What happens at a dog daycare assessment
Every dog does a free assessment before their first full day. Owners are often nervous about it, usually because it sounds like a test their dog could fail. It is closer to an introduction, and here is what actually happens.
The shape of it
Your dog meets a couple of our staff first, in a controlled setting, away from the group. Then a couple of our regular dogs — dogs we know well and trust to be fair — are introduced.
That is it. It is deliberately small. Throwing a new dog into a full pack tells you very little except how they cope with being overwhelmed.
What we are actually watching
How they greet people. Not whether they are friendly — most dogs are — but how they handle a stranger reaching toward them, and whether they recover if something startles them.
How they read other dogs. The interesting part is not play. It is whether your dog notices when another dog has had enough, and whether they can take that signal and back off. Dogs who read the room do well in a group; dogs who barrel through it need a different group.
How quickly they settle. Almost every dog is over-aroused in a new place. What matters is what happens five minutes later. A dog who comes down from that on their own is telling us a lot.
What we do with what we see
Afterwards we will tell you which playgroup we think suits your dog. We group by temperament and energy level rather than size, which surprises people — but a steady 50-pound dog often has a much better day with other steady dogs than in a room of bouncy small ones.
Our recommendation is a recommendation. The decision is yours, and if you would prefer your small dog stay in the dedicated small-dog area, that option is always available.
If the group we picked turns out to be wrong, we move them. Nobody gets it right every time from one meeting.
If your dog isn’t ready
Sometimes the honest answer is “not yet.” A dog who is genuinely frightened of other dogs, or who cannot take a correction from one, is not going to enjoy a day here — and telling you otherwise would be taking your money to make your dog miserable.
If that is where we land, we will say so and tell you what we saw. Some dogs come back a few months later and do fine.
How to prepare
There is not much to do, which is the point. Do not skip your dog’s usual morning walk; a dog who arrives with some of the edge off shows us more of their normal self. Bring the vaccination records if they are not already uploaded.
And try not to hover at the door. Dogs read their owners closely, and an anxious goodbye makes the first ten minutes harder than they need to be.