SideKick Dog Training

21/06/2025

I met with Stanley and his family when he was just a year old and at the height of adolescence! His family was struggling with mouthing, jumping, and other fun teenager stuff and, being first-time pet pawrents, didn't quite know how to handle all of it! We worked on some strategies and came up with some ideas specific to their house and family and I think they enjoyed getting to know a bit more about their teenager and how to work with him!

19/06/2025

19/06/2025

Help us welcome Miss Charlie to our Board & Train program! Her pawrent is recovering from a tumble, so Charlie has a few specific goals to help her and her elderly father - most specifically, jumping and polite greetings! Otherwise, she's here for some of the basics helpful to an adolescent doggo and her pawrent: Stay, Recalls, Leave It, and Drop It. Charlie has A LOT of land and a big yard at home, so she'll have a lot of focus on doing well off-leash, hanging close by, and, of course, coming when called so her pawrent can feel more comfortable having her off-leash at some point!

19/06/2025

Goose is just a baby in this photo and, at the time, we worked on puppy basics! He's an eager learner and such a fun guy! Since this photo was taken a while ago, we've seen Goose in our Board & Train program as an adolescent and he was just as lovely and fun!

18/06/2025

It's been a bit since I've written a blog post, but I felt inspired to write something up after a small pattern of clients with similar complaints and frustrations about their dogs' behaviors in the yard. The weather is nice and we've all pretty much exited hibernation, which means our dogs are also...

18/06/2025

Welcome, Harper, to our Board & Train program! She'll be with us to work, most importantly, on some resource guarding behavior; then, her family would love for her counter surfing and general jumping to be goals for her stay, as well as Recalls, Stays, and leash walking skills! Harper is settling in beautifully since joining us last week and is already a sweetie Leann's enjoying working with!

17/06/2025

TIP TUESDAY
This is one of the concepts that Pat Miller discussed in her book, "The Power of Positive Dog Training." Your SideKick already knows how to Sit and lay on the floor, how to walk with us and how to race to us. What we do with training is teach our SideKicks the English words for these things! We make it super fun and super rewarding to do these things, too, so they're that much more excited to choose those behaviors!

17/06/2025

I stumbled upon an enrichment challenge and I'm so excited about it for a couple reasons!

14/06/2025

Help us welcome this tiny peanut, Maple, to our Home School program! She's just a baby - only about 18 weeks - and will be working with me on all the basics: sit, down, leave it, drop it, leash walking skills, Recalls, enrichment, socialization (despite being more than 16 weeks in age, we'll add in novel things to keep the normalization of this weird world going), and so on! Maple is eager to learn, but we have to pace ourselves in our sessions, since she's so teeny and her tummy can handle only so many treatos! 😆

13/06/2025

This derpy dude, Karl, is such a lovely boy and very welcoming in his own home; however, he struggled a lot with strangers, kids, and other dogs when out on walks. The picture doesn't quite do him justice, but he's close to 90 pounds and quite muscley, making it a challenge for his humans to keep him safe (and themselves safe) on walks when reacting with big feelings! Karl's humans were already practicing some strategies when I met with them, so our session was mostly about how to add more consistency, how to tweak what they were practicing already, and including a couple of other small strategies to complement their efforts! While happy to get some treatos and practice a bit with us, Karl was also content snoozing on the floor while the adults talked!