Puppy School and Dog Training in Kirribilli

We run puppy school about seven minutes from Kirribilli on Military Road in Neutral Bay, and we train older dogs one to one in your own home across Kirribilli, Milsons Point and North Sydney.

See What We Do
No pain. No fear. No force. Training in your own home · Free meet and greet, no obligation
No pain. No fear. No force. Training in your own home · Free meet and greet, no obligation

Dog training in Kirribilli, the short version

Quick Facts

Where We Work: In your own home, across Kirribilli, Milsons Point, North Sydney and Neutral Bay

What We Offer

Council Area

North Sydney

Nearest Puppy School Location

DoggieLove, 71 Military Road, Neutral Bay NSW 2089

Distance

About 2 km, roughly seven minutes by car

What We Cover

Puppies from eight weeks, teenage dogs, and adult behaviour

Who Does The Training?

Luke Buchanan. Dog Trainer Academy accredited, Red Cross pet first aid, AFP background checked

Puppy school and puppy preschool near Kirribilli

Venue Name

Venue Name

DoggieLove, Neutral Bay

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Venue Address

Venue Address

71 Military Road, Neutral Bay NSW 2089

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Days & Times

Days & Times

Four weeks, one hour a week. Rolling start, no fixed intake dates

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About The School

About The School

Puppy school, puppy preschool and puppy kindergarten all mean the same thing. Vets tend to say preschool, we say puppy school, and it is the same four weeks either way.

Your nearest one is DoggieLove on Military Road in Neutral Bay, about 2 km away. It is a professional dog facility rather than a hired hall, fully enclosed and properly cleaned, which matters when puppies are meeting each other for the first time.

Classes stay between six and ten puppies and we match them by size, so your puppy is never learning next to a dog four times their weight.

Where we work around Kirribilli

What it is like owning a dog in Kirribilli

What It Is like

Kirribilli is dense, mostly apartments, and squeezed between the bridge and the harbour. It is one of the smallest suburbs we work in and one of the busiest, because the foreshore here is a destination for the whole city.

North Sydney's rule is that all its parks and reserves are off lead unless listed as an exception, and none of the Kirribilli parks are on that exception list. Milson Park is a good local option, with dogs welcome and a ten metre exclusion around the playground.

The catch is that nothing here is fenced and the foreshore is genuinely busy. Bradfield Park hosts monthly markets, and a market day changes the park completely for a dog who is not comfortable in crowds.

Popular Bondi Landmarks
  • Bradfield Park
  • Milson Park
  • Kirribilli Wharf
  • Milsons Point Station
  • Careening Cove
  • Broughton Street
  • Sydney Harbour Bridge
Main Housing Style

Almost entirely apartments, many in older blocks with lifts and shared lobbies. Very little private outdoor space.

Dog obedience and behaviour problems in Kirribilli

Local Challenges

  • Separation anxiety. Dense apartment living with neighbours on every side, and strata usually hear about it before you do
  • Lift and lobby reactivity, where there is no distance available and no way to leave
  • Crowds. The foreshore here is a destination for the whole city, so your local park is often full of strangers
  • Nothing is fenced. North Sydney publishes no fenced dog park anywhere in the area
  • Bradfield Park hosts monthly markets, which changes the park completely for a dog who is uneasy in crowds
  • Toileting with no private outdoor space, so every part of it has to be taught deliberately

Common Breeds

  • Cavoodle
  • French Bulldog
  • Cavalier King Charles Spaniel
  • Miniature Poodle
  • Whippet

Off Lead Spots

  • Milson Park, Careening Cove, off lead, ten metres clear of the playground
  • Anderson Park, Neutral Bay, off lead, not on the sports fields during organised sport
  • Forsyth Park, Neutral Bay, off lead, on lead in the bushland areas
  • Kurraba Reserve, Neutral Bay, off lead, ten metres clear of the playground
  • Cremorne Reserve is on lead at all times. It is a named exception

Busy Streets

  • Alfred Street
  • Broughton Street
  • Kirribilli Avenue
  • Fitzroy Street

What we get called about in Kirribilli, by age

Puppies up to 16 weeks in Kirribilli

Toileting with no garden

A puppy in a house learns half of this by accident. In a Kirribilli flat there is no accident to have. Every toilet break is a corridor, a lift and a street, and a puppy who cannot hold it that long learns to go indoors instead.

We build the route before the puppy needs it, so the lift and the lobby are boring by the time they are urgent.

A foreshore full of strangers

Bradfield Park and the Kirribilli foreshore are destinations for the whole city, so your local walk is often crowded with people who all want to say hello to a puppy. That is a lot for a nine week old.

We tell you which hours to use and how to manage the greetings, so your puppy is choosing them rather than enduring them.

Learning the lift from the start

Before vaccinations, carrying is sensible. The problem is that in a building it never quite stops, and by four months you have a puppy whose feet have barely touched the shared parts of their own home.

