"Vinney"

Vinney is a Labrador Retriever from Maple Ridge

Featured in 08,  2004

Vinney's Story:

This is Vinney, our free dog.

We were happy to add a 3 year old black lab to our dog loving family but it didn’t take long to realize that although Vinney had a great personality he was definitely a dog with a mind of his own .

Maybe our free dog wasn’t such a bargain after all.

We had acres for him to run on and run he did. If a door was opened even a bit he pushed his way out and was gone.

Calling him was useless, he only came home when he was good and ready to. We had all been late for work and school looking for him. Searching through the bushes at night with flashlights wasn't fun either.

We were embarrassed when the neighbours called saying our dog was in their yard again or worse, had chased them into their own homes. We were never sure what trouble he was getting into while he was away and there was the constant worry he would get hit by a car on our dark country roads.

Vinney felt it was his duty to bark (with great gusto) at anyone who came over or anything that moved in the yard.

Holding him "back" became a full time job. He didn’t know, or ignored, basic commands and our attempts to teach him were useless. His aggressive behavior was scaring away our son’s friends.

Walking Vinney could only be done by a strong adult. He behaved like a Tasmanian devil at the end of his leash barking and pulling until he choked. He would charge with his hackles raised at anything that came our way and the kids were disappointed they could never walk the "new" dog. Soon, nobody wanted to take him for walks anymore.Passing our "trouble" dog onto someone else wasn’t an option we wanted to consider.

We love Vinney but his behaviour was affecting our family. Having to tie him up when we were outside wasn’t the quality of life we wanted for him either. Fortunately, a neighbour (whom we were apologizing to about a Vinney visit) told us about the All About Dogs website. We read with great interest (and a little skepticism) about the success of Jeff’s training program and arranged for a visit from him. Right away we noticed Jeff’s calm manner and his obvious affection for dogs. His knowledge, skills and patience when dealing with Vinney were impressive, he even had Vinney responding to commands that very day.

Jeff’s assurance that Vinney was trainable was a huge relief... we could hardly wait to start. There was hope for Vinney!Vinney loves the park sessions. The flexibility of the training schedule allows us to progress at our own pace and we are always learning new skills. Vinney is social around other dogs now and is well behaved in the house. There is no more raising our voices to try and get him to listen. We can all walk him off leash, something we never imagined possible- we would have been happy just to walk him at all.

Most importantly, Vinney comes when he is called and we don't worry about him running away anymore. Friends can't believe he is the same dog. Because Vinney has progressed so well with his training we call him our little Superstar, which is a huge improvement on what we were calling him before.

We can’t imagine what would have become of Vinney if it weren’t for Jeff’s  program.

Thank- you Jeff for providing us with skills we needed to allow Vinney to enjoy the life we wanted for him.

Janet and Family.