Loyal Pawscast - Ep. 1 - Meet the Host • Loyal Paws Dog Training

Hello, and welcome to my blog! This will be a fun way to connect and share my thoughts, ideas and training tips with all of you! If you don’t already know, we are starting a new adventure and heading into the world of Podcasts! Check out our first one, available on Youtube and Spotify now! (Links below!)

Let’s start from scratch so you can get to know me a bit better!

My name is Amber Buhler, and I am a Certified Dog Trainer. You know the story, I have loved dogs and animals since I was born – Even clipping leashes to my family members and walking them around like a puppy…yes even my best friend fell victim to this (lol!) My family was always very supportive…giving me horse rides on their backs, pretending to be dogs, and even getting dogs so I could train them. I will always be grateful for my family’s undeniable support that continues on strong today!

At first, I wanted to train dogs for the movies, I thought it was so cool to see them on TV and Movies. Beethoven and Air bud were my favourites (Yes, I named my first dog ever, Buddy), along with a myriad of other animal movies like Black Beauty and Spirit. I also loved watching dog training and other shows with animals in it.

Do you remember Animal Miracles? I have such fond memories watching this with my Grandma, along with Stanley Coren’s show, Good Dog!

(The best photo I could find, how strange!)

Stanley Coren was my first glimpse into dog training TV. I was immersed in the way he would talk, his dogs, duck tollers and cavalier spaniels…wow the nostalgia!

Anyways…I loved anything dogs & animals: pictures, tv, movies, you name it, I loved it. You couldn’t get me out of pet stores for nothing!

So moving on a few years, the show “At the end of my Leash” with Brad Pattison, started to air. Well, that was it! He was the be all end all for me. I wanted to train dogs the way he did, I wanted the focus and attentive behaviour his dogs did…and I wanted the results he got with the clients on TV. (yes, I was a kid)

It wasn’t until later on that I realized he was not the kind of trainer I wanted to follow, although he had quite the following, I just needed to move on…not the training style I wanted to teach and live by.

At a similar time Cesar Millan became all the rage and I started assuming his methods were the only way, after all they didn’t have any other types of training on TV. What was a 14 year old to do…

So, I started reading his books, websites, and even went to one of his live shows in Winnipeg!

It was not until one of our own family dogs, Dice, came into the picture when I started feeling that maybe his training was not the way to go…

You see, Dice was a bit of a special case. We met him at 3 days old, and picked him out of a litter. He was a Miniature Poodle (was supposed to be anyways), we went and met him a few times before bringing him home at 8 weeks old. When we did finally bring him home, we got a different dog than we expected.

Dice was neurotic for only being 8 weeks old, he attacked me within the first few days we got him, he attacked a few family members throughout his life, he attacked Vegas, our other family dog, multiple times..he was a super mixed up dog from the start.

We took him to the vet, tried doing tests, the kind and uninterested vet said “It’s dick behaviour” and left it at that…leaving us feeling lost and kind of silly because he made it sound normal. Throughout Dice’s life, he struggled. He struggled with a myriad of behaviour issues and who knows what else was going through his head. Regardless, at first he was a bit of a firecracker..you didn’t know when he would give an outburst of behaviour and it made us all on edge. Oh boy how I wish we contacted a behaviour professional..but no sense dwelling on the past.

When we got Dice I was about 15 years old, and instantly wanted to get into the behaviour side of dog training. I wanted to learn everything about behaviour. I looked up and found Animal Behaviour College. I asked them if I could apply and they said I had to be 18, as many others did, rightfully so, but I was eager! I was eager to learn and help my dog. So, I started training with him the best way I knew how, I gave my family rules and boundaries to give him structured walks, training time and we practiced basic cues. I wanted to hire someone, but they were expensive.

Once I was 18, I enrolled in Animal Behaviour College and Dice came with me to my externship! He excelled, he was intelligent, focused, and driven to do whatever it was I was asking. He got glowing reviews from my head trainer and I could not have been more impressed, he thrived in the learning environment! I had never felt so close with him.

