Where Good Dogs Earn Their Badges

All first-time visitors to our daycare facility must enrol in and successfully pass a Behavioural Assessment. Behavioural Assessments are used to determine whether daycare is a right fit for your dog. During this assessment, we will be observing your dog’s human interaction responses; dog communication skills; body language; dog greeting behaviours and more. A behavioural assessment includes a full day of daycare. Owners are not required to be present.

Customers must first complete a temperament form. This form is assessed by our team and used to quickly rule out dogs that are human aggressive or dog aggressive. This form also provides the team with useful information about a dog’s level of socialisation, breed restrictions, age restrictions, and any health concerns.

During the Behavioural Assessment itself, our team will start by assessing whether your dog has any resource guarding behaviour (e.g. toy guarding or food guarding). They will then walk with your dog on a leash around an empty yard so they can get used to the smells and the environment. Once satisfied, the staff member will introduce an evaluator dog to help with the assessment. This dog is a regular Pampered Paw daycare attendee who is able to read dog communication with no risk of dog-reactivity. This dog has the personality to get along with any dog. The team member will assess the dog’s interaction with the evaluator dog and, if satisfied, will let the dog of leash to play in a small group of dogs. Once the team member is satisfied, the applicant dog will be able to play with their designated play group.

We structure our day around industry best standards.

Play

A third of the day is dedicated to good ol’ fashioned play! Dogs will be split into multiple play groups based on their energy levels and play styles. This play is continuously monitored by our team with Red and Orange play behaviour corrected or redirected.

This includes time spent in our pool where weather permits.

Rest

A third of the day is spent resting in our rest areas. Rest is a vital component of our daycare and is required to keep arousal levels low, ensure the dogs can recover from their morning play, promotes a calm energy level and reduces the risk of incidents occurring. Just like us, tired dogs can get cranky!

Dogs will be placed in their own run, with a friend or with a family member depending on the dog.

Enrichment

A third of the day is dedicated to Enrichment. Enrichment can either be in the form of our Pampered Paw group training, or via our Enrichment add-on services.

The RSPCA states that Enrichment is essential for the physical and mental health of all dogs. Because of this, we have created our Pampered Paw Program to mentally engage our daycare attendees and have built a menu of Enrichment add-on services.

At the end of the day, you will receive a report card detailing your pet’s day with us. This will include information on their demeanour throughout the day, any behaviour that needs to be corrected, an overview of their day, what Pampered Paw training they undertook andtheir grade for that training, along with any recommendations from the team and an behavioural concerns.

There are 9 disciplines that will be taught and progressed each day. All dogs attending will benefit from this training program aimed at creating well behaved dogs.

The 9 disclipines include:

1. Sit
2. Sit-stay
3. Down
4. Recall
5. Place
6. Roll over
7. Leave it
8. Spin
9. Wave

Each visit, your dog will receive a traffic light behavioural rating of Green, Orange, or Red.

The behavioural rating is given by observing:

• Play gestures
• Greetings with other dogs
• Human interactions
• Facial expressions