A DOG TRAINER from Wrexham recently got the chance to train monkeys and baboons.

Karen Boyce, from Beastly Thoughts Professional Dog Services, had a rare and amazing opportunity to go behind the scenes at Paignton Zoo in Devon.

She was part of the Puppy School UK Regional Managers Team Building exercise that spent two days learning about zoo animal training from one of the UK’s leading zoo educators, Jo Mason of Educating Animals.

Karen said: “The zoo-keepers were extremely welcoming and allowed us access across the two days to conduct training sessions with both the Diane monkeys and the Hamadryas baboons, and to practice teaching behaviours that would be beneficial to them.”

For the baboons, the Puppy School tutors were asked to train a completely new behaviour of the animal being encouraged and rewarded for putting its arm into a plastic sleeve.

The sleeve was topped with a couple of small holes that eventually would allow a needle to be inserted for vaccination and blood testing purposes.

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For the exercise to be successful the baboon was rewarded for holding a thin bar at the end of the sleeve for a longer and longer duration.

Karen added: “I was so surprised as to how quickly the baboons learnt the steps towards the behaviour we wanted; all for a few peanuts and raisins. The Paignton zoo-keepers had already taught the baboons to come for rewards, to move up or down on cue and to touch the handler’s finger so they were already very willing to try and cooperate to get more rewards."

The two days also included talks on health and safety when training zoo animals, and most importantly the training process behind positive reward-based training of an animal you can’t touch.

Karen said: “Seeing animals, including the gorilla, at the zoo being cooperative for handling, examination and inspection purposes when they are the other side of a mesh fence or barrier makes me as a dog trainer realise that I rely far too much on being able to restrain a dog.

"Taking my experience forward I will be implementing far more cooperative training with my own dogs and teaching my clients how to put less stress on their dogs and train for more consensual behaviours.

“I am really hoping I can get back some time to continue this experience, particularly as we were also allowed to go behind the scenes to feed the giraffes!”

Karen, has been helping families and their pets for more than 25 years, and her Beastly Thoughts Professional Dog Service (BTPDS) business in its own right is celebrating 17 years this year in the Wrexham to Oswestry area.