How We Train

Most people find me after the walk they stopped enjoying.

The one where you spend the whole time scanning ahead for other dogs. Where you have started going out at half six in the morning because it is quieter. Where you let them off once, six months ago, and have not risked it since.

You have watched the videos. You have bought the harness that was supposed to fix it. And on a good day it almost works, which is somehow worse, because it means you know the dog is capable of it and you cannot work out why it will not hold.

It holds when the training stops being a lesson and starts being the way you live with each other. That is a longer conversation than an hour on a Tuesday, and it is the only one worth having.

Every Day Is Training Day

Dogs do not learn in lessons. They learn in the two hundred small moments between them. The doorway they barge through. The lead you tightened without thinking. The bark that got your attention. That is where your dog is being trained, whether you meant it or not.

So, I do not just train your dog. I train you. By the time we are finished you are not dependent on me. You can read your dog, respond in the moment, and keep building long after the last session ends. That is the entire point.

Twenty-five years. Thousands of dogs. Three continents.

I have worked with dogs across Europe, the Middle East and the UK for more than twenty-five years. Family pets with everyday problems, through to operational search and rescue teams. Thousands of dogs, and very nearly every problem you can think of.

Why every dog is assessed first

Every dog new to The K9 Concept is assessed before joining a group class. Not to filter people out, but because the wrong dog in the wrong environment goes backwards, and undoing that takes months.

If your dog is not ready for a group I will tell you straight, and we will start one to one instead. You get a plan built for the dog in front of me, not the dog the class was designed for.

Where we train

I don’t train in a village hall or the corner of a public park, as this means you are learning recall in the one environment where you cannot safely test it.

Everything here is purpose built. Two fully enclosed outdoor fields behind six foot deer fencing, so the first time you drop the lead you are not gambling. A semi-outdoor training area with astroturf and a scent wall, floodlit, so February does not cancel your progress. One secure field floodlit too. And a wash-down station, because a dog that has properly enjoyed itself does not get back in the car clean.

It means we can build the behaviour somewhere safe, then take it somewhere real. 

How we can work together

• One-to-One Training. Individual coaching built around your dog, your goals and your actual life.

• Group Classes. Reliable skills built in a structured environment, around other dogs, where it counts.

• Pack Walks. Training taken out of the classroom and into the real world, distractions and all.

• Workshops. Focused skills with hands on coaching, learning from your own dog and from watching others.

Not sure where to start?

Most people are not. Fill in the information form and I will tell you honestly what your dog needs, even if that turns out to be nothing I sell.