Stokes School For Dog Training

Stokes School For Dog Training Focused on building a stronger industry by helping create and/or coach quality dog trainers.

Hops earned his BT on Sunday at the American Schutzhund Roundup. From 1 year ago not knowing if we’d ever get on the tri...
05/07/2026

Hops earned his BT on Sunday at the American Schutzhund Roundup. From 1 year ago not knowing if we’d ever get on the trial field together or if he’d even walk normal again, to this moment we shared together on the field, was quite the emotional ride. Proud of this guy for overcoming such a thing and so thankful for all the help and support from so many people all over the country that made sure he got the care he needed. We could not have done it alone. Thankful for our club mates at and all the people that were around for the past two years. Time to prepare for the 1 now.

04/27/2026

FOUNDATION FOUNDATION FOUNDATION

Hops and I have recently been struggling a little bit with his heel position. As we prepared for and tried for our BT earlier this month, he began forging and getting vocal as well. I couldn’t put my finger on why things had just changed so much after making no adjustments to our training that I thought would have created these problems.

Having a short trip away from the home field yesterday allowed me to take a step back and look closer at my work. The majority of our foundation was all done with food. Even when I brought the toy in, it was given after a food reward was given. Then….suddenly it switched to primarily toy and sometimes no food at all. One reward, one delivery, one location.

I decided to try some foundational work of our no contact lure. Boom….straight, quiet, the movement I knew he was capable of. Fading fist target, boom…the stuff I like and wanted back.

So much of our foundation was built on not just the reward itself, but the delivery and location as well. Thinking ahead, I’ll need to create a better bridge to using toy as primary if I plan to do so. Dogs will always show us the gaps in our training. Let’s hope we can keep this into his BT this weekend.

04/27/2026

Phoenix joined me last week for an extended board and train program. I took the first several days fairly easy to just let her adjust to spending time with me and getting into a flow of our day to day. We are on a short road trip and I decided to start taking a harder look at some food luring. This is a pretty large staple in a lot of the work I like to do, so I wanted to get a feel and start developing a rhythm together.

We quickly I recognized that she was not staying super connected or committed to a lure so I took a step back to work on some basic hand feeding. This is a foundational step to help build a stronger association to a luring hand and to get connected on how we are going to be doing that together. I really want her driving into my hand so I can then create more movement to help with future exercises. I’m mostly “marking” her EFFORT to push into my hand. She makes a good bit of progress in this session so we end the lure work and jump into a toy play session.

She had struggled in the past with food motivation so I use the toy to help build the session value up. Fancy term is Premack Principle. Looking forward to seeing how these session progress.

04/25/2026

Getting your hunting or searching behavior where you want it before just jumping into imprinting can really help you avoid problems down the line. I was not fully happy with where Reign’s hunting was at so I tried several things to get us in good shape to begin odor work. There’s no reason to rush into things if your foundation is not set how it needs to be.

04/24/2026

Had a little fun giving Beck a challenge with significantly dropping the odor threshold down for him. Half of a Q-tip with a tiny hole to vent out of a centrifuge pod. Usually these essential oil hides can be pretty stinky so we need to get the dog experiences like this so they can build confidence for future odor puzzles. Great work Beckster and Audrey.

03/31/2026

Beck working some simple hides at Lowe’s this morning. Working outdoors is a bit newer for Beck as the super long winter we had just wasn’t friendly to getting out. Looking forward to giving this team some greater challenges as we move ahead.

03/30/2026

My old girl Ari is imprinting on pyrodex for the upcoming AS trial. Here’s some of her first session. Two weeks out and I think we might have something here.

03/29/2026

Building our scaling wall for our upcoming trial in two weeks! This is the first trial that will be hosting. Come on out on Saturday April 11th to check out the amazing dogs and handlers that will be out on the field!

Reign is beginning a new journey in explosives detection! We began a foundation in detection a few years ago but it’s be...
03/28/2026

Reign is beginning a new journey in explosives detection! We began a foundation in detection a few years ago but it’s been shelved for quite some time. After some recent fun and reconnecting with a close friend of mine, it’s time to give her an opportunity to show me what she can do. Stay tuned for some upcoming training clips as we make our way.

02/03/2026

📣 Mark your calendars!
Vanishing Point WDC presents a 2-Day American Schutzhund Trial 🐾💪 on April 11–12.

Come watch working teams in action, showcasing precise obedience and powerful protection work under American Schutzhund rules.

🗓 Friday 8:00 AM – Saturday 5:00 PM

Judge: Tim Vaillancourt
Helper: Jay Slocum

🏅 All tests and titles offered:
BT / BTX
AS1 • AS2 • AS3
SO, OB & SW Certificates

Handlers, spectators, and working-dog enthusiasts — come out and support the sport 🔥

📝 Registration:
https://form.jotform.com/260219132324042

📩 Questions:
Tony Stokes
[email protected]

Address

1506 Centre Tpke
Orwigsburg, PA
17961

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Stokes School For Dog Training posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Business

Send a message to Stokes School For Dog Training:

Shortcuts

Share

Category