Two Gold Awards!
It was with great pleasure that we awarded two very special Gold II awards back in July. The first was to Instructor Pauline and Frankie who became the 31st combination to achieve this award in the 11 years we have been trading. This means Pauline now has two Gold II dogs!
The second was to Kevin, who is our invaluable assistant at Thanington, and Sheba his collie who are the 32nd combination to achieve this award. This also brings Kevin’s household total to two Gold II dogs as his wife Annette, who is an Instructor at Thanington reached Gold II with Cassie in 2016.
Please join us in congratulating them all.
(Our apologies for not posting this announcement sooner. Our website has been undergoing an update in the background and this is the first opportunity for us to post).
Golden end to our first course back after lockdown
It was with great pleasure that we awarded two very special Gold II awards at the end of our first course back after lockdown. The first was to Angela and Tasker who became the 29th combination to achieve this award in the 11 years we have been trading. This also marked the completion of Angela’s instructor training and we are delighted to welcome her to Enve team.
The second was to Sally, Jeremy and Castro who have been with us for nearly our entire Enve journey, from his first puppy class on 27th July 2013 to his Gold II award in 2021. A great example of perseverance and dedication. Castro claims the 30th spot. All our Gold II owners are presented with a polo shirt with their Enve Gold number on in Roman numerals. Castro is Enve Gold XXX. This makes me chuckle as it makes me think of the Vin Diesel movie XXX and the crazy action stunts and this really reminds me of some of the mischief Castro got up to in his younger days. Love him.
Please join us in congratulating them all.
April opening and addition of Scentwork classes!
After yet another lockdown we can finally announce that we are reopening. Enve Canine Services will be re-starting their dog training classes at all venues from Saturday 17th April (provided Step 2 of the governments roadmap out of lockdown goes ahead from 12th April). We cannot tell you how much we are looking forward to seeing each and every one of you and getting back to normality! Thank you for your ongoing support in what has been a very challenging year.
We aim to restart as follows:
- Sat 17th April – Minster (morning ) – 6 week course
- Sun 18th April – Thanington (morning) – 6 week course
- **NEW** Wed 21st April – Minster (morning) – 5 week course
- Thurs 22nd April – Deal (morning) – 6 week course
- Fri 23rd April – RSPCA Animal Centre (morning) – 5 week course
- Mon 26th April – RSPCA Animal Centre (morning) – 4 week course (no class bank holiday 3rd May)
We return with the exciting addition of scentwork to our repertoire. Following training six of our instructors with Scentwork UK in January 2020 the coronavirus pandemic limited our planned roll out of this exciting new activity. We are pleased to announce that Wednesday classes will now be obedience with an introduction to scentwork at the Minster venue. Scentwork utilises your dog’s number one sense. Learn to work your dog like a search handler looking for hidden scent. Teach them to indicate, to show you where the item is. Scentwork is a great mental work out for your dog and tires them out in ways you cannot achieve physically. It’s the job many were bred for, uses their natural abilities, the dogs love it and it is hugely rewarding for the handler too. All breeds can take part and all ages.
Please keep an eye on your inboxes and messages, if you have signed up to our waiting list your class time will be winging its way to you very soon! See you on the training field, lets have some fun!
Lockdown 3 - here we go again!
Here we are again and what can we say. Apologies it’s taken a couple of days to write this update we have been waiting for trading standards and government guidance to be updated. Both of us are feeling miserable but really wanted to compose something positive.
This pandemic has been really hard on our small business and being able to reopen in a small way in December, seeing everyone’s (dogs and humans) happiness at being back at class, doing what we love again has meant that this has hit harder than November’s lockdown – especially with no clear end in sight. We are on the right path though and we have to have faith in the vaccination program and that spring 2021 has brighter prospects. We know that with your continued support we can come back in the spring and pick up where we left off. One bonus is at least the weather will be warmer and drier!! We stay home now to protect each other so that when we do get back together, everyone is there.
