Emily Leiby, CCDT-DT

PictureEmily & Journey & Maple

I’ve always had a passion for animals since I was young from guinea pigs and chinchillas to a calf and multiple horses, and of course dogs! As my passion grew, I began my journey into the dog world at a professional level. I worked at a daycare/boarding/training facility, where I started as a pet care specialist, but quickly moved up to become a trainer, and eventually assistant manager for over the years.

Aside from my background in training, I am also involved in dog sports. My husband and I are avid disc players with our border collie, Journey, and lab mix, Asher.  Our newest addition Maple, also a border collie, will be hitting the disc field soon. We also participate in FastCAT with our Irish Setter, Oakley. We’ve earned multiple titles in all levels together, but most of all, we had fun reaching our goals and strengthening our partnership as a team together. This then translates to our well balanced pack life at home. Our latest “guest” for rehab-rehome is a lab/boxer mix named Kobe. 

You might consider that a dog trainer's life with dogs is problem free, but that is often not the case, especially as with our Irish Setter Oakley.  He had to work through his reactivity at a very young age by changing how he feels around other dogs. Through a lot of hard work and consistency, he can calmly pass by other dogs anywhere out in public. One of our border collies, Journey, was extremely under-socialized and fearful of the world when we adopted her at 10 months old. Through a lot of positive exposure and consistency, Journey can confidently go out in public with little to no fear of the world around her, which is a huge accomplishment from where she began her “Journey” with me. 

My passion has really turned to how to teach owners to live fluidly and easily with their dogs. The most important concept to me is how to have the needs of both the owner and the dog met successfully. Every dog and owner are unique in certain ways, and I really pride myself in working within that uniqueness to make their training experience successful and life changing. It’s never a straight path to success, you will pass over milestone hills and through low valleys until you reach that great mountain of success! I’m looking forward to guiding you and your dog on that journey as a team team together!