Services
EVALUATIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS
We’re Here To Help You And Your Pet.
At Riverina K9 Services, we pride ourselves on our professional approach and customised advice for each individual pet – we will assess your situation and provide you with the right level of education and support. Our solution-focused approach and advice will give you confidence to successfully communicate with your pet and meet their needs.
Assisting your pet means we have to look at everything from a few different angles. As well as an effective training strategy, it’s very important we get all the other fundamental areas of your pet’s life functioning well too – lifestyle, health, diet, exercise, communication, relationships and environment all play a big part in their wellbeing.
It goes without saying every pet and guardian should enjoy a rewarding relationship together, and we strive to empower through education, support and assistance where required.
The first part of working with us is the evaluation and recommendation process.
Meet and Greet
We’ll come to your home or we can conduct a virtual meeting online. This gives us a chance to gather all the information we need to provide our recommendations and tailored advice.
This consult may include:
- Temperament and psychometric testing
- Conducting a skills-based assessment
- Behavioural assessment
- Physical examination
- Health assessment
- Survey of home environment
- Meet family members and other pets
It will also give us the chance to discuss with you:
- Any current issues or behavioural problems
- Goals or areas you wish to improve
- Health issues or concerns
- Any other things you feel are relevant
Our Recommendations
After this appointment, we’ll compile a written evaluation detailing our assessment and recommendations. Depending on the services requested, this may include some of the following information:
- Behavioural evaluation
- Physical evaluation
- Health and Performance evaluation
- Goal setting
- Management strategies
- Treatment plan and recommendations
- A Training or Conditioning Program
- Home care suggestions
- Dietary advice, recipes and feeding guidelines
- Breed-specific information
- A referral (if required)
- A formal quotation
The written evaluation will give you an overview of your pet’s current situation, skill level, why certain things are happening, how things might be improved, and advice on the next steps we can take together when you’re ready to get started.
CANINE MYOTHERAPY & MASSAGE
- Looking to improve your dog’s physical health, mobility and wellness overall?
- Is your dog not moving the way they used to?
- Is your pet recovering from surgery or illness?
- Does your dog work hard and need help to prevent injuries?
- Feel your dog needs a bit of TLC?
Our canine myotherapy and massage treatments can help improve your dog’s physical condition, whether they’re recovering from surgery, living with an illness, getting on in years or dealing with the strains of high intensity work and sport.
We offer non-invasive physical treatments, which can improve and maintain your dog’s health and wellbeing. These treatments can be used to relieve the symptoms associated with existing injury or illness, and are also a great preventative measure in maintaining your dog’s optimum conditioning and mobility
What Is Canine Myotherapy Treatment And Massage?
Canine Myotherapy Treatment is a form of non-invasive physical therapy for dogs. It treats dysfunction and imbalance in the musculo-skeletal system, reducing overall stress in the body and re-establishes optimum function and balance.
During treatment, the layers of skin, fascia and muscle are manipulated using massage and stretching, to provide release and support the body’s natural ability to heal, recover and rebalance on its own. We can also provide body conditioning and strengthening exercises to assist with recovery and mobility.
What Is Canine Myotherapy Treatment And Massage?
Imbalance within the body can have a knock-on effect to all of its systems – Myotherapy supports the body back towards a balanced state.
This treatment can assist in the recovery process from certain:
- Illness
- Disease
- Trauma
- Physical Injury
- Surgery
- Strain
- Age related pain
- Sport or Work demands
Our treatments
At Riverina K9 Services, we’re able to offer treatments including canine myotherapy and massage, dry-needling, and stability and balance conditioning exercises. Our full list of physical therapy services includes:
- Myofascial release
- Sports massage and stretching
- Palliative care massage
- Lymphatic drainage massage
- Dry needling
- Soft tissue diagnosis
- Gait dysfunction analysis
- Post injury and surgery recovery
- Relaxation and puppy massage
- Therapeutic exercise and conditioning exercise
In our initial consultation with you, we’ll discuss your dog’s current situation, health and history to understand the full picture of their requirements.
PET SITTING DROP-IN SERVICE
When Your Pet Is Happiest At Home
It’s inevitable, sometimes we need to go away and sadly can’t take our pets with us. If your dog or cat is happiest at home, our holiday pet-care service can give you complete peace of mind while you are apart.
Committed To Caring For Your Pet
More than just checking in on your pet, our service offers a qualified, comprehensive and caring approach, which means your pet can safely stay in their own comfortable home environment. You deserve to feel confident of your pet’s safety and comfort while you are away from them, as pet owners ourselves, we know how important this is for peace of mind.
