Academies

Academies!!! And – Fires in California

 in Academies / Animal Training / clicker training / dog trainer / Dog Training Workshop / Pat's Blog / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training / Scholarship by

CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES It is with a very heavy heart that I watch the news reports of multiple out-of-control wildfires in California. You can see all the fires here: https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/california-fire-map/ I worked at the Marin Humane Society for 20 years (Marin County is just north of San Francisco, on the other end of the Golden Gate Bridge), lived in Sonoma County (where several of the fires are), moved to Monterey/Santa Cruz in 1996 (another wildfire hotspot) where I was on the Board of the Santa Cruz SPCA, and Paul and I purchased 160 wilderness acres outside of Red Bluff in Tehama County (yet […]

Academy Time, Pig Pumpkins and Imitation

 in Academies / Animal Training / clicker training / dog trainer / Dog Training Workshop / Life on the Farm / Pat's Blog / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training by

ACADEMY TIME! We are just one week away from our first Trainer Academy of the year – and I’m so looking forward to it! We had to postpone 3 months worth of academies due to coronavirus, and now we’ve crammed them all into the rest of the year, so it’s going to be a busy next-five months!! It’s a bit humbling to realize we are now in our 18th Academy year and I have had the incredible good fortune to personally meet, interact, teach, become friends with and hopefully influence some 500 academy student trainers over these 18 years. Thank […]

Hidden Talents – Tracking Turtles with Josie

 in Academies / Animal Training / dog trainer / Dog training classes / Life on the Farm / Pat's Blog / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training / Uncategorized by

It’s been an interesting week at Peaceable Paws… but then, aren’t they all? We continue to work through the challenges of starting up our classes outdoors – electrician is coming on Tuesday to give us some quotes on providing lighting – to see if we can do classes after dark – and we’ve ordered an Amish 8×10 wooden storage shed for some of our equipment, so we don’t have to keep lugging everything back inside after class. Wonderful husband Paul is leveling a spot for it near the training yard with the tractor, and with cream-colored siding and green roof […]

Coyote Capers and Re-Opening at Peaceable Paws

 in Academies / Animal Training / clicker training / dog trainer / Dog training classes / Life on the Farm / Pat's Blog / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training by

WILDLIFE ADVENTURES Well, it’s certainly been an interesting week here on the Peaceable Paws farm. We had previously seen a coyote at the far edge of one of our fields, at least a quarter mile from the house, and Paul had found the remains of a raccoon in that same field. This week we saw her out our back bedroom window frisking along a fence in the horse pasture at 7:30 one morning (about 200 feet from the house) and she has left the remains  of  two more raccoons and parts of 4 very young fawns in the driveway down […]

Of Protests, Riots… Peonies and Peace

 in Academies / Animal Training / clicker training / Dog Behavior Modification / dog trainer / Dog training classes / Dog Training Workshop / Life on the Farm / Pat's Blog / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training by

Incredulous, aghast, heartbroken, dumbfounded… first coronavirus, now this. Watching the protests and riots on television takes me back to the 60’s when, as a child, I watched our cities burning. Have we truly come this far… only to have gone nowhere? Maybe not quite. My heart warmed to the photo of the row of white women standing shoulder-to-shoulder, shielding black protesters from the police. And the photo of police officers taking a knee in solidarity with peaceful protesters. We will get through this, too, and hopefully come out better and stronger on the other side. I know that as a […]

A Careful Re-Opening – and… SPRING!!

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First – and most important – all of us at Peaceable Paws hope all of you and all of yours are staying safe, sane and well. I feel like we are living in a bad science fiction movie, just waiting for the credits to roll so we can get up and leave. Every day I am struck by how much this has changed – and will continue to change – life as we know it. I am cautiously excited though… with Maryland’s Governor Hogan starting the reopening process last week in our state we are in the in the midst […]

Giving Back 4

 in Academies / Animal Shelters / Animal Training / clicker training / dog trainer / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training / Scholarship / Uncategorized  tagged clicker training / dog / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Humane Society of Washington County / Level 1 Training Academy / Marin humane Society / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training / Scholarship / shelter by

