Ann Marie is a certified dog trainer with over twenty years’ experience working with dogs and their humans. She’s passionate about the science and art of dog training and behavior, and loves helping her canine and human learners shine. She believes training should be fun, simple, and most of all – pawsitive!
Training Philosophy
Ann Marie found it easy to embrace positive reinforcement-based training methods – they’re based on decades of scientific research! And as an animal lover, she was drawn to positive training because it improves dogs’ behavior without fear or pain.
Services
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Polite Paws
Get the fundamentals right with basic manners training
Your go-to solution to sharpen those training skills – for you and your dog! We provide personalized coaching in your home using positive and simple methods. Whether you’re settling a new puppy or living with an older dog in need of basic manners, we’ll help you reach your training goals.
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Harmony at Home
Resolve behavior issues for a calmer household
Get support for challenging behavior, including resource guarding, fearfulness, barking at visitors, and inter-dog conflicts. We’ll help you resolve these issues and return serenity to your home.
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Stress-Free Strolls
Turn your reactive dog into your dream walking companion
We want your daily dog walk to be the best part of your day. Many dogs struggle with reactivity, including barking and lunging at other dogs and people. Through private training and group classes, we’ll give you the skills you need to navigate walks with confidence.
Certifications
Ph.D., CPDT-KSA, PMCT4, FFCT
Specializations
nurturing puppies into well-mannered adult dogs, helping reactive dogs (and their long-suffering owners) enjoy being around other dogs, and training dogs to be great family pets.
Training Methods
positive reinforcement-based training methods
Customer Reviews
“Ann Marie was a great help with our corgi Cosmo. She helped us practice ways to control his food aggression as well as some of his other less appealing behaviors. She helped us to truly understand why Cosmo behaved the way he did. What seemed baffling and frustrating behavior on Cosmo’s part became an understandable (and treatable!) reaction to his world. Ann Marie knows and loves dogs – and their people too!”
“Owen is 75 pounds and begins to ‘play’ by knocking the girls over and when she gets excited…I [was] terrified that she might actually hurt one of us or act inappropriately toward a friend or stranger. I contacted Ann Marie. She is so understanding of life, people and dogs; and she has a gift of piecing it all together…Owen responded immediately to the training Ann Marie suggested and, with work, had remarkably improved behavior by the following week! Owen continues to make progress and we are so thankful for Ann Marie’s exquisite coaching which helps us incorporate Owen as a fun-loving member of our family.”
“My most recent foster dog has had a myriad of anxieties to overcome and offered me my biggest challenge. The worst of these was refusal and fear about getting into a car…I mentioned this at a board meeting and Ann Marie was mentioned. She was wonderful from the beginning…I have always used positive conditioning or training myself and this is what Ann Marie is all about. I just didn’t know that such an anxious dog requires baby steps. Just like the average person, I wanted to see results, immediately. So, Ann Marie had to train me as well as the dog. My foster passed the “acid test” when I asked him to load up for a trip to the vet. Then 3 of the office girls came out to watch and he readily loaded without the encouragement of a treat!”
“Ann Marie’s outstanding professionalism and kind assistance has thoroughly exceeded any expectations I had!!! She performed a comprehensive analysis of our dog Shelby’s strengths and areas for improvement, in a compassionate and kind manner. My family was provided excellent written guidelines for each behavior area we worked on together. Ann Marie demonstrated great insight and advice to help us curb undesired actions and replace them with attentive and engaging more appropriate ones. She was a delight to learn from every step of the way.”
“Edie’s aggressive behavior towards Lucy created such chaos and tension that we felt peace in our home was a pipe dream. Ann Marie taught us how to effectively use desensitization and counterconditioning, positive interrupt and other techniques to significantly reduce the aggressive behavior. We are enjoying peace in our home once again, and our dogs are less stressed by each other.”
“There has been a noticeable difference in Maggie’s demeanor since working with Ann Marie. She is calmer and more attentive to us instead of reacting to other dogs. Ann Marie is a great trainer and her methods work!!”
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