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Our Team
Our team of dedicated and passionate trainers and care givers are here to help you and your dog achieve the success and goals you desire. They have over 50 years of collective experience, and have an extremely broad knowledge base that spans several different venues, as well as complex behavior work. Our team believes in continuing education, and are always looking for new and improved methods to help our clients and their dogs.
Jessica has a BN in animal science and has been serving the pet community since 1999 as both a professional trainer and care giver. Her experience includes 22 years as a professional trainer, as well as owning/ operating a very successful pet sitting and dog walking company. She teaches a variety of classes in the CNY area, ranging from basic to advanced obedience and nosework, and also offers behavior consults and private in home consultations for a more specialized approach. She has many years of experience addressing behavior issues such as separation anxiety, guarding food or toys, shyness, lunging or barking at other dogs, and more.
She is very active in the dog community, and enjoys training her own dogs. Her dogs have won multi High In Trial / High Combined awards at all-breed and specialty obedience and nosework trials. They have also have been nationally ranked in Novice, Open and Utility within the breed, and have achieved a large variety of obedience, scent work and rally titles.
She enjoys teaching and laying a strong foundation; if you don’t have a strong foundation, you have nothing to fall back upon. Her methods are motivational and balanced, with a strong emphasis put upon the relationship - as it all starts there!
She was blessed to train with Celeste Meade for 10 years, and has taken seminars from: Julie Hill, Betsy Scappichio and Linda Brennen, Temple Grandin, Pat Hastings, Denise Fenzi, Sylvia Bishop, Jean Donaldson, and Patricia McConnell amongst others in the field, studying topics ranging from aggression and body language to problem solving for the competitive obedience or nosework student. She believes that education is continuous, and is constantly studying, looking for better ways to teach and train. She looks forward to working with you and your dog!
Jessica
Valerie
Project Manager
Valerie
Valerie has been professionally training and handling dogs for over 24 years, and has experience with all breeds, sizes and temperaments. She has trained and competed in the following venues; conformation, obedience, rally, herding, dock diving, scent work / nose work, barn hunt, and carting.
For several years she has focused on the sport of conformation, and she has trained and campaigned numerous dogs of various breeds to be top ranked in the country, as well as training and completing championships on hundreds of dogs over the years.
She started in the horse world and trained her first unbroke pony at the age of 13. The pony was unable to be trained and broken when attempted by a trainer years prior, due to fear and confidence issues. These issues prevented success in earlier attempts to train the pony, and others gave up on her years earlier. Valerie set about to break and train the pony to ride by helping the pony to overcome her fears and learn to trust her handler/ trainer, while building confidence. The training was very successful and the pony became a wonderful saddle horse. That experience helped to shape the direction and approach for Valerie's future in training.
She has brought much of her experience and knowledge from the horse world, with her to the world of dog training. She has specialized in working with difficult, shy or fearful dogs over the years, and feels that helping dogs to overcome these issues, to live a more happy and balanced life is a truly rewarding experience.
Her training methodology is a balanced approach, which is centered around positive reinforcement and motivational methods. She believes that training should be fun for both dog and owner, and truly enjoys seeing the bond between dog and owner develop and grow. This bond is strengthened and cultivated by increasing the level of understanding and trust between dog and owner through clear communication and focused training strategies.