While you’re away, we can provide the following services for your pet:
- Feeding and checking on water
- Daily yard clean-up
- Administering any medications: topical, oral or injections
- Bathing and basic grooming if required
- Play-time
- Companionship and plenty of cuddles and pats
- Appropriate exercise inside or outside the home (see dog walking and exercise services)
Along with looking after your pets, we can also take care of your mail collection, put bins in or out, check security of your home and water lawns or plants if required.
Why Choose Our Service?
- We’re fully insured for pet-sitting and care in the Griffith local area
- We’re qualified in small animal CPR and First Aid
- We’re qualified and experienced dog handlers
- We have up to date police checks
- Hear from some of our clients about why they love our service
You can rest assured that your pet will be in safe, loving hands while you’re away, and we have their best interests at heart.
TRAINING & BEHAVIOURAL MODIFICATION
A Relationship-Based Approach To Your Dogs Learning And Behaviour
- Not sure where to begin when it comes to training your puppy or adult dog?
- Frustrated on a regular basis by your dog’s behaviour?
- Want guidance taking your dog’s skills to the next level?
- Looking for new ways to keep your dog mentally and physically active?
- Looking for a Nationally-Accredited Dog Trainer?
We all want the very best for our dogs, but they don’t come with a one-size-fits-all instruction manual.
The very best approach is to support a healthy relationship from the very beginning with your dog – as with most things, prevention is better than cure, and getting started early with training and positive exposure can help establish social responsibility, healthy boundaries, clear channels of communication, a good bond, an eager learner and a trusted companion.
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Good training needs a kind heart as well as a cool and well informed head
– Konrad Most
At Riverina K9 Services, we believe every dog has the potential to be emotionally stable, well-trained, biologically fulfilled and supported.
We can help with:
- Preparing Owners for a Puppies arrival
- Training for new puppies – starting from 8 weeks of age
- Training to elevate your dog’s skills to the next level
- Behaviour modification of existing nuisance or problem behaviours
- Tailored training programs to help with specific requirements
Together, we’ll create clear communication channels between you and your dog, and provide a rewarding training experience for all involved.
Our approach to training:
- Is tailored to suit the needs of you and your dog
- Can take place at home, in an appropriate public space or via a virtual training session
- Is conducted at a pace both you and your dog are comfortable with
- Gives you the tools and skills to support and maintain positive behaviour in your dog
- Helps to build and maintain a healthy relationship between you and your dog
Dog trainers and behaviour consultants can be extremely helpful but they aren’t magicians. Guiding, supporting, motivating and maintaining your dog to be the best version of themselves can take time, effort and patience on your behalf. For your dog’s success, it’s essential to keep up training and consistency outside of formal sessions and into the future. This way the important skills you learn will become second nature and true progress will be made.
Our Training Program Levels
Beginners & Puppies
- Puppy-Preparation Programs
- Puppy Training Programs
Intermediate
Advanced
Training For Puppies And Younger Dogs
When it comes to training your dog, starting as early as possible is ideal. Young dogs are keen to learn, and training your puppy right from the beginning is an important part of giving them the best start possible.
Training a puppy is a bit like building a house.
How?
Well, just as the designing, engineering and initial foundations have a major impact on the end result of the house, training puppies is all about building good quality foundations for future success and stability. Building up younger dogs the right way will give them skills to learn efficiently, build trust, develop healthy coping mechanisms and live out each day to the max. You can take comfort in knowing our approach to training is nationally accredited – we work across all age groups too, from puppies through critical periods of development, right up to older dogs well into their senior years.
Initial groundwork and foundations with your dog involves building their confidence, supporting resilience and adaptability. We use play, positive interaction, markers and rewards to build a strong relationship, good focus and attention.
Drive building exercises, learning about positive exposure and nurturing their motivation and engagement are key throughout your sessions.
Our puppy and beginner programs can teach you how to:
- Build clarity in communication between you and your dog
- Construct and maintain a strong bond with your pup from the beginning
- Set realistic goals
- Use play in your training
- Understand the learning theory and its application
- Use rewards and reinforcement schedules
- Setting criteria
- Use luring, shaping and capturing
- Start acquisition of markers
- Navigate problem puppy-behaviours
- Successfully toilet and crate train
- Get your puppy used to manual handling
- Establish rules and boundaries in the home
- Teach essential good manners
Foundational and Fundamental skills include:
- Basic recall skills
- Foundational obedience and impulse control skills
- Positive socialisation and exposure
- How to encourage relaxation in different environments
- Leash skills
- Focus and engagement skills
Addressing Problem Behaviour
We all become dog owners with the best intentions: to give a dog a good home, welcome them into our family and enjoy their company. But the reality is every dog is different, and each dog will have different strengths, and potentially weaknesses you may need assistance working through.
“
Dogs do speak. But only to those who know how to listenhead
– Orhan Pamuk
All dogs deserve the chance to improve their behaviour, with the right assistance from their owners. Problem dog behaviours are often the result of a dog trying to ask for help. By learning how to give this to them in the most efficient and fair way we can resolve issues and bring not only balance but also joy, respect and trust back into the relationship.
