About

Hi, I am Julie Hilliard and I have been running Puppy School Hastings since 2011, I love to see families connecting with their puppies and enjoying each other’s company. The business has grown organically as my children have grown up and 1066 Pets and People has been created to reflect the wide range of services that have developed to help you and your pet have a rewarding relationship together.

I grew up with a range of animals at home, domesticated and exotic species along with helping injured wildlife recover that seemed to gravitate into our care. Animal behaviour courses weren’t available at college when I left school so I came to study a degree course as a mature student and studied part-time over five years allowing me to put theory into practise with a huge variety of dogs from my own, other people’s and at rescue kennels volunteering as a dog walker, foster carer and being a part of the behavioural support team for a sighthound charity.

After completing an Honours degree in applied behavioural science and welfare in 2013, along with my experience of being a Puppy School tutor and continued professional development I have the knowledge to help owners and their pets with reward based training techniques that builds trust and respect allowing a great bond to develop. Understanding animals is so important to create harmony living with them, often people’s expectations are too high, the animal has been told off for doing something inappropriate rather than helping them learn what to do instead and pets behaviour can be interpreted incorrectly by comparing to human emotions rather than being objective about the circumstances.

I am passionate about dogs and other animals not being treated in a forceful way to make them do things, outdated training methods are still being used today and this is often due to long term beliefs “we have always trained this way”. Reward based training is scientifically proven to get effective results and allows the animal to learn independently so that they can make good choices and build self-confidence around the people they interact with and the environment they live in, feeling safe is fundamental for all of us.