Bay Area K9 Association

Trusting hundreds of positive reviews, we chose this place to train our little 8 month old puppy, that we had just rescued. She had typical puppy issue:- a) Leash pulling b) Wanting to play with another dog and hence barking c) Very little concentration and hence tough to retain attention d) Refused to sleep in the crate Although these were the problems, she truly is a friendly puppy and extremely food motivated. Wanting to help her remain calm, we signed up for the board and train program for an expensive price tag of $2000. This was a three week program with Sherri, who agreed to take the dog to her home along with 2 other dogs for training. We were promised and assured that upon completion we would see a dog that is well behaved, knows the basic commands and is confident with other dogs. Once the board & train did start, we were told to expect an update twice a week but received an update only once a week, that said she was doing very well and is being very calm. Hearing this we were really happy to think we will bring home a much more confident and happy puppy. Due to some health issues, we did have to schedule a vet appointment in the middle of the board and train, where we saw our puppy have a PRONG COLLAR on her. We had explicitly mentioned our discomfort with the use of that. Nonetheless, we trusted her theory that it is a must and it does not hurt the dog (this was 2 weeks into the training) and that it would be off for the last week of training. 3 weeks done, we pick up our dog who was still pulling on the leash, barked at other dogs, knew few command (with treat in hand):- Sit - 50%, Down - 30%, Focus - 10%. While signing up although we were promised an hour long session with another dog to witness the reduced leash reactivity, none of that was delivered. We are really disappointed with this Board and Train program offered and sincerely don't recommend it. We have a voice and we should speak up for our pooch against the use of hurtful training methods. Since the use of prong collar, our dog has been coughing every time she drinks water. Please DON'T sign up for the BOARD AND TRAIN program here and save your money. We can't do much else than write a review that hopefully saves others from making the same mistakes we did. NOTE: We have had multiple conversation regarding these with Bay Area K9 where we were said that we cannot expect a dog with Ph.d. We were also threatened to remove our review from Yelp if we wanted to pursue follow up 1:1 session with Steve.

This training has been great for our dog! There is a mix of one-on-one training where YOU are really taught how to train your dog and group training where your dog really learns self control even with distractions. The training is 98% positive, but we went with some other positive only training before this and all we did is train our dog to decide (a) to do what we requested and get a treat, or (b) to do what he wanted if that seemed more appealing than the treat. There were no consequences- that worked fine for our last dog who was not strong willed and ALWAYS wanted the treat. But all we did is teach this pup that if he decided to listen, he got a treat - and that's not obedience. Anyway, everything is clicking for him and the trainers are super patient and read each dog to tell which dog is insecure and needs more positive training and which one is a butthead and needs some mild consequences (like ours). I think this training is great for anyone who wants to be able to bring their dog everywhere (work, friends' houses, dog parks, shopping) with them and not worry the dog will misbehave or be asked not to return.

Went to petco for training and all my dog was learning were tricks, Which is great but I needed more for him. I found this company and when I called Steve he was more than willing to help me out and taking my boy there made a huge difference. the private classes and the group classes were great too, My dog used to be aggressive towards people and other dogs but now it's like he is a completely different dog, I can take him places without having to worry. We've been going for 3 years and it's a great way to keep your dog busy and creating an amazing bond between you and your dog and the others that go as well as the trainers. Highly recommend coming here for training, awesome people!