Stellar Canine | Greater Seattle and Puget Sound Area Dog Training

There’s no standard, official certification in the United States for dog obedience training, but we’re about as close as you can come! Our team members are Certified Pet Trainers through the National Canine Academy of Dog Trainers and members of the International Association of Canine Professionals.

Owner Kristen Lee is also a Canine Good Citizen trainer through the American Kennel Club and regularly competes with and shows her own dogs at competitions both nationally and internationally to improve as a trainer and a dog owner.

When most people think of e-collars, they think of shocking a dog into submission. This is how many untrained individuals use their e-collars on their dogs, leading to a bad reputation for the training tool. Yes, using an e-collar this way is inhumane and extremely unethical. And we never use an e-collar in this way.

When used correctly, though, e-collars can be an ethical, effective way to get your dog’s attention when they’re not on a lead.

We don’t use E-Collars as a “shocking” or “punitive” device. Instead, we use them closer to a tap on the shoulder: When your dog is far away, we use a low-level buzz to tell them that we want them to return. We spend weeks training them on-leash up close so they know what these signals mean so that when they feel that “tap” they know exactly what to do.

It’s helpful to think of the way that we use e-collars less like a taser and more like an extra-long leash. When you want your dog to come back to your side, you often give a little tug to get their attention. That’s what the e-collar is – a slight remote tug to tell them you want them to come back.

Higher levels on the e-collar should be rarely if ever used. The only instance they would be used is in a situation which could result in the death of or greater harm to the dog. Situations that we, as owners and trainers, should never put our dogs in anyways.

We see lots of aggressive dogs come through our camps. What we’ve learned is that aggression is most commonly fear–based. We take our time getting to know your dog at the beginning of camp and helping them to feel comfortable, relaxed, and safe in our camp setting. After we have a good rapport with them, we then start to teach obedience while building their confidence with their particular stress triggers.

That all said, aggression does not usually disappear completely with training. Many times work must continue on once they come home. Training for aggressive dogs is more about establishing communication and management protocols that keep both dogs and the humans around them safe. We can lay the groundwork for them, but real long-term aggression reduction is a result of a better relationships between your dog, you as an owner, and their surroundings so they feel safe, comfortable, and protected all the time.

People ask us this question a lot, and we totally understand! Who wants to send their dog away to be trained and then forget how much they love their owners and want to be with them?

The answer is a resounding no! We have never seen a dog forget their owners or not be ecstatic to see them once we’re done. Your pup will come home to you excited to adventure with your family and (better yet!) equipped with the tools and techniques to behave themselves while you make more memories together in addition to the ones that they already have!

Of course you want to know all about how it’s going on with your pup! And we love to keep you up to date. We post updates and pictures via our Facebook page, so you can always check in to see what your dog is doing that week in real-time.

We also send a personal update every week via Facebook to you telling you how your dog is doing and what we’re working on. We request that people not call us during the training sessions consistently as we’re quite busy training dogs! However, we do respect phone calls for emergency situations and you will have connection with us throughout the time your dog is here with us.

Of course! We have multiple trainers working with multiple dogs simultaneously, and that’s good for the dogs! We love having multiple dogs around to help our trainees learn calm and thoughtful behavior in the presence of other dogs. Having multiple dogs also allows us to have playtime if your pup is social! And for dogs that aren’t, we can also do quite a bit of training with reactive, fearful, or shy dogs to get them socialized and more relaxed around their canine companions. We train pups that don’t like to interact with others too! Everyone is welcome here.