An admirable quality of our species is that those who have more are often willing to give back to those who have less.  For many years, much of my own giving has been focused on the animal sheltering world, with an occasional book donation to some other dog-related cause. I decided it’s time to extend that give to the dog training world through an offer of scholarships to our Peaceable Paws Level One (Basic Dog Behavior and Training) Dog Trainer Academies. There are presently three scholarships available, one for each 2011 date, for our Maryland location only. Academy dates are: […]

Contest Winner Announcement(!) and Level 1 Academy 3

 in Academies / clicker training / contest / dog trainer / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training / Travels with PPaws  tagged clicker training / contest / dog / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Humane Society of Washington County / Level 1 Training Academy / Marin humane Society / motorcycle / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training / shelter by

Exhausted after completing our last Level 1 Academy for the year… so why am I up at 5am on a Sunday morning? Well, clocks turned back at 2am this morning, so it’s really 6am and my internal clock just doesn’t get the message that fast. And besides, there are horses and dogs to feed, a dog-hike on the schedule, and blogs and articles to write. Not to mention laundry to do. Might as well get up instead of lying in bed trying to convince myself to sleep in another hour… Had a great week with a terrific group of dog […]

Long Overdue: Giving Thanks to PPaws Interns 4

 in Academies / Animal Training / Dog Behavior Modification / dog trainer / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training  tagged clicker training / dog / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Dog Training Workshop / Level 3 Academy / Marin humane Society / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training / shaping by

It’s been so long since I’ve blogged I’m almost embarrassed to start up again. I have friends e-mailing me asking if I’m still alive – and Jim Croce’s song lyric, “You never seem to have enough time to do the things you want to do once you find them…” is making endless loops in my brain. So… my apologies for the long absence. So here it is, almost November already. Where does the time go? It’s been a very busy couple of months. For some reason this fall seemed more jammed than usual – perhaps because of the addition of […]

Behavior Modification Academy 8-10 4

 in Academies / Animal Training / Dog Behavior Modification / dog trainer / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training / Uncategorized  tagged Behavior Assessment / dog / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Humane Society of Washington County / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training by

Confession time… I’m waaaaaay behind in getting a blog done, and now I have a dilemma – there have been so many things happen that I’ve wanted to blog about, like the Humane Society of Washington County donation jar getting stolen from the table at Martinsburg Bike Night, and the subsequent exciting chase, capture of one suspect, and ultimate recovery of the jar with over $250 in it. (It was the father of the two juveniles who actually went out and found the jar!). Or my observations from the Humane Society vaccination clinic and flea-less market that drew a long […]

Instructors Course 8-2010 12

 in Academies / Animal Shelters / Animal Training / dog trainer / Dog training classes / Peaceable Paws / positive dog training  tagged Bark / clicker training / contest / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Dog training classes / Humane Society of Washington County / Level 1 Training Academy / Level 2 Instructor Academy / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training / shelter by

Yesterday was the closing day of yet another Peaceable Paws Academy – this one our Level 2 Instructors Course. We tend to not get as much interest in this one as our Level 2 Behavior Modification (BMod is sexier), but it’s an excellent opportunity for trainers to hone their teaching skills – teaching humans is a very different skill set from training dogs. The students take turns teaching our Peaceable Paws Basic Good Manners exercises to each other, and as we do in our Level 1 Academy, students are working with shelter dogs. This week’s group consisted of: Bob Ryder, […]

CONTEST: Where in the World is Pat Miller? 5

 in Academies / Animal Training / contest / dog trainer / Dog training classes / Dog Training Workshop / positive dog training / Travels with PPaws  tagged contest / dog / dog trainer / Dog Trainer Academy / dog training / Dog Training Workshop / Pat Miller / Peaceable Paws / positive training by

Are you ready for a contest???? Description: below are 15 photographs taken during Pat Miller’s travels over the last several years to seminars, workshops, and on the back of the Harley. Your job is to correctly identify the locations of as many of them as possible. Identification must include city, state (if US), country, and a brief description as to what the photo represents or where in the city it is located. The contest will run for 3 months. If more than one person correctly identifies all 15 photos, the one with the most accurate descriptions wins. If there is […]