Shelly's School for Dogs has an innovative and comprehensive whole dog approach to training. As no two dogs are the same, no two training approaches are the same. Shelly has imported working and companion dogs from all around the world. Shelly's School for Dogs boasts the finest grooming facility in Monmouth County!
Reviews (10)
William Kerkstra
Feb 19, 2022
Pat Sentak
Jul 31, 2021
I enrolled my Yorkie, Ralphie, at Shelly's School for Dogs for obedience and off lease training. He was a rescue and really didn't have any real training. I have gotten so many compliments on how well he behaves from my neighbors. He is a different dog. I want to thank Trevor, (Ralphie'a trainer) for doing such a great job! I couldn't have done it on my own. I want to thank everyone at Shelly's and the staff at Green Leaf Pet Resort for all the help and kindness.
Jl
Oct 30, 2020
Our dog completed his 6-7 weeks training program a few weeks back, unfortunately we don't see any results at all. He was lunging at cars, chasing after squirrels and other dogs and we really needed this fixed. We live almost an hour away and have been sending our dog in 4 days a week 9am to 6pm. When I spoke to the trainer, he said he has 20 dogs a day and was spending only 10-15 mins over 3-4 times in a day with my dog.
So for the 8-9 hrs my dog spent at the training school, he basically got at best an hour of training a day. While he is not in training, my dog was placed in a crate. We persisted with the training while we were half way through as we didn't want to give up. But unfortunately the program feels like a scam to me. My dog also had bad diarrhea from coming here.
I met and spoke to another owner one day outside the resort and she said her dog also suffered from bad G.I issues after spending time here. I'm not sure is it is a coincidence or dogs are so stressed from being put on the choke collar in training here and suffered that as a result. I am heart broken when i see my dog suffer like that. Worse yet when we don't see result from the 6-7 weeks of training.
My dog seems so distressed now and his behaviour is worse than when I first sent him and I am absolutely heart broken. Not to mention more than $2000 we spent on the training program that has gone down the drain. I take it as a lesson learned, it's not hard to be sold on the program when you looked at the facility and the owner was definitely convincing.
I certainly hope other people have better experiences from us. It took me a while to decide to write this review but I feel like i need to be honest about my experience and share it.
So for the 8-9 hrs my dog spent at the training school, he basically got at best an hour of training a day. While he is not in training, my dog was placed in a crate. We persisted with the training while we were half way through as we didn't want to give up. But unfortunately the program feels like a scam to me. My dog also had bad diarrhea from coming here.
I met and spoke to another owner one day outside the resort and she said her dog also suffered from bad G.I issues after spending time here. I'm not sure is it is a coincidence or dogs are so stressed from being put on the choke collar in training here and suffered that as a result. I am heart broken when i see my dog suffer like that. Worse yet when we don't see result from the 6-7 weeks of training.
My dog seems so distressed now and his behaviour is worse than when I first sent him and I am absolutely heart broken. Not to mention more than $2000 we spent on the training program that has gone down the drain. I take it as a lesson learned, it's not hard to be sold on the program when you looked at the facility and the owner was definitely convincing.
I certainly hope other people have better experiences from us. It took me a while to decide to write this review but I feel like i need to be honest about my experience and share it.
Nidhi Singh
Apr 11, 2020
So I have very high hopes for get basic foundational training for our rescue dog. I picked them because of trust that they have trained a lot of dogs and that focused full board training will get our dog to a better state so that we can do advanced and agility training. I completely understand that dogs will need consistent training even after they are trained so that they can learn to listen to us.
Here is my big disappointment with this whole training process. We discussed a long list of things we wanted our dog to do (basically ability to pass urban canine good citizen test). - three weeks back home with us doing several training sessions with our dog. I have not seen a marked improvement certainly not worth the thousands of dollars we spent.
If we were to take him for the test he would fail 90 percent of it. One of the big reasons I sent our dog to green leaf for training was so that he can be socialized with dogs, have a proper structured training but much to our disappointment I don't think the dog spent any time with other dogs, he was trained mostly in confined structured space. I don't believe he was trained outside at all.
