18/10/2026
The Dog Who Needs Us Less
One of the greatest successes we can have at Dereham Dog Den is a dog who gradually needs us less.
That might sound like a strange ambition for a daycare where so much of our work involves supervising, guiding and interacting with dogs. But there's an important difference between a dog who behaves well because someone is constantly managing them and a dog who has learned to make good decisions for themselves.
And it's that second dog we're working towards.
When a dog first joins us, they might need plenty of guidance. We may help them disengage from exciting play, encourage them to settle, support them around other dogs or remind them to wait rather than rush through a gate.
There's nothing wrong with that. Learning takes time, and our job is to provide the support they need while those skills develop.
But we don't want to be giving those same reminders forever.
Over time, we want to see the dog who once needed help settling choose to lie down and rest without being asked. The dog who struggled to leave an exciting game recognise when they've had enough and walk away. The dog who used to rush towards an open gate pause and wait because they've learned that's what we do.
These might seem like small things, but they're significant achievements.
They tell us that the dog is beginning to take responsibility for their own behaviour rather than relying on somebody else to manage every decision.
Of course, that doesn't happen simply by putting dogs together and hoping they'll figure things out.
It comes from consistent expectations, carefully managed opportunities, appropriate reinforcement and knowing when to offer guidance and when to allow a dog to think for themselves.
In fact, one of the easiest mistakes to make when working with dogs is to become too involved.
If we're constantly telling a dog to sit, wait, settle, leave something alone or come away from another dog, we might achieve the behaviour we want in that moment. But we can also create a dog who waits for instructions rather than learning to recognise situations and make those decisions independently.
Sometimes the most useful thing we can do is give a dog the opportunity to make the right choice before we tell them what that choice should be.
That's also why we don't believe good daycare means keeping dogs constantly entertained or staff constantly involved in every interaction. There needs to be room for dogs to practise the skills we're teaching them.
And those skills have value beyond the Den. Learning to regulate excitement, cope with frustration, settle independently and make sensible choices are all abilities that can help dogs navigate everyday life.
We still provide guidance when it's needed, and we never stop observing or supporting the dogs in our care. But as their skills develop, our involvement can become less frequent and more subtle.
Because the ultimate goal of good training isn't a dog who needs to be told what to do all the time.
It's a dog who has learned what to do when nobody is telling them.
