Celebrity-Endorsed Dog Trainer Relocates To The Twin Cities

If you’re an animal person, you likely tune into the Animal Planet to get your fill of wild and domesticated animal information or entertainment. And if you watch Animal Planet, you’ve probably come across the show “It’s Me or the Dog,” where dog trainer Victoria Stilwell comes into the homes of dog owners to help them tame or manage difficult doggie behavior.

Stilwell has created a network of positive reinforcement dog trainers in Great Britain and the United States, and she hand-selected a new local resident, Amy Sandmann, to be part of her Positively Dog Training network.

Just about a month ago, Sandmann and her family relocated to the St. Michael area of the Twin Cities region from Indiana. She is eager to continue her dog training business in her new hometown.

“When we work with dogs, it’s not about using force or intimidation of any kind,” Sandmann said. “Positive reinforcement is more about teaching your dog to feel differently about something … without the use of choke chains or shock collars.”

Sandmann has had dogs by her side as long as she can remember, has studied canine behavior and she has been a positive reinforcement trainer for 20 years, long before jumping onboard with Stilwell’s Positively Dog Training last year after an extensive selection process.

“It’s truly a gift I think I was given,” she said of her experience growing up with dogs. “It’s just something that has been the core part of my life: it’s who I am and I like to help other people understand what their dogs are trying to tell them. Dogs are communicating all the time, but they communicate differently than we do, so you have to learn to speak dog.”

She also currently has two dogs of her own, English mastiffs Earl and Howie. She and Howie–her ‘Angel with Paws’–are a registered therapy team and they go to the children’s hospital every week together to work with kids and bring some joy to their day.

Sandmann said it’s often the owner’s actions that are playing a role in the dog’s behavior, though many would like to think it’s simply a problem with their animal and not themselves as well. This is why Sandmann’s training involves coming into the dog’s home to get a good assessment of what the dog’s life is like at the family home and how family members interact with the animal before creating a training program.

“Training is a lifelong thing,” she said, “you can’t just take your dog to a training class and in four or six weeks you are done. A dog needs constant leadership from the day you bring the dog home to the day the dog passes.”

One such client is Stacy Ivy, of Sandmann’s former hometown near South Bend, Ind. Ivy’s new lab/husky mix, Brody, was hyperactive, anxious and not too keen on following instruction; Ivy and her fiancé were at their wits’ end, unsure how to handle him.

Ivy said Sandmann worked with them and the dog to recognize positive behavior with positive reinforcement and to swiftly withdraw affection and attention when the dog misbehaves.

“We had tried using a shock collar in the past, because we didn’t know any better,” she said. “I felt terrible doing it and he wouldn’t behave unless he had the collar on.”

“He’s a lot calmer and happier now, and my fiancé and I are a lot happier,” she added. “Amy has really helped us out a lot … she really knows how to relate to dogs. It’s more like people training than dog training, honestly. He used to be too much for us to handle and now he’s our baby.”

For more information on Sandmann’s dog training, click here or call Sandmann at 763-354-9909.