I was also disappointed that you are forced to sign the contract after dog comes back saying that you are satisfied with the training. Without this signing you would not get the sessions with the trainers. Lastly I was highly disappointed that Shelly never called back to discuss my concerns. I think the staff is responsive and likely took good care of our dog. Trainer has been helpful and have been responsive but overall I don't believe our expectations were met.
In hindsight I should have spent more time to get details of training and what is covered rather than relying on trusting the phone conversation to sign up for training. I did read the reviews of others and probably should have learned to ask in writing more details of training. My advice to others considering this training: - do ask for a lot more details of training in writing - do ask what is covered and not covered - ask for a review and end goal delivery of what to expect - set clear expectation for goals and ensure it's in writing that those goals will be met My advice to Green Leaf: - be clear about what you will be teaching the dog and what is expected - be transparent about the training process - be upfront on what the owner can expect for example if you had told me that our dog won't get to socialize with other dogs it would have been nice to discuss that upfront rather than saying yes they will be socialized. - please be responsive to concerns of the owners At the end, it has been disappointing experience overall and a very expensive lesson for us to learn:(
Here is my big disappointment with this whole training process. We discussed a long list of things we wanted our dog to do (basically ability to pass urban canine good citizen test). - three weeks back home with us doing several training sessions with our dog. I have not seen a marked improvement certainly not worth the thousands of dollars we spent.
If we were to take him for the test he would fail 90 percent of it. One of the big reasons I sent our dog to green leaf for training was so that he can be socialized with dogs, have a proper structured training but much to our disappointment I don't think the dog spent any time with other dogs, he was trained mostly in confined structured space. I don't believe he was trained outside at all.
I was also disappointed that you are forced to sign the contract after dog comes back saying that you are satisfied with the training. Without this signing you would not get the sessions with the trainers. Lastly I was highly disappointed that Shelly never called back to discuss my concerns. I think the staff is responsive and likely took good care of our dog. Trainer has been helpful and have been responsive but overall I don't believe our expectations were met.
In hindsight I should have spent more time to get details of training and what is covered rather than relying on trusting the phone conversation to sign up for training. I did read the reviews of others and probably should have learned to ask in writing more details of training. My advice to others considering this training: - do ask for a lot more details of training in writing - do ask what is covered and not covered - ask for a review and end goal delivery of what to expect - set clear expectation for goals and ensure it's in writing that those goals will be met My advice to Green Leaf: - be clear about what you will be teaching the dog and what is expected - be transparent about the training process - be upfront on what the owner can expect for example if you had told me that our dog won't get to socialize with other dogs it would have been nice to discuss that upfront rather than saying yes they will be socialized. - please be responsive to concerns of the owners At the end, it has been disappointing experience overall and a very expensive lesson for us to learn:(
Tricia Hogan
Jun 14, 2019
Scott trained my Jake and he is a better behaved dog. Scott is patient and kind but more importantly a great trainer. My observations of Scott showed knowledge and kindness. My Jake was a very stubborn student but Scott worked with him successfully! The entire training staff is kind and knowledgeable. I would recommend Scott and this school for pet training as my first choice! They do love dogs and the dogs do love them!
Elaina Spraker
Apr 07, 2019
Terrible experience. My dog got extremely sick while staying here despite their claims that they have high end bacteria fighting lights. Also, they were not transparent at all about the training process. I was led to believe the head trainer was training my puppy, only to discover he wasn't. They never seemed happy to give me updates. And despite dropping 4,000 dollars on training, my dog only responds on the leash. Yes.
It's great he walks on a leash. But he needs to be able to respond to commands off a Leash. When I shared these concerns with them, they blamed it on me and my lack of commitment to getting trained. I paid for my dog to get trained, not for myself? This is a complete waste of money. My dog is still sick and I regret spending so much money on a company so quick to charge you for extras and blame anyone but themselves for their failures.
It's great he walks on a leash. But he needs to be able to respond to commands off a Leash. When I shared these concerns with them, they blamed it on me and my lack of commitment to getting trained. I paid for my dog to get trained, not for myself? This is a complete waste of money. My dog is still sick and I regret spending so much money on a company so quick to charge you for extras and blame anyone but themselves for their failures.
Roseann I.
