Wild Spirit Canines, Pencader (2026)

06/12/2025

The commonly overlooked Assistance Dog skill: Light Pressure Therapy (LPT)

LPT is a frequently used assistance dog task designed to provide gentle, grounding sensory input.

It offers a subtle and convenient alternative to deep pressure therapy (DPT) and is particularly useful in situations where full-body DPT is not practical, such as crowded lecture theatres or during procedures like blood tests.

One common form of LPT is the head-down behaviour, where the dog rests the weight of their head on the handler’s lap, arm, or hand. This provides mild, calming pressure and is often paired with the additional sensory benefit of being able to stroke the dog’s head, ears, or neck.

Another example is contact-settle work, demonstrated here by Tigger the Irish Setter and Swift the blonde Labrador, who both fell sound-asleep providing this task. Contact settle work is an even more highly subtle and accessible version of LPT.

LPT—and pressure therapy more broadly—is highly adaptable. It may appear simple, but the specific angle, placement, and level of pressure can vary significantly between handlers based on individual needs.

01/12/2025

Christmas & Assistance Dog Welfare 🎄🐾

Reggie and his handler enjoyed a festive start-of-December outing!

The environment was challenging, with plenty of sensory stimuli to navigate, but their careful preparation paid off. The trip was focused on fun and prioritising canine welfare, allowing the partnership to thrive and enjoy the experience together.

The festive season brings plenty of excitement and new experiences for handler and dog alike.

Christmas often means new environments, decorations, and routines, so keeping welfare in mind helps dogs stay comfortable and confident throughout the celebrations.

Busy shops, sparkly decorations, and extra visitors can create more stimuli than usual, while travel and schedule changes may make the holidays a bit busier for working dogs.

But with thoughtful support, assistance dogs can adapt beautifully to allow access to seasonal environments.

Many handlers also rely on their dogs a little more during the festive period, making rest, routine, and calm spaces especially helpful.

Below are some examples of how to support canine welfare during Christmas time:

– Keep familiar routines where possible

– Offer quiet, cosy resting areas away from the noise

– Advise visitors on how to interact with the dog respectfully

– Manage safety around festive foods to keep dogs safe

– Analyse and prepare for unusual working environments

– For a household with a lot of stimulating christmas decorations, put these up gradually

– Include extra breaks and downtime

Image description: Reggie and his handler pose facing away from the camera underneath large stone archways and pillars. Reggie looks up at his handler, who is using an electric wheelchair. To the right of them are a row of Christmas trees with small red baubles. The second image showcases Reggie sat down in his program working dog gear looking at the camera. Behind him is a beautiful country house with a stone statue and some red parasols.

28/11/2025

Puffin and Flora, two young Goldadors, have had a fantastic first few months with their new handlers — building confidence, growing their skills, and settling into life as newly formed assistance dog partnerships. 🐾

These early weeks are all about connection, having fun together, tackling the first milestones, and finding a rhythm that works for each team.

Whether it’s mastering a new task, navigating a new environment, or simply learning to trust one another, every step counts. What matters most is that each partnership’s journey is unique. There’s no single path, just individual teams learning, adapting, and achieving in their own way.

Here’s to Puffin, Flora, and all the new partnerships finding their stride. Every win, big or small, is something to be celebrated. 🧡

25/11/2025

Training assistance dogs means preparing them for real environments, including ones with other animals. 🐑🦙🐓

We’re fortunate to have access to a wide range of species including: goats, sheep, llamas, chickens, horses and more. This means our dogs can learn to work calmly and reliably around all kinds of distractions.

Assistance dogs are used to access the wider world independently. Socialisation with other animals helps nurture the animal-loving nature of many of our handlers.

Therefore, incorporating this variety of animals into training and socialisation is something that sets up partnerships for future hobbies. Such as, horse riding, visiting zoos and aquariums, ownership of other pets (especially small fluffy pets), doing courses in person about animals, jobs working around other animals.

23/11/2025

Our ambassador dogs are extra special members of our community.

These are assistance dogs whose handlers are confident and passionate about advocating, educating and sharing their experience.

You’ll find these partnerships at events, community and social meets and out and about in daily life — showing the incredible skill sets of a working dog.

Helping the general public understand the vital role these partnerships play in their handlers daily lives is the driver force for independence and inclusion.

Together, they represent the heart of what we do: education, advocacy, and connection. Here’s to our Ambassador Dog teams — leading by example and inspiring understanding.

20/11/2025

Assistance dogs change the lives of their handlers. However, the partnership between dog and handler goes far beyond logistics and practical support. 🐾

Together, Penny and her handler work as an experienced partnership. Below they offer some heart felt words…

“Having Penny as my assistance dog completely changed my life.

Without Penny, I wouldn’t be able to safely access the community independently.

