About Dog Days Farm

Who they are

Dog Days Farm is Sarah Todd, CPDT-KA, working from a 132-acre farm in Salem, out in the Battenkill country of eastern Washington County. The credentials she publishes are the most specific of any trainer in this metro: CPDT-KA, a Nationally Certified Dog Trainer through the APDT, a certified professional member of the Association of Professional Dog Trainers, and former head trainer for the Monks of New Skete — the Cambridge, New York monastery whose German Shepherd program and training books are known well beyond this valley. Her stated motto is the line at the top of the site: dedicated to helping dogs and humans have better lives together.

What they offer

The core product is board and train, and the distinguishing feature is that it is kennel-free — dogs live in the house and on the farm rather than in runs. Stay and Play is the boarding-side version for dogs that do not need a program. Beyond residency there is at-home private training, where she drives to the client; behavioral consults and behavior modification; and phone consults, which the site pushes for people who need an answer immediately rather than an appointment. Herding is a service in its own right, listed on its own page — she describes herself as personally passionate about and a specialist in working and herding breeds and herding training. No other business in this metro publishes herding.

How they train

The stated approach is deliberately unbranded: a broad range of techniques, tailored to the dog as an individual, rather than one system applied to everybody. The farm framing carries the same idea — dogs are allowed to be dogs, she writes, while learning to become better family members.

Practical details

Salem is a long way from the center of this metro. The site names its catchment as Glens Falls, Saratoga Springs, Albany and Westchester County in New York plus southern Vermont, which tells you two things: the board-and-train clients travel to her, and the private-training clients get visited. That makes this the practical answer for owners out in the Washington County farm towns — Cambridge, Greenwich, Granville — who are otherwise 30 to 45 minutes from any trainer. The site publishes a gallery of past guests and testimonials but no prices; the phone consult is the fastest route to one.