Jan 12, 2019
Green Leaf Resort is absolutely amazing! Our friends highly recommended Shelly's school for dog training (they went there when he was in Freehold). We decided to contact Shelly. Shelly took his time to explain his training program and we felt his background was not only impressive, he has extensive experience in training all types of dogs (breeds, rescues, behavioral). Shelly was always very responsive to our calls and emails.
We decided to enroll our energetic Australian Shepherd puppy (Beau) in the Day Training program. Our pup picked Matt as his Trainer. We were stunned by how well Matt synched with our puppy, Beau, and how much Beau adored him! Once Beau graduated from day training, during the demonstration Beau looked like a beautiful show dog with Matt. My husband and I were so impressed with how calm, focused and obedient Beau was with Matt! Beau's transformation is BEAUTIFUL.
Now we are in the process of transitioning Beau's training with what was taught by Matt to use at home. So now it's our turn for training! Currently, we are now in weekly training lessons with Matt at Green Leaf so we can transition the obedience that Beau learned at Training Day school for home. Beau gets SOOO excited when he sees Matt yet, Beau shows much respect for Matt during commands. Matt is patient, responsive, dedicated and has no problem correcting us as Beau's owners when we don't properly give Beau commands.
At home, Beau has much more self-control with our cats, becoming more obedient to our commands and is making great strides in transitioning with what was taught at home for us. WITHOUT any hesitation, we HIGHLY recommend using Shelley's school for training! And if your pup picks Matt, they are smart and will most definitely be in great hands!
We decided to enroll our energetic Australian Shepherd puppy (Beau) in the Day Training program. Our pup picked Matt as his Trainer. We were stunned by how well Matt synched with our puppy, Beau, and how much Beau adored him! Once Beau graduated from day training, during the demonstration Beau looked like a beautiful show dog with Matt. My husband and I were so impressed with how calm, focused and obedient Beau was with Matt! Beau's transformation is BEAUTIFUL.
Now we are in the process of transitioning Beau's training with what was taught by Matt to use at home. So now it's our turn for training! Currently, we are now in weekly training lessons with Matt at Green Leaf so we can transition the obedience that Beau learned at Training Day school for home. Beau gets SOOO excited when he sees Matt yet, Beau shows much respect for Matt during commands. Matt is patient, responsive, dedicated and has no problem correcting us as Beau's owners when we don't properly give Beau commands.
At home, Beau has much more self-control with our cats, becoming more obedient to our commands and is making great strides in transitioning with what was taught at home for us. WITHOUT any hesitation, we HIGHLY recommend using Shelley's school for training! And if your pup picks Matt, they are smart and will most definitely be in great hands!
Dina F.
Apr 01, 2018
We brought our new puppy to Shelly to help us train her to be around our other dog. After the initial consult he assured us he could help and we started training with Josh. He explained how long everything would take, was very responsive when I called him with concerns during the process, and now that he is done, WOW. We are impressed. We are still in "our" training classes where Josh teaches us how to control the dog but I love watching our pup with him.
You can tell she was in good hands with Josh and he really cares for the dogs he's working with. And she is responding great! This is the 2nd dog Shelly' s school has trained for me and I will continue to use them and recommend them in the future!
You can tell she was in good hands with Josh and he really cares for the dogs he's working with. And she is responding great! This is the 2nd dog Shelly' s school has trained for me and I will continue to use them and recommend them in the future!
Danielle Brown
Feb 03, 2018
This place is truly amazing! My 4 year old golden retriever is such a love bug but gets easily distracted. I brought her to Shelly's and I can't believe the improvement. Her trainer Josh is a godsend. He's so good with her and with me and has helped me so much with her. He and the rest of the staff really do love their jobs! I would like recommend this place to everyone who has dogs!
Do Lee
Oct 25, 2017
We left our Cooper for on-leash boarding and training for 3 weeks because while he was a sweet pup, he was also a handful on the leash and my wife and I were worried she would not be able to handle him as he got older. Josh was Cooper's trainer, and did a great job! Cooper was a completely different pup when we got him back. Even our dog walkers noticed the difference. And most importantly, Josh was great training us the parents after Cooper's training was done. We would highly recommend both Josh and Shelly's School for Dogs!
