Dog Nerd Training

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Dog Nerd Training

Dog Nerd Training is a small West Sussex dog training business run by Emily Talmadge CTDI PDT.

At Dog Nerd Training we want to inspire our clients to truly learn about their dogs and how to help them succeed throughout their life, and we aim to be with them every step of the way. Our small business model allows for the 1-2-1 attention and ongoing assistance our clients need in order to succeed long term. Making our service a true partnership between the client and myself. I, Emily, am a ful

ly qualified dog trainer, puppy training specialist, and certified trick dog instructor (CTDI) with 5+ years of experience in the industry. I am also well known for my educational dog training graphics, which I use to proudly spread up-to-date training information across the web. When training I use science-based, force-free training methods alongside games-based training. I also focus on good habit-building for both dog and owner using worldwide recognised habit-building methods, this allows owners to keep motivated with their training so they can get long-term results they need. My focus and hope for my clients is that they will gain a true love of learning about their dogs and through their time with us they too will also begin to call themselves a 'Dog Nerd'.

15/08/2025

Enrichment, why should I do it? 🤔

It is well known the benefits of providing enrichment for captive animals in zoos, with some animals even dying when without appropriate natural stimulation. To quote the Smithsonian National Zoo and Conservation Biology Insititute 'Enrichment provides the positive stimulation necessary for the animal's mental and physical health. In many ways, enrichment is just as important for animal well-being as proper nutrition and medical care. '.

However, despite dogs essentially being similarly captive animals, it is often seen that the only natural needs they have to meet is to be fed and walked daily, and other natural doggie needs are left at the wayside, or seen as 'extra'. But studies have shown that enrichment is similarly helpful to our canine companions, with dogs having been provided with enrichment showing less unwanted behaviours, likely due to being able to engage in natural foraging behaviours, and a decrease in their overall stress levels. And who doesn't want their dog to exhibit less undesirable behaviours and to be less stressed?

But how else can enrichment benefit our and our dogs lives?

🐶 It helps dogs learn resilience and problem-solving. We all like to think our dogs are smart, but working with activity toys can help them get smarter! Giving appropriate leveled challenges can help them learn to get better and better at figuring out new tasks, which can then spill over into training and other areas of their lives.

🐶 It can boost their confidence - this is particularly helpful with nervous dogs, but can be excellent for puppies learning about the world for the first time too. Positive interactions with new items to engage with helps create a future positive bias to dealing with new things later on as well, as well as the natural confidence boost of finally figuring out a puzzle.

🐶 It keeps their brains active for longer, which although is good at all ages is particularly good for older dogs. We all know the phrase 'if you don't use it you lose it' and the same happens with our dog's brains. Keeping dogs mentally active can slow canine cognitive decline.

🐶 It provides light excercise, which is similarly great for older dogs, or younger puppies who can't walk far. Moving around activity toys to release food, or snuffling over larger areas can keep your dog's body moving, and help burn off extra energy.

So when thinking about providing enrichment for your dog, consider it an essential part of their day rather than an additional extra. There are plenty of FREE enrichment ideas online, that take minimum time and effort and your dog will certainly thank you for it. 😁

You can find the studies quoted in the graphic here:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37766708/

https://www.alexjvs.com/fulltext/31-1598460790-adt-1.pdf?1604911317

13/08/2025

Some 1-2-1 cuties I managed to see avoiding the start of the week hot weather! ☀️ 🐾

I am pretty much fully booked now until September 😲 but if you are interested in any 1-2-1 sessions do get in touch and we can see what we can do: [email protected]

11/08/2025

What a truly lovely review I received just yesterday on Facebook about our most recent puppy classes! I've had to cut it down a bit to fit on the graphic, but it really did make my day to receive such wonderful words. 🥰

10/08/2025

A huge congratulations to our Thursday class graduates! It has been amazing to see all your progress over the 6-weeks 👨🏾‍🎓 👩🏻‍🎓 👏🏻

We also had our Friday puppy classes where we started working on stay and went over correct on lead greetings.

If you are interested in any future classes you can email me at: [email protected]

08/08/2025

When it comes to behaviour, what is repeated (and rewarded) will be what becomes the habit; behaviours are built like muscles - the more they are rehearsed the stronger they become. This means when training a new behaviour, or habit, we need to make sure the old behaviour can't be practised and allowed to become stronger. This is called behaviour management. 💪

Trying to train a new behaviour without managing the old behaviour is like starting a race 10 laps behind your competitor - you are never going to catch up. Every time you reward the new behaviour, the old behaviour is still being rewarded at another time, and has a much larger reinforcement history, due to the constant repetition it has previously acquired. To actually make progress we need to stop our competitor running until we are the one who is several laps ahead!

This can be seen most clearly when we look at something like recall. To manage the behaviour of running off, we want to put our dog on a long-line (attached to the back of a harness), this means they can't rehearse and get rewarded for chasing the squirrel, bike, small child etc. The behaviour of 'running off' is already established as extremely rewarding for the dog. If it was a savings account it may have thousands of pounds of rewards in, whereas coming to us may only have a hundred or so. To actually be able to compete with the previous behaviour, we need to make sure no more rewards (or savings) are going into that account, and plenty is going into the new behaviour we want the dog to do, until they find it to be the most rehearsed and rewarding option and will choose it on their own. 💰💰💰

If you are ever having trouble changing your dog's behaviour, it could be they are still getting the opportunity to get rewarded for the old one. If you 'manage' that behaviour so they don't get rewarded for it, you will have a better changing in promoting the new behaviour as the better option!

