PUPS’ philosophy and excellent reputation definitely began many years ago with the inception of our Basic Group Obedience Course. While PUPS has grown, gained more tools and expertise over the years, and now offers additional services, the Basic Group Obedience Course remains the cornerstone course. Specifically, our philosophy for our progressive 8-week Basic Obedience Course centers around three goals.
While our program is phenomenal for all breeds, we do specialize in high drive working breeds of all categories that are just rambunctious and in need of training as well as dogs with temperament issues of all types, including but not limited to separation anxiety, “stressy” dogs, hyper-reactive dogs, low confidence, all forms of aggression including dominance, social, dog aggression, fear aggression, etc. What the program does is build the dog’s confidence while teaching him/her to bring their adrenaline down and have self-control. The combination of confidence and self-control creates a thinking dog that is able to make more appropriate assessments around stimuli. It also creates a larger threshold of tolerance within the dog’s nervous system in general. The other key component of the program is that it respectfully and productively establishes a trusting relationship between the owner and dog so that the dog learns he/she can trust in the owner’s ability to be a capable leader in all situations. In other words, the dog will read off the owner instead of feeling the stress of having to make all the decisions not only for him/herself, but, for his/her owners as well. All of this combined, creates a more confident, thinking dog that can transition with greater ease and calmness from situation to situation and make more appropriate assessments while being attentive to his/her owner’s needs.