We sought out and found Kate to help us with our rescue dog that we adopted about a year ago. During our first year, we lucked out and experienced almost no behavior issues. But once he reached about the 2-year old mark, a few minor but concerning issues started cropping up with some regularity. After poking around Youtube videos for ideas, which were completely ineffective and in retrospect likely made some of the issues worse, we decided to seek professional help.
Given the nuanced nature of the issues (dog aggression, resource guarding, and humping – but only in very specific situations), I suspect Freddy presented a challenging assignment. Despite that, we are more than pleased with Kate’s help and the outcomes with our dog.
I attribute this success to a few key elements of Kate’s approach:
- The very thorough client in-take and background questionnaire
- The clearly written and described training handouts we received as homework
- The specific behavior modification examples of her pets and others that she described during our in-person session
- Her explanations of dog psychology and linking it to why certain approaches work and others don’t
- Her clear love of these animals and wanting both the animals and the humans to have an improved quality of life
Although our homework training required real commitment (in patience and time), we’ve seen an 80 to 90% improvement in Freddy’s problem areas, and a complete elimination of one problem behavior in particular. Freddy gives Kate 4 paws up!