Fur and Feather Works, LLC

I emailed several dog behaviorists after my dog's destructive tendencies peaked following the birth of my baby. I loved my dog but with the added stress in the home I was feeling like I was going to have to give her up. What I appreciated first about F&F is that they responded by email as I requested, and the email was lengthy and personal. Bridget validated and sympathized with my frustration, gave a couple of quick diagnoses of the problem (that my dog may be bored or anxious), gave me a quote, and asked me to call to schedule and appointment if I'm interested-- no pressure. I liked her response best so I scheduled an appointment with Joanne, who came to my home, met both my dogs, and asked me in-depth questions about the situation to figure out the best solution. I really appreciated that Joanne really agreed with and complimented some of my past training of the dogs, loved on both of my dogs, and came up with solutions that were practical and affordable for me. She recommended hiring a dog walker for the days I did not have time to take them out, to buy some dog toy feeders and bully sticks to get the dogs something active to occupy their brains, and to temporarily restrict their access to areas they could destroy things, with them gradually earning back access to other rooms based on good behavior. I majored in Psychology at UNR so I could tell that her recommendations were based on solid operant and classical conditioning, which has good results with animals. The focus is on redirecting and rewarding alternate behaviors instead of punishing, which is also more effective as well as more humane. Joanne used an example of a case study to emphasize how dogs perceive cause and effect, which really helped me make sense of the way my dogs were viewing the situation. As far as results... It's only been a few weeks, and Joanne pointed out that habits years in the making can take at least months to undo. Unfortunately my dogs aren't really into the dog feeder puzzles, but the destructive behavior has decreased a lot. The only con to this service is that they charge a $25 travelling fee for certain zip codes. I live in central Sparks and their office is in South Reno and I doubt it costs $25 to travel the extra 10 minutes. However, the cost of the consultation was quite reasonable, and I really appreciated the low sales pressure. They did not urge me to schedule additional consultations, push me into attending dog training classes (other than the destructive behavior, my dogs are very obedient), or even pressure me to buy the dog feeder puzzles she had on hand, encouraging me to look at other options on Amazon. I'd definitely recommend this service to anyone with dogs with special issues outside of normal dog training.

Joanna is incredibly experienced and educated in training, she literally saved our family! Our yorkie was terrified of our son and once our son began to crawl she really freaked out and would bark nonstop and would even try to bite him when he approached her. My husband and I were devastated and overwhelmed by the situation, to say the least. I was referred to Fur and Feather Works by my vet and upon meeting Joanna I knew why my vet referred her. Joanna is knowledgeable, compassionate, understanding and immediately had a plan for us. After the first week we saw a difference in our yorkie and now 5 weeks later our yorkie actually likes our son! I never thought that would be possible, Joanna’s training FAR exceeded my expectations. I honestly thought with training we would work out a manageable plan to keep them pretty much separated with a few rare instances where they would be together. I never dreamed they would be living in harmony together. We no longer need to keep our yorkie separate from our son; she no longer barks at him or tries to bite him when he startles her. She actually prefers and enjoys to be around him because of the training method Joanna used.