06/08/2025

Mainly spaniels and poodles/crosses this week! It seems the spaniels really enjoyed my feet too bless them. 🐶💕

If you are interested in booking any future 1-2-1 sessions you can contact me at: [email protected]

03/08/2025

We were busy with our all-ages and puppy classes this week! 😁🐾

Our Thursday puppies had a go at off-lead puppy play and we covered what is appropriate in dog-dog play and when we should intervene. Our Friday puppies leveled up their recall, and started to work on leave and stay.

If you are interested in future classes you can contact me at: [email protected]

01/08/2025

My dog has separation anxiety, how should I treat it? 😬

People often believe that a dog suffering from separation anxiety is being deliberately disobedient and destructive to get back at owners for leaving the home. This breeds the idea that the dog is bad, and needs some kind of punishment in order to resolve their behaviour. However, this is very much not the case. Separation anxiety has been shown, (as quoted in the graphic) ‘The term separation distress may best describe the phenomenon, which incorporates signs consistent with anxiety, fear, and phobic behaviour’ (Sherman and Mills, 2008), to be physiologically similar in many ways to a human panic disorder and is far from a conscious choice the dog is making. This means every time a separation anxiety dog is left alone they are essentially having a panic attack. When framed like this instead of seeing the dog as behaving badly on purpose, we can hold some empathy for them as many of us personally know someone or have experienced a panic attack or similar disorder ourselves and know it is truly terrifying.

So what can we do? 🤔

When looking at treatment of human panic disorders, we can see that there are multiple options, including medication, but what has been shown to be the most effective and long-lasting treatment (when implemented correctly) is gradual exposure therapy/systematic desensitisation which, as quoted in the psychiatric times, 90% of human patients have been shown to still have a significant reduction in symptoms after 4 years from treatment. Therefore, we can take that knowledge into account when training our dogs, to give them the most effective, and long-lasting option also. In fact a study done by Rogerson (1997), found an even better success rate in dogs ‘A combination of systematic desensitization and counterconditioning for the treatment of fears and phobias of dogs was found to be successful for 100%’, and an additional study specifically into separation based phobias found ‘The frequency and severity of the problem behaviours were reduced' and that 'the problem behaviour almost completely eliminated’ (Butler et al. 2011). But it is so important that it is done correctly. With human subjects it is expected that this kind of therapy, in order to not accidently make the issue worse, would be done by a qualified medical practitioner, so with our dogs we will want to find someone who has a thorough understanding of how this technique needs to be implemented for separation distress. Although Butler et al.’s study did still find some success when owners worked on the method at home, a big reason separation anxiety training ‘fails’ is due to inconsistency, and rushing the steps needed to truly desensitise the dog to absences, which can occur when owners don’t have a thorough training plan or assistance. Working through separation anxiety can be a long road, but it can be made significantly more tolerable with the support of qualified specialist in the area to help you every step of the way.

If you feel you are in need of specialist help for separation anxiety, then I can thoroughly recommend Pippin Pets with Jo Sellers- Separation Anxiety Specialist who kindly collaborated with me to make this post/graphic. 😊

And, you can find the studies and articles mentioned in this post here:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168159110002923?fbclid=IwY2xjawL0aZVleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETBEWGhEOHBWenZ2TFhwRDRHAR72Vinw3uc8Sz3x2zp1MHRKbvI75ivRC41QVnjfPKgb_TxhxvEmxyyvcjSbbA_aem_6-bWWeWb4hUKeTwL8uXtcA

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S016815919601129X?fbclid=IwY2xjawL0aZVleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETBEWGhEOHBWenZ2TFhwRDRHAR72Vinw3uc8Sz3x2zp1MHRKbvI75ivRC41QVnjfPKgb_TxhxvEmxyyvcjSbbA_aem_6-bWWeWb4hUKeTwL8uXtcA

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0195561608001125?fbclid=IwY2xjawL0aZZleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETBEWGhEOHBWenZ2TFhwRDRHAR6DqKdy5V9weFwijXZrVJqrqvXObCrAdG6z7ks3buXu2tv-N74H8CB69lKNnw_aem_5IzCt6enSRBTBeIiOoN4Og

https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/exposure-therapy-anxiety-disorders?fbclid=IwY2xjawL0aZZleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETBEWGhEOHBWenZ2TFhwRDRHAR7k4iqIWeTDEWTYEndgBwdm09MICM6kHH_KSngQht3vct8e3zg4giDyJV8KDQ_aem_l2ov0UjbfUCtXej9U_fFww

30/07/2025

Look at all these adorable doggies I have seen this past week! I am so lucky 😍 ✨

If you are interested in booking any future 1-2-1 sessions you can contact me at: [email protected]

28/07/2025

🌟 PUPPY CLASSES 🌟

Do you have a new puppy, or plan on getting one soon? Would you like THE BEST start for your new family member? Well, we have the service for you!

Our next set of puppy classes are starting 6pm September 4th at Coolham Village Hall. These classes run for 6-weeks, giving ample time to cover all the vital skills your new friend will need.

So, why should you choose us?

✅ Our classes are run by a fully qualified puppy training specialist.
✅ We provide our clients with exclusive handouts even when they miss a training class.
✅ We offer lifetime online support for you and your new addition.
✅ We keep our groups small, so each client and their pup can get the individual attention needed.
✅ We have been rated 5-stars on Google and Facebook.

If you are interested in booking you can contact us via messenger, or email us at: [email protected]

We very much look forward to hearing from you 🥰

27/07/2025

Another fab week of classes, we are certainly glad it’s not as hot as it has been! 🐶 ✨

Our Thursday puppies worked on heel work and dog-dog greetings, our all- ages group started leveling up recall with fun proximity games and our Friday puppies went over checking vital signs and off lead following amongst other skills.

If you are interested in any of our future classes you can email me at: [email protected]

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+447890034391

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http://www.dognerdtraining.co.uk/

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