Problem behaviours may include:
- Excessive Barking & Vocalisation
- Scavenging
- Digging
- Resource guarding
- Nipping/Biting
- Chasing/stalking things
- Jumping up
- Inappropriate elimination
- Chewing
- Hyperactivity
- Overstimulation
- Anxiety
- Fearful behaviours
- Reactivity or Aggression
- Escaping
We believe in an integrated approach when it comes to behavioural modification and conditioning. We’ll work with you to try and understand the underlying issues, and create a guided solution-focused approach to help you get back to enjoying a positive relationship with your dog sooner.
Our approach:
- Tailor a conditioning or training programme to most effectively meet the needs of you and your dog in a positive way
- Provide guidance at a pace that is comfortable and sensitive to the progress of your dog
- Agree on the best strategy which is fitting for the abilities of both you and your dog
- Nurture and support clear ongoing communication between you and your dog
- Give you the skills to build and maintain a positive relationship with your dog
- Provide honest and trusted advice with your dog’s best interests at heart
- Provide ongoing support and consultation in person or online
Intermediate And Advanced Skills
So you’ve mastered the basics with your dog and are looking for a new challenge? We get it – dog training can be a great hobby and the possibilities are pretty endless once you start. We love enthusiastic and motivated Guardians who want to keep learning and working with their dogs.
We can provide both intermediate and advanced training to move onto when you are ready to keep developing your dogs skill set.
We can work with you to teach your dog:
- Scent work
- Dog sport skills
- Complex behaviours
- Continued Social Responsibility
- Advanced recall and obedience
- Assistance-based tasks
Train with us, and you’ll benefit from our professional, accredited advice and ongoing support throughout your program.
PET NUTRITION
Food To Fuel Your Fabulous Pet
Your pet’s diet directly impacts its health and behaviour.
Just as humans need a highly nutritious diet, exercise, social interaction and personal interests, so do our dogs. The right food can fuel your pet to lead a healthy, happy and long life. Unfortunately, many commercial pet foods are not giving our dogs and cats the essential nutrients they need to live their lives to the fullest.
“
When diet is wrong medicine is of no use. When diet is correct medicine is of no need.
-Ancient Ayurvedic proverb
A Healthy Pet Is A Happy Pet
Surprisingly, ‘bad’ behaviour, illness and disease in pets is often linked back to their diet and a lack of quality and balanced nutrition. Poor diet can create a number of chronic issues and deficiencies that can easily go unnoticed. It’s one of the reasons we encourage you to prioritise assessing your pet’s current diet: we can help by putting together an ideal nutritional strategy appropriate to their energy and nutritional needs.
When we talk about your pet’s diet, we’re looking at a couple of things including:
- Type and quality of foods they consume
- Formulation and balance of nutrients
- Energy density
- Portion sizes
- Frequency of feeding
- Special individual requirements
- Species-specific requirements
This information is sometimes informed by a pet’s:
- Age and life-stage
- Breeding
- Reproductive status
- Temperament
- Intolerances and sensitivities
- Current health
- Current body condition
- Past injury or illness
- Predispositions
Highly refined commercial diets can be counterproductive and highly inflammatory for both dogs and cats. Certain nutrients in their natural unrefined forms are essential for maintaining healthy biochemical function, and enabling normal body processes. When bioavailable nutrients are lacking, this can manifest itself via indicators such as:
- Hyperactivity or hypersensitivity
- Irritability & Lowered thresholds
- Anxiety or clinginess
- Changes in appetite and thirst
- Skin, nails or dull coat
- Lack of energy or a depressed demeanor
- Rashes, dry skin, dandruff or itchiness
- Excess shedding or hair loss
- Mood swings
- Restlessness & lack of quality sleep
- Unusual smell or bad breath
- Decreased mobility
- Inconsistent or changes in bowel movements
- Digestive discomfort
- Flatulence
- Impaired immune function
- Impaired Cognitive function or compulsive tendencies
- Pickiness
- Obesity or anorexia
A Long, Happy Life
We all want our pets to enjoy a long healthy and happy life. The correct nutrition has been shown to help prevent illness and disease, and to increase the lifespan of our beloved pets. We can help you transition them to a diet which will encourage overall health and happiness, and lead to less money spent on medical bills and a longer life for your dog.
“
The peace of mind that comes with a pet having their nutritional needs precisely targeted and continually met means not just an overall healthier pet, but less risk of future disease or illness with the comfort you are supporting them to thrive naturally
– Racheal Romeo
In The Raw
A BARF or raw wholefoods approach is considered to be ideal and the gold standard for species appropriate feeding of dogs and cats. Even though there are slight physiological and anatomical differences in our current day domestic pets, it most closely resembles an ancestral diet.
