Hey all from North Carolina,


Long time reader, first time poster <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I'd like to know about apprentacing to dog train as a part-time job / hobby. I am in the military and my work won't allow me to attend any of the recomended schools I've seen in other posts, but I do have experience with dogs. I have owned/ trained about 10 hunting dogs and one doberman over the course of my life, have some Leerburg videos, and read much of Ed's stuff, finding his outlook and my own are very alike. I love the high drive breeds but would like to work with all kinds of dogs. I see alot of experienced owners / breeders / trainers on here and wonder if anyone was ever in my position and knows what the next step is to becoming worth my salt as a dog-man?

Thanks in advance

TJ

 Quote:

Hey all from North Carolina,.....Long time reader, first time poster <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I'd like to know about apprentacing to dog train as a part-time job / hobby. I am in the military and my work won't allow me to attend any of the recomended schools I've seen in other posts, but I do have experience with dogs.......

Here's a reply from me last month to another board member who is also in the military and had the same question. <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

QUOTE:
There are other ways to get in the door of general obedience training (although the apprentice/intern way is a good one).

One way is to volunteer at a shelter and gradually demonstrate so much training know-how with the non-aggressive animals that the shelter starts to trust you with "staff only" dogs. (At many shelters, volunteers aren't allowed to handle dogs who have been deemed agressive.)

Even if that doesn't happen, the adopting humans have been known to admire the effect a volunteer has on the dogs and to ask the volunteer about paid training.

The same thing has been known to happen with people who help out in grooming businesses, kennels that take pets while the owners travel, vets who hire kennel attandants........

And maybe best of all is helping one person with one dog so well that word spreads.

If I were you, and if I were pretty sure I wanted this line of work, I would get some cards printed up. You can do that yourself with any word processing program and the blanks with the smooth-edged divisions. Better to spend the $8 than to wish you had.

You never know when you will be asked for your telephone number, and looking for a pencil and the back of an envelope is so much less cool! JMO! END

TJZaremba
As per the stated rules of the forum, you post under your real first and last name.
Please go into your "My home" area and correct this before posting further.

Thanks,
Will Rambeau
Moderator

Thank you Connie, I think I'll give that a try. I suppose going to one of those correspondance schools that I've seen online makes you more marketable to a chain petstore or something equally as useless. I talked to a woman on the phone from the "ABC dog training school" and almost laughed in her ear when she told me how PetCo hires almost all of their graduates. Have you ever seen those people work...ug
I knew that wasnt the right way... maybe this is! <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Thanks

TJ

It depends what venue you want to become reputable in.

If it is sport you need to get a dog and take it 'all the way' yourself.. or work as a helper/decoy and take several dogs in your club 'all the way'. You need to be seen out there on the curcuit.

If it is OB, same think, title and be seen out there in the venue of your choice.

Join a club, get as much exposure to working as many different dogs as possible.

I think volunteering at a shelter is a good idea - for another reason too - you can use the dogs as "guinea pigs" - take them out and train them! Practise your skills on them, try new things, find out what works with some dogs and not with others. You will have lots of breeds, ages, temeperaments, good dogs and not so good dogs - dogs with drive and dogs with low drive. Fat dogs and athletic dogs, small and big - anyway you can train them all. The benefit to you is experience training lots of different dogs, the benefit to the dogs is one-on-one attention, exercise, and training that can only benefit the dog, and help it get adopted.

molly

Thanks all!!!

I have been working, but will try the shelter this weekend. I am really excited for lots of obvious reasons. also, this is a test... I tried to change my name to fit the forum rules and I want to see if it was successful. I hope no Admins will poop on me if it wasn't. <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

again, thanks!

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......f it is sport you need to get a dog and take it 'all the way' yourself.. or work as a helper/decoy and take several dogs in your club 'all the way'. You need to be seen out there on the curcuit. .....If it is OB, same think, title and be seen out there in the venue of your choice......

Yep, if you have a dog, or when you have a dog, your dog should be the best-trained dog imaginable. Your biggest asset is going to be the attention your own amazingly well-trained dog gets.

But even if you don't have a dog right this second, I'm big on shelter work. Or kennels, groomers, etc............. but a shelter can be where the eyes of the public are on how adoptable a dog can become at the hands of shelter staff. (Just be prepared to do some scut-work for a while and show your good sense and reliability. <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />