Things started off weird at this place. We go around the circle and say the dogs name, breed and breeder. The trainer was all smiles learning about where all of these pure bread dogs came from. Then it was my turn, I have a mutt. I feel like the smile quickly was gone and she just said "oh."
We adopted our dog from a pretty bad situation. I'm happy we did, rescue all the way. He's a little timid and shy, but that's why we thought puppy school would be great for him. He'd learn some lessons, and most importantly get socialized a little. That's when we got our first lesson "dogs should not interact before class, during class, or after class." How crazy is that?! I've been to other dog training places for previous dogs and there is ALWAYS a socializing element. Dogs switch handlers, play with each other, have other people play with them, etc. It gets them use to those situations.
Instead, our poor puppy is now not just timid, but is deathly afraid of other people and dogs. Through this class he was taught that he is bad for trying to play with people and other dogs. Thank god spring is almost here and we can try to undo what this class has taught him by bringing him on walks and to the dog park. It will take some time though....
This trainer is an agility dog trainer, and that's what you're going to get. By the end we stopped going to class because it became useless. She should have spend less time on tricks and things like that, and more time socializing and working on different situations with the dogs. We did learn sit, stay, down etc. But we could have practiced healing more, and other basics that we ended up teaching our puppy on our own. read more
