don't teach obedience!

It's totally impractical for most dog owners to acquire the skill level in a short period of time and it doesn't ACTUALLY teach the 'manners' and 'skills' that you're really after -

like walking on a leash nicely and calmly, not crowding or rushing the door, leashing up without a circus act, and listening to things you need them to cooperate with during the day.

Turns out, it takes about 5x less time, effort and skill for dog owners to achieve the things they want from their dog when you learn how to train in what we call 'free behavior' instead of 'obedience and command-based' training.

Which means you get to have a dog who listens and responds, has great manners with you, your friends, and even your kids SUPER FAST!

Notice in the video I don't give any commands. No sits, no stays, no heels, no downs, no struggle getting them to settle at the front door before we go out, no struggle with them rushing out of the car door, and no struggle when it's time to leave the park.

dogsavvytraining.com

11/24/2023

Can’t think of a better way to end Thanksgiving day than with a message of another THRIVE Program win!!

‘Lulu’ came into this family “like a wrecking ball”.

Full of life, enthusiasm and plenty of ENERGY🤣

Super sweet and friendly, but really intense jumping and pushy behavior and had a very hard time settling down.

We’ve been working for the past several weeks teaching Lulu HOW to relax and make good choices on her own so her owners don’t have constantly tell her “no” all the time or constantly give her commands so she doesn’t misbehave.

That’s the beauty of our training process - train your dog to make all the good choices you want them to make, but without having to tell them to do it.

No tricks. No obedience. Transformational Training.

dogsavvytraining.com/programs

11/22/2023

An AMAZING moment of spontaneous improvement caught on camera today with Duncan!!

The only reason it doesn’t LOOK amazing, is because Duncan DIDN’T do the very thing that his owner was most concerned about and why she started training.

Duncan has been ‘explosive’ at cars in the past, often lunging at them when they pass

She had stopped walks altogether because she was worried that he’d get loose from her or possibly injur her shoulder. When we started training a few weeks ago, we began by working on other skills FIRST, until today.

This was Duncan’s first time out-and-about on leash since she stopped walking and honestly, I had completely forgotten about the leash lunging towards cars.

Can you blame me?? He’s a TOTALLY different dog - he never even gave me a CLUE to be on guard.

I did notice his owner, who was facing me, watch the car intently but I just thought she was waiting to say hi to the neighbor. I didn’t know she was actually really tense and hoping he wasn’t going to do it. 😭😭

He didn’t struggle AT all and didn’t even need any help or commands to prevent him from it. Just easy-going all on his own🎉

Follow the THRIVE Program steps in order, trust the process, and watch the things that were a ‘problem’ begin to literally melt away and disappear.

So proud of these two today and their incredible diligence in training!

11/18/2023

Our newest THRIVE Program ‘student’🎉

This is Daisy 🌼 and she starts training this week.

Daisy is the friendliest, wildest, no-personal-space, and sweetest little 10 month old girl you’ll ever meet.

She doesn’t listen when she’s excited (which is basically all the time🙃)and has embarrassing guest manners.

She fidgets and pesters everyone because she has a hard time settling down.

Her owner is afraid to walk her bc she’s gotten so strong and will dart after a squirrel.

We’re so happy to help her learn to relax, listen, and walk calmly for an enjoyable walk.

We’ll keep you posted!!

11/17/2023

When we started training 4 weeks ago, Merlin the cat was scared to be around Biscuit the Aussie and had been that way for almost a year!

Biscuit is a very confident, super energetic and friendly Aussie (actually overly-friendly and way too exuberant🤣) and just wanted to play with Merlin but her intense excitement was so overwhelming to Merlin that he rarely came around anymore.

It’s sad and stressful when you have an animal, or your kids, that don’t feel comfortable around your pushy/hectic dog.

Excitable, energetic, overly-friendly dogs can be really overwhelming handfuls and can often discourage other animals and your kids from wanting to interact.

They just don’t have any manners or boundaries and they can’t just settle sometimes!

Someone told me the other day they felt like they were living with a toddler 24 hours a day!

I couldn’t have said it any better because that’s exactly what it feels like sometimes.

That was Biscuit the Aussie only 4 weeks ago!

For Merlin to feel safe enough to come around while Biscuit is out but ALSO to feel safe enough to fall asleep is a true testament to the transformation of our THRIVE program.

Our THRIVE program has brought this amazing family a worry-free and peaceful reunion between the animals, and joy from their owner who now feels her family is whole again and connected.

Dogsavvytraining.com/programs

11/16/2023

It’s usually around this time of year Brittany and I start looking back through the last year and review things like:

What could we have done better?
How can we serve our clients and their dogs better?
What were our biggest wins and did we meet all our goals?

We got Phoebe 1 year ago. (Gosh, I really can’t believe it’s already been that long!)

We had an early setback with Parvo, but recovered (Thank you Heart Of Texas Veterinary Specialty Center & 24 Hour Emergency Center for their AMAZING doctors and staff). A special thank you to Dr. Erin Schran for being very so supportive and giving us great guidance along the way and to Dr. Leslie Holsapple for your care for her in the hospital.

Not only did she recover, but she SMASHED it.

She’s earned AKC Canine Good Citizen, AKC Virtual Home Manners, AKC FitDog, AKC Trick Dog and more.

She’s earned several AKC conformation wins along the way and we also had the amazing opportunity to go all the way to the Great Dane National Specialty Show in Santa Fe last month.

She took a second place ribbon there too!

I couldn’t be more proud of our very special Phoebe (aka Pheebs, aka BB🤓) but more importantly my wife, Brittany.

Her hard work, patience, persistence in her goals absolutely amazes me everyday.

Congratulations you two. You deserve every ribbon, every AKC title, and every bit of credit and applause.

11/12/2023

Holy Moly!! Read this‼️

What an amazing transformation with our leash walking method!!

If we’ve helped you transform your walk with our method leave a picture of your dog in the comments because I’d love to see there faces again🤓💙

11/10/2023

‼️⚠️PSA to anyone who feeds with Victor Dog Foods⚠️‼️

Big recall on Victor dog and cat foods.

See more info here:

FDA, CDC, and state partners are investigating an outbreak of Salmonella Kiambu that is potentially associated with pet food made by Mid America Pet Food.