As per government guidelines group classes and 1:1 appointments are on hold for the foreseeable future. Neither are permissible by law in the current lockdown. You can still support us though by ordering your dog treats from us instead of picking them up from the supermarket with your shopping ( https://www.envecanineservices.co.uk/finer-by-nature-catalogue/ ) or treating your dog to a tug toy from us instead of ordering online (https://www.envecanineservices.co.uk/toys-and-other-equipment/ ).
In addition we have our online course, Good Dog Level 1 for anyone new, waiting to join us with puppies or adult dogs. This is a basic obedience, 6 week course with daily videos. These easy to follow videos introduce exercises on loose lead walking, sit stay, recall, leave and much, much more. Now is the perfect opportunity to crack on with this course in the comfort of your own home, garden and on your daily walks. By the time group training courses reopen you will have a strong foundation in training techniques and your dog will have a baseline understanding of what is expected. You will be perfectly ready to then take your training to the next level at group lessons adding in the distraction of the environment, people and other dogs. You’ll be amazed at the difference that practicing daily can make. As well as lifetime access to the course, you will have support from us via email and a dedicated Facebook group. For more information please see https://www.envecanineservices.co.uk/online-training-courses/
Stay safe everyone and as always if you need anything during the lockdown please do not hesitate to get in touch. Look forward to seeing you all as soon as we are allowed.
Emma, Ve and the rest of the Enve team.
Christmas message and Covid-19 update
- Our 10th year trading anniversary.
- Addition of canine hoopers to our training program.
- Addition of Deal, our 5th venue.
- Taking on our first employee.
- Engaging a canine behaviour practitioner consultant to manage our high volume of 1:1 appointments.
- Qualifying six of our instructors with Scentwork UK.
- Addition of Scentwork lessons to our training program.
- Purchasing a complete, brand new agility kit and hoopers kit including giant tunnels.
- Launching our first online training course Good Dog Level 1 (learning about online course writing, filming, editing and marketing on the way!)
- Passing 5 more dogs at the highest level ENVE Gold II bringing the total to 30 dogs in 10 years reaching this prestigious level.
Looking back at happier times - two more Gold II passes in March 2020
At the final Saturday session of training classes we held on 22nd March, ahead of the first lockdown, we awarded not one but two Gold II awards – both to Labradors! This post to congratulate those receiving the awards got somehow missed in amongst all of the covid-19 drama! I do apologise.
The first was to our Ve and Mia who became the 26th pair to be awarded Gold II, closely followed by Iain with the lovely Gill who were the 28th combination.
But, hang on I hear you say, you’ve gotten that wrong – you have missed number 27. I haven’t – the 27th spot was taken by one of our St Nicholas clients, Paul with his gorgeous Vizsla Milo, who snuck in between the two labs. Milo was Paul’s second Gold II award having already taken the 22nd spot with his boxer Tosh making Paul the 4th person to get two dogs to Gold II – well done! (I unfortunately don’t have a photo of Paul and Milo).
Lockdown 2 - temporary closure
We’ve been here before and no doubt we will be here again before this is all over. The difference is we know a bit more this time - it’s not so scary or unknown. We know that with your continued support we can come back and pick up where we left off.
We stay home now to protect each other so that when we do get back together, everyone is there.
As per government guidelines classes are therefore on hold from 2nd November until 2nd December when we hope to resume for mini courses in the lead up to Christmas. All being well normal courses will resume from January 2021. Stay safe everyone and if you need anything during the lockdown please do not hesitate to get in touch via the enquiry page or email. Look forward to seeing you in a months time.
Emma, Ve and all the Enve team x
10 Years in business!
1st October 2020 marks Enve Canine Services 10 year anniversary trading and what a 10 years it’s been. From a part time hobby business to a full time job for us both with our first employee taken on last year. From 2 venues, 2 days a week to 5 venues, 6 days a week, we have trained thousands of dogs and more importantly their owners. Starting with obedience and agility and adding Scentwork and hoopers along the way. We’ve gone from being virtually strangers to the best of friends, learnt to run a business, studied numerous canine courses in our quest for knowledge, Ve has gained a degree and post grad diploma in Veterinary Physiotherapy and Emma has had 2 children. Emma has sadly lost Rocky and Apollo, two of our founding canine members, but Ve’s black Labrador Missie has been with us every step of the way.