When choosing to feed your pet a raw food or a home prepared diet, it is important you have professional advice to ensure you’re properly meeting their individual nutritional needs and supporting optimal health long term.
Benefits of species appropriate feeding include:
- Increased longevity and life-span
- Better dental hygiene and fresher breath
- Better functioning digestive system
- Increased immunity
- Healthier microbiome and GI tract
- Shinier coat and healthier skin
- Stronger bones
- Healthier organs
- Better blood sugar regulation
- Better overall behaviour
- A happier pet and better quality of life
We will work with you to create a meal plan for your pet which provides the balance of nutrients they require according to their individual needs consistent with the recommended allowances in the National Research Council guidelines for feeding cats and dogs.
Our Nutrition Services For Pets Include A Written Evaluation And A Recommendation Document Which May Outline The Following Areas (Dependant On The Service):
- Meal recipe formulations + complete nutrient analysis
- Transitioning feeding guidelines
- Energy & Calorie requirements
- Portions and feeding guidelines
- Meal & Batch prep
- Shopping List
- Recommended Supplements and dosages
- Macronutrients & Micronutrients Information
- Body Condition Scoring guidelines
- Dangerous foods
- Guidelines when feeding Raw Meaty Bones
- Information about the additional benefits of raw feeding
- Troubleshooting
- Recommended supplementary reading
- Product recommendations
- AAFCO, NRC & FEDIAF comparison of current diet
- Additional topper recommendations
DOG WALKING & EXERCISE
Let’s Get Moving
Dogs are known for their exuberant energy and love of life. It’s one of the reasons they make such wonderful companions and family members.
More than just a chance for fun and play, exercise is essential for your dog for many reasons, including:
- Improving mental health Just as it is in humans, regular exercise is linked with better mental health in dogs, and has been shown to reduce anxiety, making for a calmer companion at home.
- Maintaining a healthy weight: Exercise means your dog is more likely to be a healthy weight, and contributes to their overall health – meaning a longer and healthier life for your beloved pet.
- Looking after joints: Healthy dogs need healthy joints, and exercise can contribute by lubricating joints and strengthening the supporting muscles.
- Behaviour and bonding: Exercise is a great opportunity for you and your pet to train and bond, and is shown to improve their behaviour at home, reducing nuisance behaviour.
- Socialisation: Dogs are social creatures, and exercise is a fantastic way to get them out in different environments, encouraging positive exposure to various stimuli.
- Mental stimulation: More than just physical exertion, the right exercise can provide your dog with opportunities to stimulate their mind and learn new things.
Why Choose Our Service?
- Young dogs: Most puppies have a lot of energy, but not a lot of stamina, and recovery breaks are important. As they are still growing, high impact activities need to be strictly limited until they are fully mature.Exercise with younger dogs is more about exposing them positively to the big outside world which might mean new things, sounds, sights and smells.
- Older dogs: Sometimes older dogs have the will, but their bodies can’t keep up. It’s important to have regular health check-ups to make sure activity levels are suitable for your dog.
- Breed: Some breeds naturally have different energy profiles, whereas others are quite happy with a slow walk around the block and a few simple games in your backyard.
- Yourself: Perhaps you work long hours, are physically limited or extremely time poor. Even with the best intentions, we can’t always be available to give our dog the exercise they need.
At Riverina K9 Services we offer a dog exercise and walking service, which tailors exercise to your dog according to their needs, while also fitting in with your busy schedule.
Our services can be an ongoing solution or a temporary fix as required.
We will fit in with your schedule and lifestyle, and can even pick-up and drop-off pets from your home while you’re out. You can also rest assured your dog is in the safest possible hands – our trainer Racheal is fully insured, CPR and First Aid qualified, and an accredited dog trainer and handler.
Our Dog Walking and Exercise Service
Initially, we’ll ask you to complete a questionnaire, and then we’ll come for a short meet and greet at home with you. During this appointment we’ll discuss your dog’s exercise needs, and finally provide a quote based on your requirements.
- We provide a tailored and balanced exercise program for your dog.
- We can take your dog out for exercise and play, or can provide suitable activities in your own backyard.
- Out and about we offer dog exercise options including walking, jogging, running, canicross, drysledding and urban agility.
- We can provide daily or weekly reports on your dog’s sessions, and can share a virtual dog walking map so you can see exactly where we’ve been with some happy snaps along the way.
We’ll also fit your dog with a Fitbark activity sensor – a FitBit for dogs – tracking energy output and calories burnt. This is especially useful for high energy dogs or those trying to achieve better body condition.
For past students we offer a ‘Walk & Train’ service where we are able to combine exercise and training in the same session, giving them the chance to rehash their training skills while burning off energy with a handler they know well.
