I can't say enough good things about Amanda. I have known her through dog sports for a few years, and saw how well she trained her own dogs. My older dog is a rescue who had a lot of behavioral issues; many have improved with time and training, but he would have had a leg up had we worked with Amanda at the onset.
Now, I have a second dog, who is going through adolescence. While he is outgoing and high energy and cute as a button, he was also going down the road of developing bad behaviors.
Me: what's that in your mouth?
Him: I'm going to go run away now.
Me: come here!
Him: catch me if you can!
Me: stay!
Him: as if!
I contacted Amanda to inquire about private lessons to work on establishing positive behaviors with him. Even though Amanda is based in Southern OC and I'm in LA, I contacted her because I know that she not only knows dogs well, and has a lot of education and experience in dog training, but that she is also very intuitive. She gives off a calm energy that my hyperactive dog and my nervy self needed to get out of the downward spiral that we were on. Additionally, she uses positive reinforcement training (versus a correction-based training), which I feel far more comfortable doing. I had met with more local behaviorists and various training schools with my older dog, and didn't feel comfortable returning to any of them with the younger pup.
So far I've done three lessons with Amanda, and plan to do more. I am so amazed at how she is able to demonstrate the finished desired behavior (let's say, drop it/give, where the dog spits out the contraband from his mouth), and then breaks it down piece by piece. Each step in building the behavior is fun for the dog. My dog is not only excited to work during the lesson, but is super jazzed to do our "homework" because it's very rewarding to him. She stays calm in explaining how to troubleshoot issues, how to build the behavior from foundations, and how to continue to proof the behavior.
Case in point: before a lesson with Amanda, if my dog found some trash on the ground (let's say, a phone charger), he would run off and would not let us near it. Within two weeks, he would immediately spit it out when asked, and come jump in my arms (and then he gets lots of praise/treats). With each of the behaviors we work on, we're also working on the larger relationship building, and I'm noticing a huge change in his attitude. Because Amanda shows us how to "play fair" with the dog, he is encouraged to listen because he knows only good things will happen when he does. He's not offering behaviors out of fear, but rather out of desire. As a result, we are both much happier and are back on a good path.
As with any other type of dog training, there are no magic bullets. I don't think any behavior will be perfectly fixed in a lesson. Amanda offers packages (in addition to single lessons), which have a slight discount versus a per-lesson fee. Her pricing is very fair, especially given her natural skill and her experience level.
If I'm willing to sit in traffic for 1.5 hours, even though I live in a city where you can spit and hit a dog trainer, I would hope that that's testament enough about how great Amanda is. I will be forever grateful for how much improvement I've already seen in both my dog's behavior and my relationship with my dog. And I look forward to continue working with Amanda as we continue to work on improving my dog's behavior and becoming a great team! read more