Four Paw Fun Dog Training LLC

Introduction: My style of dog training is for owners that want to build a working relationship with their dogs. Training includes agility, flyball, herding, lure coursing, therapy dog, Rally-O etc., which also makes for a great family dog. I usually get my students from word-of-mouth referrals. Students will call me when they get their pup at 8 weeks old. I immediately get them into my puppy play group for socializing. This play session is on-going, drop-in, every Thursday evening. I watch each pup to see if they are appropriate with the other pups. Some never go off leash, until they can control their impulses. This class benefits all the pups and handlers, by introducing the pups to each other before starting their obedience class. Without the play group experience, pups usually take the first 2 classes before they settle down enough to learn and focus, due to the distraction of all the new pups in class. Once the pup is old enough to go into a puppy obedience class, at 4 to 12 months, we work on recall and heeling from the first class to the last class. These two cues are important for a performance dog. We need off-leash control, as well as the pup watching and reacting to where we are going. We also teach attention, sit, down, heeling with the auto sit, which leads into greeting with a sit, wait at the door or pup sits at the door waiting for a verbal release, before walking out the door. Once pups graduate from this class, we go into a class called Crate Games. This is not crate training, it's a fun class that again works on a strong verbal release, impulse control, drive, and letting your pup make its own choices, while you say nothing. All good choices are rewarded, which develops a pup that can think on his/her own. If your pup is thinking about choices, your pup will choose choices that get good responses from you, whether a verbal praise or a treat reward. At this point you are ready to go into your respective calling. Pups interested in going on to agility will start my foundation beginner agility class. In this class, we work on start line stays, flat ground work or pup following your body, and jump skills. After your pup graduates this class, we go to the agility arena, a 80' x 90' horse arena. We start contacts (dog walk, A-frame, teeter) and weaves. I have students that have been taking classes with me since 2004. These students continue on for various reasons, competing in agility. They love the team feeling they get from working together with their dogs. I have several retired folks, whose dogs are their kids now, and they enjoy the social interaction with classmates, as well as seeing their dogs have so much fun running on the equipment.