We plan when the carrying stops and what replaces it, so the lift is normal rather than something they only ever see from someone's arms.

Teenage dogs, 17 to 32 weeks, in Kirribilli

Reactivity in the lift and the lobby

The Kirribilli adolescent problem. A dog who was fine in the lift at four months starts barking at six, and there is nowhere to take them, because the lobby is the only way out of the building.

We work in your actual building on your actual floor, starting with the lift empty and stationary, because a lift cannot be rehearsed anywhere else.

Recall going, with nothing fenced

North Sydney publishes no fenced dog park at all, and the Kirribilli parks run down to the water with roads and ferry wharves nearby. An adolescent who ignores you there has very little margin.

We rebuild it on a long line at the distance it actually breaks, in the park you actually use.

Being overwhelmed on a market day

Bradfield Park is a quiet park most days and a crowd once a month. An adolescent who has a bad experience on a market day can decide the whole park is a problem.

We plan around it rather than pretending it is not happening, and use it deliberately once your dog is ready.

Dogs 32 weeks and older in Kirribilli

Barking when you leave, with strata involved

The most common call here and the one with a deadline, because it usually arrives after a letter. Owners have almost always tried a camera, a longer walk and the radio before they ring.

We start inside the flat rather than at the front door, because being left is only unbearable when being together was never neutral.

A dog who cannot use the lift

Owners end up on fire stairs, going out at odd hours, or carrying a dog who is too heavy to carry. All of those work and none of them fix anything, and they usually make the dog worse because the lift stays frightening.

We do this in your building, with your lift, in short pieces. It is one of the more satisfying things to fix because the change is so obvious.

A dog who has stopped coping with crowds

In a suburb this small, when the foreshore becomes unbearable there is not much left. Owners narrow their routine down to one quiet lap and the dog gets less world every month.

We find the quietest version of your route and the quietest hour, and rebuild from there rather than pushing through.

A man crouching in a studio while holding a Dalmatian puppy. The man is wearing a dark navy polo shirt and blue jeans, and the puppy is white with black spots.

A Kirribilli call out, start to finish

A composite of the calls we take here. Details changed, the pattern is real.

The call

A three year old Cavalier in a block off Broughton Street. He had started barking and backing away from strangers on the foreshore, and the owner could not work out why, because he had always been the friendliest dog on the street.

What we found

He was the friendliest dog on the street, and that was the problem. Everyone stopped to pat him, all the time, and he had never once been allowed to decline. Three years of that had turned a sociable dog into one who had started saying no the only way that had ever worked.

What changed

We gave him a way to opt out. The owner started intercepting greetings rather than allowing every one, and we taught the dog to move behind her when he wanted to. Within about three weeks the barking stopped, because he no longer needed it. He is still friendly. He is just allowed to choose now.

What owners say, at every age

Absolutely fantastic, we had a 10 week old demanding Labrador puppy, 3 days later he barely lets out a yelp. It seemed expensive to get 1 on 1 help at first, but having him here meant we could remove any doubt about whether we were on the right track. Plus his online course and ongoing support have been a god send.

Mattice, 10 week old Labrador

I'm in Bellevue Hill and I'm struggling with recall and defiance with my 9 month old puppy. He thinks he's the boss. Luke at Toe Beans showed me a series of easy corrections and behavioural skills that my pup responded to almost immediately. He filled in my missing knowledge.

Lesley, 9 month old puppy, Bellevue Hill

I couldn't believe anyone could really have a big impact on a 7-year-old pet but within just one session, I could see a big difference in both of my dogs. They were calmer, more responsive, and Rosie was completely de-stressed around strange dogs.

Adrienne, 7 year old Bordoodle, Mosman

How we train

How We Train

How We Train

Force free, all of it. No shouting, no punishment, no pain, and nothing that works by hurting your dog.

We call it Relational Leadership. It is less a set of commands than a way of behaving around your dog, so that you become the obvious thing to look at when they do not know what to do. A dog that complies because it is worried about what comes next has not calmed down, it has gone quiet, and that comes back later somewhere less convenient.

Luke's Credentials

Luke Buchanan is the owner of The Toe Beans Co and Sydney's Puppy Trainer. He works as a dog trainer and a dog behaviourist, which in practice means the puppy obedience side and the behaviourism side are handled by the same person rather than referred on. He is accredited through the Dog Trainer Academy, Red Cross certified in pet first aid, and AFP background checked. Every session is run by Luke.

Force Free & Ethical. Always.

No pain. No fear. No force. No aggression. That is the whole philosophy in plain terms, and it does not bend for a difficult week or a stubborn dog.

Guarantee

Dog obedience and puppy training in Kirribilli, in more detail

Kirribilli is dense, almost entirely apartments, and squeezed between the bridge and the harbour. It is one of the smallest suburbs we work in and one of the busiest, because the foreshore here is a destination for the whole city rather than just the people who live in it.

