About Mill Creek Kennels

Mill Creek Kennels is a training and boarding farm at "6503 Terry Road Lavinia, TN". The business locates itself by drive rather than by town – "Only eighteen miles northeast of Jackson, we are centrally located in Cedar Grove, Tennessee in the Terry Farming Community", and lists "Milan, Medina, Huntingdon, Lexington, McKenzie, Paris, and Martin" as the places it is convenient to. It is "owned and operated by Mike and Shirley Simmons", who the site says "have been howlins with the pack since 2002!", on what it describes as a "100 acre training farm".

Pet obedience in three four-week levels

The obedience track is written for owners rather than hunters: "Mill Creek Kennel's obedience programs designed for the non-hunter pet owner who wants their canine to be a well-behaved citizen at home and away." The structure is published plainly – "There are three levels of Obedience training that include Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced. Each level is four weeks in duration and requires owner participation to learn the necessary handling skills." Basic covers "the Sit, Down, Here(Re-call), Pivot and Reverse Heel, maintaining steadiness with light distractions on leash" and is aimed at the AKC test; Intermediate "transitions the dog's basic commands to remote positions learning control off-leash." Ask what the Advanced level covers.

An approved AKC Canine Good Citizen site

The business states that "Mill Creek Kennels is proud to be an AKC certified Canine Good Citizen Training and Evaluation Center" and that as "an approved CGC site" it "has instructors and evaluators that can train and test for the 10 step requirements AKC requires for the certificate." A separate phone number, "(731) 987-7787", is published for CGC enquiries. Mike is described on the about page as holding "certifications in Canine Training and Behavior Techniques" and as "an AKC approved Canine Good Citizen Trainer and Evaluator", and the kennel says it is "a member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers, Jackson Area Chamber of Commerce". That is the business's own account.

The retriever side of the farm

The gun dog work is where the kennel started – "Our roots began training Gun Dog/Hunting Retrievers, UKC/AKC Hunt Tests, and Field Trials." It is priced monthly and residential: "Monthly training is $764. All monthly fees include training, boarding, food, and heartworm prevention". The ladder runs from a basic obedience foundation of "SIT, STAY, DOWN, HERE, and HEEL", where "Training methodology begins with short-lead commands, elevating to extended check chord, to final finish with the dog at remote locations without lead", through a Basic Gun Dog program built on "whistle, force fetch, hand casting, and e-collar conditioning" with an "Average completion time" of "eight to twelve months", to an Advanced program the site says requires "two to three years of extensive training" for owners interested in "competitive AKC/HRC hunt tests". Owners are pulled in rather than kept out: each client "is encouraged to participate in the learning process as much as possible to become a better handler at no additional charge."

What to ask

Ask about pet obedience pricing; the monthly gun dog fee is the price the site gives. Also ask whether it offers puppy classes, behavior or aggression work, or in-home training.