Stotfold Puppy & Dog Training Club

08/12/2025

Many congratulations to these gorgeous puppies, who completed their foundation course this evening.
They all show so much potential and looking forward to continuing with them in 2026 !!

08/12/2025

Post from Irwin Dog Training

Just a reminder! No one gets into this career field to be millionaires.
But we do all need to make a living.
When you're paying your dog trainer for their time, you're really paying for the countless hours, years (often times decades) of work spent into developing a person who's individual skills and areas of expertise are tailored to fit your individual dog just right.
For many trainers the education they receive, and continue to seek out to better their craft, is time consuming and resource consuming to come by.
So when looking around at trainers keep in mind what each trainer has gone through to achieve their goals and experience level.
And always seek out trainers who are continually working on improving and studying the science of dog training! (And it is a science!)

06/12/2025

If you have some free time tomorrow, pop along to the Roecroft centre where you can purchase some amazing artwork and crafts for Christmas presents.
I popped over today and got a few bits - support local artists !

06/12/2025

🎉 Exciting News! 🎉

2 spaces still available to book into the January evening puppy training courses starting on the 19 th January, (suitable for puppies under 18 weeks at that date).

And as an Easy Peasy Puppy Squeezy Qualified Instructor, I specialise with puppies !!

I completed this course as part of my ongoing CPD to meet my annual requirements to keep my IMDT accreditations -and I’m thrilled with how much it has added to my puppy-training toolkit.

🐾 What this means for you & your puppy:
✔ More up-to-date, science-based training
✔ Stronger support for common puppy challenges
✔ Better socialisation guidance
✔ Clear, step-by-step methods that make learning fun
✔ Training that’s kind, confidence-building, and truly Easy Peasy

I can’t wait to bring all of these new skills into my sessions and help puppies (and their humans!) get off to the very best start.

If you’re welcoming a new puppy soon, I’m here to help.
Contact [email protected] with your pups details and a contact phone number if you’d like to join us.

06/12/2025

Sounds familiar 🤣

02/12/2025

It’s so lovely to receive feedback like this today- thank you for your kind words ….

Rob myself and Teddy would like to thank you so much for your brilliant puppy classes !

Teddy started off as a nervous little puppy, worried about going through the "big doors" and into the "big hall"!
Fast forward to now, where he has quickly transformed into a confident little puppy, so excited about going through the big doors and into the big hall !!

We understand and appreciate your teaching, which has helped us be aware of 'puppy' psychology, around what to do and what not to do !

Teddy is so good at home. He's no trouble at all and readily follows our instructions when we practice various command's.

On walks he greets people very nicely, he doesn't jump up, he just sits and waggs his tail. He is still obsessed with collecting leaves, especially the big ones! However, just recently when we say leave it, he looks and carries on sniffing and ignores the leaves! So we have progress there!

Wishing you a festive Christmas and Happy New Year and continued success with your puppy classes.xx

02/12/2025

Besties in their foundation puppy course - such good posers too!!

02/12/2025

Will he grow into those ears ?!

First class yesterday for 12 week old Kal,
whose mum enquired about joining us for training as soon as they got him home.

People often ask’ when’s the best time to get in touch for booking puppy training classes?’

Sooner rather than later is my reply as although occasionally we have a space available when you enquire and your puppy is 12 weeks old already, but this is not always the case as the classes are popular and get booked up quickly !

29/11/2025

The spaniels we’re having an important ‘board meeting’ in their training session this evening.
Gotta love these special trio ❤️🐾🙌

25/11/2025

Something we discussed yesterday with the puppies - from Dogs Disclosed

SECONDS COUNT
This post is not advocating that dogs meet every other dog, but rather about how to go about it in a safer way, if and when it does happen.

The 3 second rule for dogs meeting each other is used as a guideline to help foster positive introductions, prevent either dog from feeling overwhelmed or trapped and prevent any potential reactivity and stress.

A short 3 second introduction is enough time to provide important information to both dogs.

Enough time and information for dogs to decide – “are you a threat?”, “do I like you?”, “do I want to learn more about you?”, “do I really dislike you?”, “do I want you to go away?” etc. Both dogs may not feel the same way – one may not be happy to engage while the other may want to.

All interactions should ideally happen like this, not just initially. Just like us, dogs can have off days – things like pain, trigger stacking, lack of sleep or a host of other reasons can influence a dog’s emotional state and whether a dog wants to interact or not.

There are countless times I have witnessed meetings or introductions between dogs that have gone on just a few seconds too long and have not ended well.

This can have long lasting effects on future behaviour when meeting other dogs.

Understanding body language is critically important. If we are going to share our lives with another species, protect them, advocate for them and help them feel safe, then we need to understand and respect their language.

The examples in this post of red and green flags are just a few general ones to look out for – there are many more and these will differ depending on the individual dog, context and circumstances.

Here are some resources that provide more detailed information about body language –

The Veterinary Behaviour Centre
https://bit.ly/4hwC8k1

On Talking Terms With Dogs - Calming Signals, 2nd Edition by Turid Rugaas
https://bit.ly/4oftWqW

Make sure those first 3 seconds count – they can make all the difference.

25/11/2025

‘What do you mean, our follow on course has finished ?’

Don’t worry Oakley, you and your classmates can come back to join us in January when we start your intermediate puppy training course.