Alex - Proper Paws

Location: Teeside

Working Area: North East England

Specialties: Reactivity Rehabilitation & Social Skills. I have lots of experience working with reactive dogs, I help owners work through reactivity whilst introducing appropriate social behaviours and provide a safe place to continue to practice and develop on my social walks.

Services Offered:

  • 1-1 In-person Behavioural Session

  • 1-1 Zoom Behavioural Session

  • Workshops (e.g. Recall & Reconnection, Mobility & Movement)

  • Behavioural Courses (e.g. Social Skills 101)

  • Board & Train - Exclusive to 1-1 clients only

  • Neutral Walks

  • Social Walks

  • Adventure Walks

  • Weekend Ad-hoc services (e.g. Dog chaperone for wedding)

Instagram: @properpaws_dogtraining

About Alex

I was a Chemical Engineer with over 14 years experience working on some of the most dangerous chemical sites in the country. I always wanted a dog growing up, but was never able to provide a good home due to work requirements. Once I was able, my partner and I adopted Flint from a Romanian Rescue and I have always loved working with him. I found myself pre-empting what the trainer was going to suggest next so I started shadowing our balanced trainer to increase my knowledge and be able to further help my dog. At this point, I was becoming more and more interested into making dog training a career. Even when Flint was at his worst and redirecting his reactivity on to me and resource guarding, I still enjoyed working with him.

As I realised we weren't making progress with the reactivity, instead he was getting worse, I explored other options to see what would help. I didn't want to go into Force Free training as due to my personal experience with life, positive reinforcement without any repercussions for the poor behaviour, did not make sense to me.

We found Jess Probst and took Flint on a week long residential to deal with his issues, and to expand my training knowledge. I really enjoyed Jess Probst' ways of working, tackling the root cause of the emotion that led to poor behaviour and teaching new choices were incredibly effective with Flint and in one week, we had gone from a muzzle, prong collar and always on lead around other dogs, to off lead, unmuzzled and making good choices.

We had no intention of getting a second dog at this point, however Jess Probst had a neighbour who had just had a litter of Rottweiler puppies. I've always loved the soft & gentle nature of a well raised Rottweiler so we agreed to go see the puppies. As always, this was probably a silly idea as no one can resist an adorably cute puppy and before even leaving the residential, we had put a deposit down on Ember.

On return from the residential, I took voluntary redundancy at work and set up Proper Paws Dog Training. As we learnt more about Honest Hounds and as they partnered with Jess Probst, I joined to continue my professional development and this led to becoming an Affiliated trainer.

Now I really enjoy spending my days working with my dogs, and helping other people create the life they always envisioned with their dog!

Favourite Part Of Being A Dog Trainer?

Watching owners fall back in love with their dogs.

Favourite Breeds

My clients currently range from miniature dachshunds to a St. Bernard but I don't have a general breed preference - although I will admit I do prefer bigger dogs to help save my back from bending down all the time!

My Dogs

Flint - Ex-reactive Romanian rescue. He is a mix of lots of hound breeds with some shepherd, chihuahua and various other random breeds mixed in. I initially worked with a balanced trainer which just made his reactivity worse. Using more empathetic methods, prioritising behaviour over obedience, he has now become much more sociable and is able to make the right choices. He can still lean into his protector role on our pack walks as this is something he enjoys, but is able to do this in a stable and calm manner while still being engaged and listening to instruction from me. He is now so much happier in himself and his fun loving nature has come much more to the front now he isn't stressed. In his work role, he is the stooge I use to help me read other dogs intentions and he assists me teaching dogs appropriate social behaviour.

Ember - Rottweiler. She has always been raised in line with the empathetic and relationship based training methods used on Honest Hounds and is an absolutely delightful dog. She has never shown any issues with people or other dogs and generally is fun loving, easy going and chilled. On our pack walks, she is curious and anticipatory about meeting new dogs and people. In her work role, she takes on the opposing role to flint, being the fun and goofy dog to help dogs come out of their shells and realise not all dogs are a potential threat.