Hey all, first thank you for the support and motivation to keep going over the past few months ❤️
My name is Néidín and I already have an established pet services business (mainly dog walking) called for over two years now. Reactiv8 is a dream I’ve had for a very long time and have gained extensive knowledge of reactivity in dogs. This started 6 years ago when when I adopted my first eve
r reactive dog, Ryuu 🐶
Ryuu is a husky/beagle cross (pictured below) if you have any knowledge of either breeds then you will know both have very poor recall and high prey drive! I myself was not so knowledgeable 😬 Ryuu was ‘friendly’ but when he got a scent he was gone and there was times we searched hours for him. One good thing was he always found his way back 😂 it was because of this we then began to keep him on lead, naturally, however we lacked consistent training and he then became frustrated wanting to greet each dog. He had no dog manners and if he was off lead he would run full sprint at dogs then howl/bay, bouncing in the air profusely for them to play. As you can imagine this was overwhelming for a lot of dogs and resulted in a few incidents where he was snapped at or attacked (completely our fault!). Ryuu became slightly fearful and his frustration on lead grew. We then completely took him away from anywhere public including the streets and found places where we would meet no dogs or people. Instead of taking up more training with Ryuu and putting in some time to help him relax around other dogs whilst also working on recall. This also had a knock on effect on my other dog 😞
Then I stumbled across positive/reward based training, from there I just researched, read and grew my knowledge. I desperately wanted to help my boy and enjoy our walks, at this point it was just so much effort! Ryuu wasn’t an easy nut to crack 😂😬 and he definitely put me through my paces. He wasn’t food or toy motivated and he was so focused on his own anxieties that he was incapable of listening to direction. I wanted to build our relationship to understand his behaviour and learn how to communicate with him in a way that he would understand. Since then I’ve completed a dog training course with Robin Bates and Sandra Gilliland along with a dog handling course with dogs in rescue. From this I have been doing a lot of one on one training with reactive dogs. Ryuu attended Al Rankins Rowdy to Relaxed course, which not only helped him build confidence but gave me more knowledge and experience with reactivity. For years I have climbed over and under fences, through bushes and holes etc to find space where my dogs can run free, unfortunately these places don’t stay so hidden for long. This was my dream to have a space in my own community that not only gives a relaxed worry free environment for some off lead time but to build a network of support as it can be lonely being a reactive dog owner. Finally our own magic place 🙌🏻🐾🐶
If you have any questions please message the page and I will be more than happy to answer them. Again a massive thank you to everyone who support this project and spurred us on ❤️🐾🐶
