Dog Happiness and Enrichment Workshop

Enrichment is an activity that taps into a  dogs natural instincts and behaviours creating mental stimulation and sparking their interests.

When we think of having a tired dog we can look straight to a long walk to long game of fetch to burn off some of that energy but dogs like humans can be tired from mental work such as learning. Studies have shown that on average about 20 mins of mental enrichment is equally as effective as an energy outlet as 60 mins of walking.

Why do dogs need Enrichment?

 Dog enrichment reduces unwanted behaviours caused by boredom and can build their confidence by learning and problem solving. 

• How we can use enrichment to help reduce unwanted behaviours in our dogs
• What our dogs get mentally out of interacting with enriching activities
• Discover a variety of ways we can stimulate our dogs’ brains to meet their welfare and happiness needs

How will we do this?

The exercises in this dog training workshop are designed for dog happiness and enrichment…

• Mental vs Physical
• Enriching Playtime
• Boredom Busters

How do we train?

We are a reward based training team. This means we will never ask you to use fear, pain or any type of aversive to control your dog’s behaviour. We focus on making the behaviours we want more appealing than the ones we want less of, and in so we more of what we want and less of what we don’t.

Why do we train in this way?

By focusing on rewarding and not punishing, we help build our dogs confidence and strengthen our relationship with them in the process.

Marking and rewarding is a feedback system that we use to communicate with our dogs when working with positive reinforcement. A marker is simply a cue (normally audio) that lets our dogs know the exact moment they did something that then leads to a reward.

Timing is key. Mark the exact moment your dog performs the behaviour you want and then reward after to make things as clear as possible.

We generally use food as our primary means of rewarding. High value treats work best, which can be different for each dog.