None of this would have been possible without our volunteer instructors, our friends, who have given up their time in the best and worst of weathers to help and support us on our journey. We are ever thankful to them.
And, you, our clients. We have loved working with each and every one of you. Each dog teaches us something new and makes us better trainers for those that come after. To know that we have helped solve problem behaviours, helped dogs fill their potential, created partnerships and helped dogs become happy, well behaved family members means everything. When lockdown was announced I think everyone saw how distraught we were at the thought of losing the community we had grown. We love what we do and are thankful we can continue even through these difficult times.
Thank you everyone, here's to the next 10 years!
Exciting news - we are opening!
After 4 long months of uncertainty, in a very much
changed world due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we can finally announce that we are
back in business!! Enve Canine Services will be re-starting their weekend dog
training classes on Saturday 8th August at Minster and Sunday 9th August at
Thanington (provisional dates). We cannot tell you how much we are looking
forward to seeing each and every one of you and getting back to some thread of
normality!
Our reopening will be phased to enable us to make sure
the new health and safety measures are working. We will start by reopening the
weekend classes to those that were attending at the point that lockdown was
implemented. We hope that many of you will be able to return but appreciate
that for some, circumstances may have changed. Please keep an eye on your email
and what’s app messages and get back to us ASAP. After that we will offer
places to anyone who was attending on a weekday (as those classes will not
resume until September). We will then start offering places to people from our
weekend waiting lists. Please be patient, we will try to get everyone into
class as soon as we can.
As with everything, your experience with us will need to
be slightly different to before COVID-19 came along. As well as precautions to
safeguard everyone from the risk of contracting or spreading coronavirus, we
have had to make changes to the content of the training syllabus. These changes
are made in accordance with our risk assessment (which you will find on our
website new.envecanineservices.co.uk/covid-19-risk-assessment/
) and in line with Health and Safety directives, government guidance, kennel
club advice and the Canine and Feline Sector Group (who advise DEFRA). We hope
that these changes will not put you off returning. We promise that the training
content will be just as fun and just as challenging as before. The main change
is that all dogs (with the exception of puppies in puppy class) will need to
remain on lead at all times in the training areas as we are using public
spaces. That means that exercises that would have previously been completed
off-lead will need the dog to be on a long line instead. With this safety
precaution in place we can still carry out virtually all of the exercises.
Hopefully as the pandemic eases so will these restrictions. If you are at
silver or gold level we suggest that you purchase your own long line for use in
the lessons if you do not already have one. This will enable you to simulate
the dog being off lead but remain in complete control. (This is one of the ones
we use in class (7m long) https://www.cannyco.com/shop/canny-recall-lead
or you could look at horses lunge lines or canine tracking lines).
In order to be able to go ahead and reopen we need to ask everyone to abide by the Enve COVID-19 rules. These rules are in place to protect both your health and ours. They are also mandated by the venues we hire and the law. Anyone not following the rules below puts our livelihood at risk. We have made it through a forced 4 month closure - we cannot afford to do that again. These COVID-19 specific rules have been added to our terms and conditions which can be found in full here: https://www.envecanineservices.co.uk/training/terms-and-conditions/ . By accepting a space on a course you are agreeing to abide by these conditions.
We appreciate it is a lot to take in and this new normal
will take time to get used to. We thank you for your ongoing support. We look
forward to hopefully seeing you at class very soon.
Emma, Ve and the rest of the Enve team
Challenge 6 - Boundary activities
This is the sixth instructional video from the series we hope to share whilst we are all in isolation due to COVID-19. In it you will find some information on boundary activities to help teach your dog to stay in a set location until released. This training can help with teaching your dog to stay for example in its bed whilst visitors arrive, stay in a specific location whilst you prepare or eat food, stay in the car boot when opened or maintain distance whilst training distance control (if you have a dog that returns to you for reward by hand). All is explained in the video and your challenge is to train your dog to go to a specified location and stay there until released. Good luck!