What is a Behavior Consultation?   Why do I need it?

Most of my clients are split into two distinct camps.  One needs training skills.  These tend to be people who have puppies, young rambunctious dogs or newly adopted dogs from rescues.  They may be running amuck and need training, but they do not have serious behavioral problems.

The other camp is people who have dogs with behavioral problems that are interfering with their daily lives.  These tend to be dogs with leash reactivity, various types of aggression issues toward other dogs and/or humans, separation anxiety, problems with veterinary or groomer handling and destructive or self-injurious behaviors.  And that is just a few.

These dogs require a careful, systematic combination of information gathering, management, training and behavior modification…in that order.  The cause of the problem behavior has to be identified first and then a plan can be made to change the behavior.  It is a bit like organized detective work.

This is where the consultation comes in.  I ask a lot of questions and observe the dog carefully to better understand why the behavior is occurring.  Once I have observed the dog and gathered the information I need, I can design a plan to change the behavior.  And work begins.

You will receive a written report of my observations, prognosis and recomendations for a behavior modification plan to change your dog’s behavior.  This step can be very helpful to dog owners because it outlines clearly what is causing the behavior.  It also recommends a systematic way forward to change it.  Depending on the complexity of the case, a document write-up can take me four to six hours of screen work to complete.