At Small Friends Veterinary Hospital we love puppies and want them to get the best possible start. Our classes are run by Nurse Tara and provide a fantastic opportunity for your puppy to bond with our staff, while learning basic obedience, how to socialise with other dogs and people, and the odd trick. The aim of our Puppy Classes is to provide a fun and rewarding environment for you and your puppy to learn important “dog life skills”.

Taking your puppy to Puppy Classes is one of the most valuable things you can do for your new small friend. The time spent at Small Friends Veterinary Hospital’s classes will provide you with the basic skills to raise a well-behaved, well-balanced dog that will be a pleasure to be around. Puppy Classes also provide a great setting for your small friend to learn how to interact with other dogs not from the same household in a “dog appropriate” manner. Small Friends Veterinary Hospital’s Puppy Class sizes are deliberately kept small so all puppies feel confident enough to get involved.

Between the ages of 8 and 16 weeks old, puppies are in their “socialisation period”. This is a term used to describe the period of time that pups learn about the world around them. They form associations about what is good and bad and how to behave in any given situation. For example, a pup that grows up in isolation may fear novel experiences in later life. By comparison a pup that has positive experiences while meeting lots of different people (young and old), travelling in the car, meeting other dogs, going on walks, meeting the postman and visiting the vet is far less likely to fear them on subsequent exposures. What your small friend experiences during this socialisation period becomes your pup’s “normal”.

We teach owners how to reward, encourage and discourage any given behaviour using positive reinforcement techniques. This will ensure that bad habits are nipped in the bud and good habits can flourish. In addition we will also teach owners how a dog learns so that you can continue to teach new skills to your dog right through their lifetime.

The Puppy School curriculum covers

• Basic obedience
• Toilet training
• Feeding
• Grooming
• Lead control
• General healthcare
• And more!

The course is held on Wednesday evenings at 7:00pm, runs for 4 weeks and costs $120. Each small friend can bring two human friends with them and children over 8 years of age are welcome to be one of these two. Bookings are essential so please call Small Friends Veterinary Hospital on 02 6262 2233

» Also see information page: New Puppies