Come, Sit, & Stay Well.
You love your dog.
You want the best for them.
I’m here to help you.
Dog Behavior Help for the Dog You Actually Live With
Maybe your dog needs training. Maybe your dog already knows Sit, Stay, Place, Heel and Come and you are still dealing with anxiety, reactivity, aggression, hypervigilance, household conflict or a dog who simply does not seem comfortable in their own life. Sometimes the problem is straightforward. Sometimes it is not.
I help dog parents understand what they are seeing, identify what may be driving the behavior and decide what actually makes sense to do next. We can work on training without pretending every behavior is only a training problem, and we can look at the whole dog without turning every naughty behavior into a medical mystery.
What Kind of Help Are You Looking For?
Not every dog who barks, pulls or steals socks needs behavior rehabilitation. And not every dog who lunges, shuts down, bites or panics needs another generic list of obedience commands. Start with the problem that brought you here.
My Dog Is Driving Me Nuts
Barking, jumping, house-training accidents, leash pulling, chewing, digging, crate problems, door chaos or a dog who apparently thinks “Come” is only a suggestion? These problems are common, and many have straightforward training foundations.
Start With the Top 10 →Something Deeper Is Going On
Anxiety, fear, trauma, leash reactivity, separation distress, resource guarding, over-arousal, hypervigilance, aggression or a dog whose behavior changed even though the training looks good belongs in a different conversation.
Explore Dog Behavior →I'm Ready for Professional Help
You may already have tried trainers, classes, videos, advice from friends and enough late-night Googling to make your head hurt. Tell me what is happening and what you have already tried. We can decide what kind of help actually fits the dog.
Tell Me What's Going On →Your Dog Can Be Trained and Still Not Be Okay
This is the dog who changed the way I think about behavior work. The dog knows the commands. The obedience may actually be beautiful. But the dog still scans the environment, worries about getting something wrong, explodes at another dog, cannot recover after something stressful, shadows the human constantly or seems permanently switched on.
In those cases I want to know more than whether the dog can hold Place. I want to know how the dog sleeps, how quickly they recover after stimulation, what the environment is asking of them, whether pain or physical discomfort may be involved, what happens on the other end of the leash, what the dog was bred to do, how the household functions and what everybody has already tried.
That does not make obedience unimportant. It means obedience is one tool in a much larger toolbox.
What Can We Work On?
I no longer need a separate package for every behavior label. We can work on the dog who is standing in front of us and build the plan around what that dog and family actually need.
And sometimes the first thing we discover is that the label you came in with is not actually the most useful way to describe the problem.
Three Ways to Get Help
I simplified my services because I do not want you trying to diagnose your own dog well enough to buy the correct package before we have even talked. Start with the amount of help you actually need.
Consultations
Sometimes you need an experienced person to step outside the situation with you, look at the history, watch video, help you make sense of the behavior and give you a sensible roadmap. Consultations are available by Zoom nationwide and locally in person when appropriate.
Learn About Consultations →Behavior Immersion
When an hour at a time is not enough, you travel with your dog to North Myrtle Beach and participate in concentrated work over a weekend or several days. We can observe, train, go into the real world, review video, troubleshoot and spend enough time together to see patterns that a normal lesson may never reveal.
This is not traditional board-and-train. Your dog does not leave you to be fixed. You are part of the process.
Explore Behavior Immersion →Membership
Not every question requires another private appointment. Membership gives dog parents ongoing education, resources, Q&A and continued access to a community where behavior, training, nutrition and whole-dog wellness can all be part of the conversation.
Explore Membership →I Need the Real Bite History, Not the Polite Version
If your dog has caused punctures, seriously attacked another animal, redirected onto a handler, attempted to bite a child, escaped with aggressive intent or is becoming increasingly unpredictable, say so in your inquiry. Do not turn “he bit my husband twice and broke skin” into “he can be a little reactive.”
I am not asking so I can judge your dog. I need accurate information because bite severity, targets, predictability and the circumstances around an incident change what is safe to do next. Management comes before training experiments.
I Look at the Whole Dog
I began as a dog trainer and behavior professional. Over the years, complicated dogs kept teaching me that training and physical wellbeing do not always live in separate boxes. Pain can change tolerance. Poor sleep changes how well a dog copes. Digestive discomfort can look like restlessness. Age, medications, nutrition, physical limitations and chronic stress can all become relevant to what we see behaviorally.
That is why I may ask questions that seem broader than dog training. It does not mean every behavior problem gets blamed on food or that I am trying to replace your veterinarian. It means I am willing to notice when the dog may be telling us that another professional or another piece of the picture deserves attention.
The Well Oiled K9
When the conversation needs to go deeper into fresh food, canine nutrition, natural wellness, essential oils, herbs, homeopathy, senior support or longevity, that side of my work has its own home.
K9Coach does not need to become a wellness website, and The Well Oiled K9 does not need to become a dog-training website. They are different parts of the same professional background, connected when the dog in front of us gives us a reason to connect them.
Visit WellOiledK9.comStart Learning Here
K9Coach has years of practical dog-training and behavior education. If the problem is something you can reasonably begin working on yourself, use it. If what you are reading makes you realize the situation is bigger than DIY, you will know where to find me.
Top 10 Dog Problems
Reactivity, barking, house training, crates, digging, jumping, leash pulling, chewing, door chaos and recall.
Pick Your Problem →Dog Behavior
Anxiety, fear, trauma, aggression, separation, resource guarding, hypervigilance and the behavior that remains after training.
Explore Behavior →Dana's Take
The things I have learned from years of dogs, clients, mistakes, difficult cases and changing my own mind along the way.
Read Dana's Take →Downloadable Help
Practical guides for common training and behavior problems when you want more than a short article but do not necessarily need private coaching.
Browse Guides →Dog Trainer. Behavior Specialist. Whole-Dog Thinker.
I have spent years working with dogs who are easy, dogs who are complicated and dogs who did not fit neatly into the explanation somebody gave their family. My work began in dog training and behavior and eventually led me much deeper into canine nutrition, holistic pet health and the physical and emotional pieces that can overlap with behavior.
I still train dogs. I still believe dogs need communication, useful skills, boundaries, exercise, appropriate outlets and humans who know how to follow through. I simply have a much larger toolbox now, and I am far more interested in helping the individual dog in front of me than defending one narrow explanation for why dogs behave the way they do.
You Do Not Have to Live Next Door to Work With Me
I am based in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, with local behavior support available throughout the Grand Strand and surrounding coastal communities when appropriate. Families also travel here for concentrated Behavior Immersion work.
Online behavior consultations allow me to work with dog parents nationwide, and video is often extremely useful because I get to see the behavior that happens in your actual home, neighborhood or daily routine instead of waiting for your dog to reproduce it on command in front of a stranger.
Start With the Dog, Not the Package
Tell me what your dog is doing, what life looks like at home, what you have already tried and what you wish could be different. You do not need to decide whether the problem is training, anxiety, aggression, over-arousal, relationship, nutrition or something else before you contact me.
That's part of what you're asking me to help you figure out.