Carol Byrnes, CPDT-KA

Carol attended her first dog training class in 1974 and started teaching as a volunteer at a local club in 1978, where Carol began her instructing career and over many years served as an officer, board member, and assistant director of training. She helped develop their first Puppy Preschool curriculum. Carol has been involved with training and showing dogs in both conformation and obedience since 1974. During the 80's they were founding members of the Inland Empire Doberman Pinscher Club and Doberman Rescue. While following every show circuit competing in AKC conformation and obedience and hanging ribbons on the wall was once a focus, Carol & Dana started traveling great distances to spend weekends at behavior seminars instead of show rings. They discovered clicker training. Captivated by the study of canine behavior, they found their calling: teaching families to better understand their pets. They abandoned their choke chains and military style "forward & halt" training in favor of motivational no-force methods that focused on building great relationships between families and their pets and haven't looked back. Carol & husband Dana instructed for The Family Dog from 1992-96 and opened Diamonds in the Ruff in 1996 with the goal of providing positive, dog and people friendly training for Spokane's pet owners. Their goal is to not just teach the mechanics of training, but provide instruction that helps their students develop an understanding of how dogs learn and view the world.In the community:In 1991, Carol began work with Spokane area hospitals to research and draft protocols for the first pet-assisted therapy programs which continue to this day. Carol's whippet Rio was the first dog to set paw in a Spokane hospital in 1992. They were well-known by staff and patients at Deaconess, Sacred Heart, St. Luke's Rehabilitation Institute, Shriner's Hospital for Crippled Children and Sunshine Gardens elderly care center, where Carol & Dana provided pet-assisted therapy visits with their whippets Rio, Spinner, & Eddie for many years. Carol served as a certified Pet Partners evaluator for the Delta Society in Renton to provide Pet Partners® aptitude and temperament screening for potential pet-assisted therapy animals until 2001.On ScreenIn January of 2007, Carol's Beagle/Rat Terrier mix Stanley was chosen by North by Northwest productions to play the role of "Buster" in a Lifetime movie channel production "The Family Holiday" which was released Nov 6, 2007. He was later cast as "unconscious dog in an elevator" along with several other Diamonds in the Ruff instructors' and students' dogs in the movie "Falling Up" released in 2008.What is My Dog Saying?Carol released a CD of her canine communication Power Point presentation "What is My Dog Saying?" in 2008, selling hundreds of copies all over the world in a matter of months. It is part of the curriculum of the International Institute for Animal Assisted Play Therapy and available for purchase through director Rise Van Fleet's online store. In 2009 Karen Pryor contacted Carol to sell her CDs through Sunshine Books on Karen's online store at www.clickertraining.com. It is also available through Dogwise.com. Carol has presented her workshop on reading body language and understanding canine communication for the Washington Animal Care & Control Association in Oct 2007 and for the Intermountain Search Dogs annual Washington Dog Meet in Sept 2008.In 2011, Carol started work on "What is My Dog Saying - at the Dog Park?" which was released in the fall of 2011. In January of 2012 she began work on "What is My Cat Saying?" in collaboration with cat behavior specialist, Jacqueline Munera of Positive Cattitudes which was released in the fall of 2013.Carol's current passion is leading the training team at the Airway Heights Corrections Center's Pawsitive Dog Prison Training Program where offenders attend weekly training and behavior lessons and train shelter dogs to help them become more adoptable. Not only are the dogs learning to be better companions, but they are teachers, too, teaching these men lessons of kindness, empathy and patience. Of all the training assignments she has ever had in her training career, Carol says this program is the most rewarding project she has ever done.