Rivapetz Puppy Preschool

The aim of Puppy School is to help both you and your pet achieve:

• socialisation skills with other puppies and people
• an ability to deal with loud and unexpected noises
• basic obedience skills using the commands - sit, drop and stay

You will also have the opportunity to learn how to look after your puppy in the best possible way by being made aware of grooming and skin care, nutritional requirements, dental care and hygiene, parasite prevention and vaccinations.

The classes are held on Thursday evening from 6.00 - 7.00pm at RivaPetz Pet Care, 8 Gilbert St, Berri.

To book yourself and your new puppy in for an awesome experience contact Paula Wachtel at RivaPetz Pet Care on 088582 1344.

Why should I have my puppy trained?

Training and soclialization is one of the most important things that you can do for a new puppy when it joins your family. Sound training and great social skills are as important as vaccinations and parasite prevention for the health and wellbeing of your new puppy.

The society we live in is very much aware of good and bad manners, and what is considered acceptable behaviour from our canine companions. Puppies behaviour is imprinted from birth and they are most receptive to training between the ages of 6-16 weeks.

They will certainly still be capable of being trained after this period, but lessons that they learn when they are young will stay with them for life. Unfortunately this applies to both positive and negative experiences, so it is critical to teach new puppies appropriate behaviour at a time when they will remember these lessons for life.

One of the most important experiences we can provide for new puppies is involving them in Puppy School classes - these have been running in veterinary clinics across Australia for at least 10 years and have been proven to have a signifcant impact on the long term socialisation skills and manners of the puppies that participate.

While it is possible to train puppies to sit, stand and drop in isolation, this is only a small part of what we consider to be basic 'training' that a puppy requires. Of greater importance is learning how to play and communicate with other dogs and people.

We also now offer 'pet dog training' using positive reward based training methods. Classes are based on 'clicker training', a method in which the dog quickly learns to offer new behaviours in order to gain rewards. These classes are ideal for young adult dogs (teenagers) and also those that are older but still silly.