After I was enrolled in Animal Behaviour College my view and training methods shifted. Since they taught primarily with Lure Reward Training and Positive Reinforcement. This was all new to me, but I was enjoying it so much. Not using harsh or aversive methods was freeing, I loved being able to work WITH my dog instead of punishing them and having them guess what I want through trial and error, or physical manipulation. Anyways, that’s another story!

So, I graduated from ABC in 2014, and I moved out with my, now husband, in 2015. I started getting into the dog training world myself, opened up my business, Loyal Paws Dog Training and started working with the local rescue. We got Rambo, our first puppy and we trained and trained and trained. We trained all the time! He was an amazing puppy. He did not prepare us whatsoever for our second puppy, Nova. She, unfortunately, did not have the best start to her new life, having littermate syndrome, but has turned out to be an incredible dog, and that’s a story I will save for another time.. We later got Storm as well, who was another nervous nellie, and is thriving today thanks to positive training.

On the business side of things, I started seeing a gap in training, when we would get dogs coming into rescue due to behaviour issues. I wanted to help, I wanted to make dog training accessible to people that don’t live in the city. I knew trainers would drive out, and charge per KM but some people don’t have that kind of money..So I started online programs!

Then online programs turned into Online Courses when I moved to Lynn Lake Manitoba, with my Husband and our 3 dogs. I loved it, it gave me something to do up north, the dogs were happy to learn tricks and new stuff for our courses, it was a great way to connect with people from all over too! I have clients from, BC to N.L.! My husband and I also started rescuing the stray puppies and dogs up north and getting them to rescues in Winnipeg.

My goal has and always will be to make dog training more accessible to everyone and to be able to help owners bond with their dogs on a whole new level.

I do believe one positive that has come from the pandemic, is that professional dog training has become more accessible than ever before. Forget dog training TV, it is a farce and will only give you a false sense of what dog training is and should be. Instead look to your local professional dog trainer, (the ones who dedicate their lives to learning about dog communication and training) for online services or in-person services to get a proper training plan that suits you and your dogs training goals!

Dog training is not a cookie-cutter field, and we need not treat it as such. In the beginning, as a child/teen, I fell victim to those TV shows, and I am here to let you know I made the mistake, and you don’t have to!

So, today, I am a certified trainer who believes in humane and positive training methods that better the life of the dog and the owner. I believe working with your dog is better than punishing and suppressing them, and that every dog is different and training one dog will never be the same as training the next. Which is part of why dog training is so appealing to me!

I am currently enrolled in Canine Correspondence Studies, Professional dog training and Dog Behaviour and Aggression therapy programs. I hope to complete them this summer! Funny enough, this program is Canadian made, and endorsed by Stanely Coren, he is a well-known Dog Trainer and Professor in B.C. (from the TV show I watched as a kid). (the world is funny sometimes)

I have also completed other courses that I will list below:

Certified Dog Trainer

Animal Behaviour & Welfare – University of Edinburgh
Dog Emotion & Cognition – Duke University
Training Shelter Dogs – ABC
Pet Sitting and Dog Walking – ABC
Pet Diet and Nutrition – ABC
The Art of Selling and Teaching Private Lessons – ABC
Separation Anxiety – Fenzi Dog Sports Academy

I hope that you all have a better idea of who I am and the trainer I am and strive to be! Loyal Paws Dog Training is a dream! And now that my husband and I live near Emerson, Manitoba I hope to expand my business into in-person training services as soon as the pandemic allows me to do so safely! I am always learning and enrolling in new courses to serve my clients better and continue to make training fun for dogs and their owners!

I want to take this time to give a special thanks to my family and my husband for all their amazing support throughout my career. I truly could not do it without them!

This blog was written after our new Podcast! Feel free to check out our Podcast on Spotify and/or YouTube! Our First Episode is out now, links below!

YouTube Loyal PawsCast Ep. 1 : https://youtu.be/YaRK23HGwZc

Spotify Loyal PawsCast Ep. 1: https://open.spotify.com/show/6tYafsYyBBF78hVJ1Rnv3o