Dog trainer caters to women

Petaluma dog trainer Camilla Gray-Nelson teaching a class.

Camilla Gray-Nelson grew up on a dairy farm in Petaluma, where she learned everything she needed to know about true power and influence from a cow named Piggy.

When it was feeding time, all the young heifers would race to the hay. Piggy would saunter over to the feeder, and the other cows would part like the Red Sea.

“Every cow made room for her, because they knew she was the queen,” the 62-year-old dog trainer said. “If they kept eating, Piggy would come over, and she would give a well-placed bump … They got the message.”

The downhome farm girl, who learned the non-verbal language of animal instinct before she learned English, got the message as well.

“Quiet power is real power,” she said. “The real leader in the animal world is the one who sets boundaries and makes rules and is not afraid to enforce them. But, the enforcement is done quietly.”

Gray-Nelson, also known as the “Dog Talk Diva,” owns Dairydell Doggie Dude Ranch and Training Center in east Petaluma, where she has offered dog training, day care, boarding, classes and consultations since 1989.

About three years ago, she started catering to the specific needs of women, offering a special methodology along with a line of customized products. In March, she published her first book, “Lipstick and the Leash: Dog Training a Woman’s Way,” an instruction manual for women who need help controlling their dogs.

“Statistically, 73.4 percent of dog-owning households leave training to the woman of the house,” she said. “I realized that the majority of my clients were women.”

Because women are not big or strong like men, they do not achieve automatic respect and obedience from a dog. But they still need to get the upper hand in the relationship, so that the dog will want to obey them.

“That’s where deference to a leader comes into play,” Gray-Nelson said. “The dogs may know how to sit, but if they don’t feel like it, they will only be obedient to a higher-ranking member of a social group.”

To gain a dog’s respect, women need to ask once and make sure they follow through with a consequence, being careful to stay calm and not lose their cool. If they yell and get angry, the animal will regard them as weak and unstable.

“Animals consider emotional extremes unstable behavior, and they distance themselves,” she said. “They want to stick around the stable and the strong, because they are the ones that are most likely to survive.”