Dog Nerd Training

31/08/2026

🐶 PUPPY CLASSES 🐶

Do you have a new puppy? Would you like THE BEST start for your new family member with five-star rated puppy classes run by a puppy training specialist?

Well, we have the service for you AND we are even offering an EXCLUSIVE back to school discount! 🤩

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] quoting code 'BACKTOSCHOOL' to get your discount.

We very much look forward to hearing from you 🥰

28/08/2026

Argh 😠 My dog is always barking/chewing/digging in the house!!

Lots of owners complain about dogs doing certain behaviours at home like barking, digging or chewing (and others). But these are all perfectly normal doggy behaviours.

These behaviours are not done out of being deliberately naughty, but are actually due to the dog being bored at home and not having their innate needs met. So many dogs are expected to deal with being home all day without any form of entertainment apart from a single walk, when we, in contrast, can barely go a minute without entertaining ourselves on our phones.

This resorts in what I call going 'self employed’. Because the dog doesn’t have a job or hobby given to them, they find one that is a normal behaviour for dogs, but their human doesn’t like. And, some of these behaviours may be more common in certain breeds, like a terrier digging.

So what can we do about it? 🤔

We can start with having empathy with for dogs. We can switch on the TV, go out, go on our phone, read a book etc. when we are bored, but our dogs rely on us for all forms of entertainment. So, understand they aren’t being naughty and they simply need us to offer them more appropriate stimulation.

What this more appropriate stimulation is will depend on your situation and your dog. For instance, if they are chewing, finding safe appropriate chews for them to have instead. If your dog is bred to do something specific, find an appropriate outlet for that behaviour you can get on board with, like a digging pit for your terrier so they don’t tear up the whole garden. You can also look at other activities you can do together outside the home such as agility, scentwork or trick training.

There may still sometimes be more to your dog’s behaviour, so it is always worth getting a qualified trainer in to ensure we aren’t missing anything more severe. However, there is never any harm in adding more interest and appropriate outlets into your dogs day as a starting point! And you never know, it may solve the issue entirely! 🤩

26/08/2026

Always a pleasure to see this happy chap! We started working on some heelwork on paths this past week - a big step for him. 🌤️🐾

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

24/08/2026

It was so lovely to see this review on our Google reviews page! 🥰

So many times owners want to do the right thing and have somehow ended up with a dog that challenges them even though they are trying their best, I am always honored to be chosen as someone to help them get towards where they wanted to be with training. As training only goes as well as the practise and time put in by the owner between sessions, so these owners who want to do what’s right and put the time in are wonderful to work with as we find solutions to any struggles together. 💕

21/08/2026

In the age of the internet, we are lucky to have so much information available to us right at our fingertips, and this means that a lot of people choose to forgo in-person training when they feel that they can get the same content from a quick google search. There is no point, they think, in spending the money when they can just figure it out for themselves! 🤷‍♀️

To an extent this is true, you can teach 'sit', 'down' and 'stay' at home if you like, but puppy classes are SO MUCH MORE than that.

🐶 A good puppy class should give you a huge variety of useful information, not just basic training - we cover basic first-aid, nutrition, and confidence-building in our classes (to name but a few).

🐶 The trainer will know you and your puppies as individuals and give ongoing personal support - something that no online video, or google search, can do.

🐶 They will know a wide variety of tricks of the trade from working with so many different dogs on a daily basis. These can be revelations to new, and old dog owners alike.

🐶 The class gives you the opportunity to meet other local puppy owners at the same stage as you, and make friends and a support group for both you and your puppy, for life.

🐶 You can practice behaviours your dog may already know in a distracting but controlled environment - something which is key for 'proofing' cues, whether learned in class or at home.

The fact is good, scientifically endorsed puppy classes have been scientifically proven to have a positive effect on the development of your puppy, something that is not worth missing out on!

You can check out the study mentioned in the graphic for yourself here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/248578004_Training_engagement_and_the_development_of_behavior_problems_in_the_dog_A_longitudinal_study?fbclid=IwY2xjawTupGxwZG9mBWV4dG4DYWVtAjEwAGJyaWQRMDRpeEdMUnlCSGc3M3dNejBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeCphgazOXoVMHZGM6gBNh8nj34eUEpc_d_UpMRZHHqLeL5Zb-o2IM-MvwJUM_aem_LMhM7CU5YgjcNa_clg1yww

19/08/2026

1-2-1 cuties from this past week! We worked on harness sensitivity and being touched, as well as calmness and decompression to set up for future training success. And I’m glad it’s a bit cooler now for training. 🐶 🌦️

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

17/08/2026

🌟 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 🥰

Contact us for more details about our 1-2-1 dog training, and dog and puppy training class availability in West Sussex.

14/08/2026

What is reward placement and why is it important? 🤔 🧀

One of the ways we can help tweak training to be more effective is to think about reward placement or position. So when training for a certain behaviour where is it we are looking to build value, as that is where we will want the reward to be. If our placement is off, we may not actually be rewarding what we wanted to!

For example, if you are working on heelwork but your dog is a jumper, and has a tendency to jump upwards to get the treat in your hand rather than walking nicely next to you, you can change the reward placement from being given directly from your hand to instead to being dropped on the floor by the dog. This means the value is now lower down on the floor, so instead of jumping up to get the reward we will be focused downwards to get the next one.

Similarly, if you have a dog that is very downwards focused on walks you may want to encourage more upwards focus. So teaching them to catch treats and associating looking up with where the value will be may be better choice!

Another tip for heelwork positioning specifically is to try and reward from the hand that is on the same side as your dog so they stay in that position. If we lean across our body to reward them, our dog will start to walk further and further across us in order to get closer to where the value of the reward is (the other hand).

Some other examples of reward placement would be…

🐾 Putting food on the mat rather than giving it directly to the dog for boundary or place training. So the value is in the mat not you.

🐾 Throwing food away from yourself or visitors if your dog has a tendency to jump up at people on arrival home. So they learn to stay further away in order to get the rewards.

🐾 If a dog gets excited when visitors come over, have the owners reward the dog for being calm when someone new comes over, rather than the new person themselves, so there is less value in the visitor making them less exciting.

🐾 If teaching your dog to drop an item in a specific place, such as over a basket, reward above the basket in the position they need to be when they drop the item. This means they will make sure their head is in that position when they drop the item, rather than turning towards you to drop and missing the basket.

What are some ways you have used reward positioning to improve your training?

12/08/2026

A couple of 1-2-1 sessions from this past week! We worked on recall, heelwork, desensitisation to grooming, hu***ng and more. 😲

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

10/08/2026

It was lovely to receive such a positive review here on Facebook 🥰

I am so happy to hear what clients get out of classes with us, and I will always try and give further advice whenever any of my clients are struggling if they contact me about it - because at the end of the day we all want the same thing, for them to succeed in their training!