Her enthusiasm and love for being out and around people has allowed me to make new connections and lifelong friendships.

Penny’s unconditional love, boundless joy, and extensive training has given me a confidence I never thought I’d have. She’s not just a brilliant assistance dog, she’s my best friend.”

Image description: The two images showcase Penny, a black Labrador, wearing the wild spirit canines cic program orange vest and lead wrap. She is looking up at the camera in both images. Surrounding her are quotations from the text above in orange text.

14/11/2025

Retrievals are not always what they seem - Showcased by Assistance dog Robin.

Classically, retrievals are trained as a task for an individual with mobility needs. Assistance dogs are trained to retrieve in a variety of ways, such as:

- Retrieving named items from a designated place or around the home, e.g. a medication or sensory bag.

- Retrieving dropped items.

- Advancing retrieval skills to produce tasks such as delivering items to another person or place, e.g. a basket.

However, as an organisation, we commonly take tasks used for other purposes and change the original intention to aid a handler. This is only done through assessing the individual’s needs.

For example, training a dog to retrieve dropped items can be helpful for situations of dysregulation for a neurodivergent handler because:

- Automatic retrievals of commonly dropped items can lessen the anxiety or stress of this situation arising. Especially if dropping items can commonly happen if a handler is already feeling overwhelmed.

- They can increase safety in situations where a handler may be stressed, such as dropping a set of keys whilst trying to unlock the house or a car.

- A handler may not notice dropped items if they are indicated to and retrieved. This can stop a handler from losing important items such as their phone or wallet.

Retrievals at home can be utilised for automatic retrievals or comforting items, sensory bags, emergency medication and more.

07/11/2025

We are delighted to share the news that Wild Spirit Canines CIC has achieved candidacy status with Assistance Dogs International 🌍🐾

Over recent years, our team has been continuously developing our specialist training program in order to produce and support many incredible assistance dog partnerships.

As candidates, we are looking forward to committing to a structured journey to further refine our policies and procedures, ensuring we uphold the highest standards of training and welfare for our handlers and their dogs.

We would like to thank our incredible trustees, partnerships and networks for all of their dedicated time and supportive efforts.

We are honoured to be listed as a new candidate organisation for Assistance Dogs International (ADEu/ ADUK) and are excited to engage in the future growth, and opportunities this will bring.

07/11/2025

During our consultation process, trial days are key to identifying a suitable partnership.

Prospective handlers can experience working with our demonstration dogs, helping trainers assess compatibility and allowing handlers to explore their preferences.

These personalised sessions consider each individual’s needs, confidence, and experience.

They also offer a valuable opportunity to discuss aspects of assistance dog handling, such as giving obedience cues, available tasks, and addressing any questions in person.

These sessions serve as an initial opportunity for trainers to discuss and trial aspects of handling an assistance dog, such as:

•⁠ ⁠The input and attention that a working dog requires, such as giving obedience cues.

•⁠ ⁠Elements not commonly discussed surrounding the lifestyle of being an Assistance dog handler.

•⁠ ⁠What tasks are available, and how a handler may use these in future.

•⁠ ⁠Answering any questions the handler may want to ask in person, or whilst handling a dog, etc.

22/10/2025

At this time of year, pumpkin patches and autumnal events are a popular day trip out for many of our handlers. 🎃

We couldn’t resist sharing this adorable photo of Assistance dog Stevie. This lovely cocker spaniel almost blends into the background with his adorable pumpkin hat and orange coloured Wild Spirit Canines Assistance dog vest.

Image description: Stevie, a Black and Tan cocker spaniel Assistance dog sits in front of a row of pumpkins in the first image. The second image is the same environment from the opposite (left hand side) angle except in this photo, Stevie is lay down wearing a small fabric pumpkin hat that looks like a small pumpkin balanced ontop of his head.

19/10/2025

Sharing our favourite ‘dog friendship’ posts from the recent Cotswolds trip! The combinations of the same breeds in different shades and little and large makes for some lovely photos 🦏

Our community often nurtured friendships between handlers, but also friendships between dogs!

18/10/2025

Thank you to and for welcoming our group of Assistance dogs. Both parks allow well behaved dogs on lead. These types of locations pose a vital training environment for partnerships wishing to access zoos, aquariums or other animal-based attractions in the future.

The assistance dogs attending were able to experience all the stimuli of animal enclosures, loud sounds, such as lions roaring, and socialisation to a wide range of large safari animals and birds.

Wild Spirit Canines

06/12/2025

01/12/2025

28/11/2025

25/11/2025

23/11/2025

20/11/2025

14/11/2025

07/11/2025

07/11/2025

22/10/2025

19/10/2025

18/10/2025

Address

Website

Alerts

Contact The Business

Shortcuts

Share