That creates a problem you do not get anywhere else. A friendly dog in Kirribilli gets stopped constantly, and a dog who is never allowed to decline a greeting will eventually find a way to decline one. Barking works. We see more dogs here who have become uncomfortable with strangers through too much attention rather than too little.

North Sydney's rule is that all its parks and reserves are off lead unless named as an exception, and none of the Kirribilli parks are on that list. Milson Park at Careening Cove is the main local option, with a ten metre exclusion around the playground. Nothing here is fenced, and Bradfield Park hosts monthly markets, which changes the park completely for a dog who is uneasy in crowds.

  • Puppy preschool plus managing greetings properly from the start.
  • Adolescent training for lift and lobby work, which cannot be rehearsed anywhere but your own building.
  • Dog behaviourism for adults, including strata noise and dogs who have stopped coping with crowds.

Puppy school is at Neutral Bay, about seven minutes away. See adolescent training and in-home behaviour training. We also work in Neutral Bay and Cremorne Point.

Frequently Asked Questions

Location - Kirribilli

Common questions we get about our puppy program.

Location - Kirribilli

Are you a dog trainer or a dog behaviourist?

Both words get used loosely in Australia and neither one is protected, so anyone can print either on a card. Here is the honest version.

Training is teaching a dog what to do. Behaviourism is working out why the dog is doing something else. Most of what we are called about is the second one, and the training only sticks once that part is sorted. So we do both, and we start with the why.

Luke Buchanan is Dog Trainer Academy accredited, Red Cross pet first aid certified and AFP background checked. If your dog needs medication or a clinical diagnosis, that is a veterinary behaviourist rather than us, and we will say so and point you to one.

What is the difference between puppy school, puppy preschool and puppy kindergarten?

Nothing. They are three names for the same thing. Vets tend to say puppy preschool, some trainers say puppy kindergarten, we say puppy school.

What actually matters is not the name on the door. It is whether the group is small, whether the puppies are matched by size so yours is not learning next to a dog four times its weight, and whether someone is watching the play properly and stepping in before it tips over. A badly run puppy class can set a puppy back further than no class at all.

Which areas of Sydney do you work in?

One to one training happens in your home, anywhere in Sydney within roughly a forty five minute drive of the Harbour Bridge. That covers the:

  • Inner City and City Centre
  • Eastern Suburbs
  • Inner West
  • Lower North Shore
  • Upper North Shore
  • Northern Beaches
  • Hills District
  • Western Sydney
  • South Sydney and St George

Group puppy school runs at fixed venues within about eight kilometres of the Harbour Bridge. See the puppy school dates page for which venues are currently taking bookings.

Do you offer meet and greets?

For group dog walking, a meet and greet is mandatory before any walking can take place to make sure that everyone is safe. We will under no circumstances accept a group dog walking booking without a meet and greet

How many dogs are in puppy school?

We aim for between 6 and 10 dogs in puppy school to balance quality and socialisation.

Does your training use pain, fear, force or aggression?

Absolutely not. If you want a method like that I suggest you call the 1980s, go back there and never get a dog.

We teach The 5 Golden Rules, which is built on calm and consistent communication. The aim is a dog who chooses to look to you when something happens, rather than a dog who has been made to. No pain, no fear, no force, ever, and that is not a marketing line. Anything that works through intimidation gets you a quieter dog for a fortnight and a worse problem six months later.

What is the ethos behind your dog training?

Developing a well behaved dog has 2 parts: dog psychology & dog training. We focus first on understanding your dog and getting them to choose to follow and listen to us. When dogs aren't making all the decisions, they calm down and relax, making them far more receptive to training. To do this, we don’t need to use force, fear or aggression. In fact the opposite. Whether dealing with barking, leash pulling, jumping, or aggression, these behaviours typically stem from dogs being too excited, reactive, and emotional. The key is getting them to turn to you and listen when it matters. Once they're calm and looking to you for guidance, you can effectively show them how to behave.
In short: before you train the dog, you need to win their mind.

Can you help with apartment barking and noise reactivity?

Yes. We address both separation anxiety and environmental triggers through desensitisation and independence training protocols.

How do you handle toilet training in apartments?

Apartment toilet training requires consistent scheduling and reward systems. We provide step-by-step guidance for high-rise living.

Do you run group obedience classes or one to one training?

Both, and which one you need comes down to your dog's age. Puppies get group puppy school alongside one to one work in your own home. Older dogs get one to one only.

Group obedience is very good at teaching a dog to behave in a hall full of other dogs. It is much less good at fixing the barking that happens in your hallway at eight in the morning, because the hallway is not in the hall. That is why everything past puppy school happens in the place the behaviour actually lives.

Not sure where to start with your Kirribilli dog?

Come and speak with us about puppy school, teen puppy training or adult dog behaviourism. Book a 15 minute call, it's free and no obligation

Book a free meet and greet

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