We are open!

Winter & Spring 2022 Update:  Masks are optional (as of 2/10/22) during indoor lessons.  We will default towards wearing a mask but if our clients prefer to not wear a mask, we are fine with this.  Thank you for understanding!!

As of January 3, 2022, Gene and Kinna received their third dose booster vaccinations.

As of April 21, 2021, Animal Connection Training Owners/Trainers Gene and Kinna are both fully vaccinated for the COVID-19 virus.

We thank all the local, regional, and national health care professionals for making this possible.

Our options for teaching:

We can teach outdoor lessons at your house or at the training center in Saranac Lake.  We have a covered porch at the training center for rainy (but not stormy as it is an open porch) weather.

We can also have single family inside lessons at the training center in Saranac Lake.  Here are the steps we’ve taken:

  • We have a hand wash station at the center.
  • We ventilate with outside air if the temperature is appropriate, and, as of late September 2020, we have an air filter certified to clean the air every 12 minutes of viruses, bacteria, and allergens.

We will continue to provide Zoom lessons also as we’ve discovered these remote lessons help dogs who are nervous at the training center or even in the presence of strangers.  For many clients, we may start with Zoom lessons and graduate to the outdoor, in – person lessons.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Zoom Video Lessons:

We’ve switched to using video conferencing for lessons during the virus season — and we’re successfully using the application Zoom for these lessons.  If you’d signed up for private lessons, your Zoom session will be 60 minutes – the same length as a regular private lesson.

How this works (and why it’s working so well!):

  • Our training approach is hands off in general.  We tend to watch and coach you so you can learn how to train on your own.  So, with the Zoom lessons, we’ll do our usual combination of watching you, giving you steps for learning more, and we’ll have our own dogs available to do demonstrations if needed.
  • We’ll send you a link for the Zoom meeting and we’d like it if you can set up the camera so you can show us your work and we can offer live assistance.
  • If you can’t do the video conferencing, a second option is for you to send us a video (or more) of your work with your dog.  We can then set up a phone call with you to go over the video.  We’ll also most likely be able to send you the video back with a voice over explaining how it looks to us and what we recommend for progressions.  And, if you need a video to explain any concepts, we can take one with our dogs as demonstrations are easier than explanations!  We can send you information about how to transfer a video to us via a program called Dropbox.
  • Finally, if your home technology is only equipped for a phone call, we will be happy to speak with you about the training level you’re at and offer advice for the next steps!

And, for a little humor about Zoom lessons, see below……

We’re open for lessons from Wednesday – Saturdays so can work with you for a good time slot.

Best wishes and stay healthy,

Kinna, Gene, Laddie, and Britta, etc.
518-637-1170
animalconnectiontraining@gmail.com