KW Happy Dogs - Woodacre, California

Kris Christie

When we brought our new puppy home, Kirsten guided us through every stage with clear, practical advice and tailored strategies that helped her thrive while strengthening our connection. She also worked miracles with our elder dog, addressing cognitive issues and anxiety with patience and compassion. Thanks to her guidance, we’ve created a calming environment and learned to better understand our senior dog’s needs, bringing her comfort and joy.

Kirsten’s kind, professional, and insightful approach has made all the difference. She’s always responsive when we need reminders or tune-ups and has shown us how training and activities can deepen our bond with our dogs. If you want someone who truly invests in your dogs’ happiness and well-being, Kirsten is the best!

Stacy Colwell

Kirsten is very knowledgeable and intuitive when relating to reactive dogs. She is confident, patient, and a great teacher. Observing her interact with my dog in the presence of her triggers has helped me learn how to approach similar situations positively and more confidently. I've had five sessions, and at each session, Kirsten taught me new strategies, offered practical solutions to problems, and provided me with tools to help. My sweet rescue dog and I are making consistent progress in addressing her fears and anxiety. We will continue to work with Kirsten every few months to strengthen those skills and learn new ones. Kirsten is a great resource, and I couldn't recommend her enough!

Michael Barrientos

Kirsten brings decades of knowledge and experience to helping improve behavioral problems with your furry (or fluffy, as it may be) best friend. Look no further, Kirsten is the best behaviorist you will find.

Almost a year ago, my partner and I adopted a 9-month-old, abused and traumatized Great Dane, named Brünnhilde. We don’t know her history, but we know from her high levels of anxiety and her physical scars that she had a very difficult formative period and, now a teenager, she was large and strong (100+ lbs) and highly reactive to people and other dogs. She was very hard to control. We knew immediately we were in over our heads and needed an expert to help us. By way of many phone calls, we found Kirsten and began an incredibly rewarding journey. With Kirsten’s help, Brünnhilde learned to be a dog—a normal dog! We now love having Brünnhilde in our home; she has become our best friend, and she now even plays with other dogs! It has been an amazing journey, from questioning whether we could keep her, to being grateful that found Kirsten and stuck with it. In literal terms, Kirsten made it possible.

During this journey, Brünnhilde and I have met with numerous dog trainers, behaviorists, veterinarians, and even veterinary behaviorists. If I have learned anything, it is that the world of helping your dog (and helping yourself) is complicated and hard to navigate. Kirsten is an invaluable resource—she has worked with dogs from all angles for many decades, knows the best veterinary behaviorists, and knows the landscape and how to get results.

Finally, and maybe most importantly, Kirsten is a “positive reinforcement” trainer. I put that in quotes, because there is a lot of complexity in that phrase; the basic idea is that Kirsten is about building a relationship between you and your dog. Co-regulation is the foundation, and fun and positive training is the end and the means. Kirsten is about building the relationship with your dog—obviously that is the right idea and why we have a dog in the first place. I have limited experience with other kinds of trainers, they usually they call themselves ‘balanced’, but after seeing such incredible results with Brünnhilde, and growing my relationship with her, I am now firmly in the “positive reinforcement” camp. It just makes sense—have a better relationship with the animals you love.

Kathleen Burke

Highly recommend! Kirsten taught me all about my dog, how he sees the world and how I can support him and help him thrive in this busy and complicated world. Kirsten is a partner and collaborator for me as I learn to adjust my behavior and communicate clearly to my precious pup. I’ve seen Kirsten work with many breeds and she always finds a path forward for canine and human, together. It’s a beautiful and often fun process. Book her today for a better tomorrow with your dog.

Alison Farmer

Kirsten is the absolute best. We're so happy to have found her help with our rescue dog, Evey. When we first got Evey, she was very reactive to other dogs, quite dysregulated and lacking in confidence from her time on the streets. Kirsten has helped us to bond with Evey, showing us a range of games and techniques to help her find calmness and to build up her confidence, trust and connection to us on walks and when seeing other dogs. Her reactivity is so much better and I feel much more confident when walking her around other dogs now. I love that Kirsten will meet you out and about with your dog so that you can work through real life situations, rather than meeting somewhere out of context. She really understands animal behavior and has taught me a lot about what Evey's body language has been expressing. I love Kirsten's positivity and calmness and her style of 'training' makes the most sense to me. She will gear her suggestions towards the type of dog you have, with her expert knowledge of different breed mixes. I can't say enough good things about Kirsten. I'm just so happy to have her help and I always leave our sessions feeling more confident and knowledgeable about my dog. Evey loves her too!

Zora Ableson

I cannot recommend Kirsten Wojkick of KW Happy Dogs enough! Not only did she work wonders with my 5 year old frenchies anxiety issues, but she also identified a potentially serious health issue that I had no idea about. Kirsten’s expertise and knowledge in canine behavior made all the difference in my dog's well-being. Kirsten is patient, kind, and truly dedicated to helping dogs blossom. She was recommended to me by a friend and I am forever grateful for her. I travel from the East Bay to see her and would travel further if needed! She has been truly life changing me and my little guy. If you”re looking for someone to help with your dog's behavior, look no further than this amazing dog whisperer.

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update
Just wanted to add that prior to Kirsten, my dogs were reactive when we passed a dog that was across a 4 lane road...
Now.. we go to Fort Funston .. one of the girls stays on leash.. but we have stress free / incident free strolls and my other dog runs merrily in the beach.. I'm forever greatful to Kirsten !
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Kirsten has made such a change to my life. I adopted 2 adult large dogs that were close to impossible to walk together due to their anxiety. I would fear coming across any dogs and worried about any additional damage I was doing to my dogs.. Kirsten gave me the tools and confidence to not only walk my dogs but also search out opportunities to further improve their confidence / comfort as well. No words can express my gratitude!

aman kmangat

My dog was really struggling with reactivity around bigger dogs and Kirsten has really helped us not only get better on walks but also more comfortable with reading his body language and how he perceives the world! Highly recommend for anyone who would like to pursue some training or understanding your dog’s behavior and working on specific issues!