Welcome to Our Kennel
The Kennels
After coming through the lobby of the Stud, you will see a door to the far left where the Evaluation Room waits, to the far right is the Nursery, the stairs before you lead down to the Indoor Training Facility and before you awaits two heavy duty steel doors with an uninviting deadbolt. Beyond this two sheet of reinforced steel reside the residents of Aethon Stud, the members of the military and police force that are fully capable of bringing an armed robber's face to the dirt and screaming their surrender. These are the homes of the narcotics dogs with 220 million olfactory receptors (humans posses 5 million) able to detect marijuana wrapped in plastic, layered next in mustard, followed by a tinfoil layer, smeared with grease, re-wrapped with more plastic and finally blanketed with scented dryer sheets and dropped into coffee grounds. These are the attack dogs with a bite pressure of up to 750 pounds per square inch easily able to snap most bones in the human body on the first try. These are the athletes who can run at 30 miles per hour and scale 8 foot walls. These are the soldiers who are strapped into harnesses, lowered from helicopters into the arms of our men and without hesitation start tracking for roadside bombs. These are the doors that lead to the dogs who give us their loyalty and their lives to save ours.
There are 8 fully functioning, brand new kennels with smooth concrete floors and refreshing floor-to-ceiling windows. A central drain cuts through the center of the room for a quick and efficient way to hose down the entire room once a week. See the Cleaning Routine on the Operations page for more details. Each dog has a comfortable bed and fresh water available at all times. Classical music is sometimes played for the dogs while resting, but during the day most dogs are usually out training or competing. We have specifically ordered 8 kennels to keep our numbers low and efficient. A locker for each working dog is provided that keeps all of the dog's equipment in close reach, equipment such as collars, choke chains, leashes, harnesses, and any medication for minor incidents. Trainers also each have a locker in this area. We have installed a powerful heating and cooling system from the largest generator available to quickly be able to cool or heat the entire room. Most of the time, however, the dogs do not have time to complain. By the time they are put back in their kennels, they are almost certainly exhausted from the days work and fall fast asleep. The room is monitored on our closed circuit television (CCTV) video surveillance camera every hour of every day and has a backup battery to continue recording in the case of a power outage.
There are 8 fully functioning, brand new kennels with smooth concrete floors and refreshing floor-to-ceiling windows. A central drain cuts through the center of the room for a quick and efficient way to hose down the entire room once a week. See the Cleaning Routine on the Operations page for more details. Each dog has a comfortable bed and fresh water available at all times. Classical music is sometimes played for the dogs while resting, but during the day most dogs are usually out training or competing. We have specifically ordered 8 kennels to keep our numbers low and efficient. A locker for each working dog is provided that keeps all of the dog's equipment in close reach, equipment such as collars, choke chains, leashes, harnesses, and any medication for minor incidents. Trainers also each have a locker in this area. We have installed a powerful heating and cooling system from the largest generator available to quickly be able to cool or heat the entire room. Most of the time, however, the dogs do not have time to complain. By the time they are put back in their kennels, they are almost certainly exhausted from the days work and fall fast asleep. The room is monitored on our closed circuit television (CCTV) video surveillance camera every hour of every day and has a backup battery to continue recording in the case of a power outage.
The Evaluation Room
The evaluation room was once the kitchen of the lodge, but has now been gutted and transformed into an open space for evaluating dogs. From the moment you walk inside, you will see to the left is a counter top that runs the length of the room. We, too, have kept this space as the kitchen for our dogs but in a much more functional way. A seating bench with hidden storage for detection work runs along the opposite wall while the outside wall houses four floor-to-ceiling windows and a door leading to the fenced in deck area. This functional deck is a story high and covered by the roof of the building, giving the dogs the most secure outdoor pen with a concrete base. A bed and water are provided for the dogs who spend time basking in the shade and watching over the distant city.
We use this room primarily to prepare the dogs meals, introduce dogs to new people who may or may not be interested in buying them, and also as the location for every one of our Puppy Aptitude Tests to judge their behavioral traits. Staff meetings also take place here as it serves us well as a break room. Storage is quite available while being discrete enough to give plenty of open space for whatever we need to do. The last purpose it serves is as an introduction room where we can let new dogs to the kennel be off the leash and evaluate their training, temperament, stress level, and other valuable information before they are given permission to meet the other dogs or the rest of the facility. A calender and events board is always viewable and up to date in this room also, as it serves as a well-used area of the kennel.
We use this room primarily to prepare the dogs meals, introduce dogs to new people who may or may not be interested in buying them, and also as the location for every one of our Puppy Aptitude Tests to judge their behavioral traits. Staff meetings also take place here as it serves us well as a break room. Storage is quite available while being discrete enough to give plenty of open space for whatever we need to do. The last purpose it serves is as an introduction room where we can let new dogs to the kennel be off the leash and evaluate their training, temperament, stress level, and other valuable information before they are given permission to meet the other dogs or the rest of the facility. A calender and events board is always viewable and up to date in this room also, as it serves as a well-used area of the kennel.
The Indoor Training Facility
One of the most convenient architectural aspects of the revamped lodge was the huge, open basement. After careful evaluation and inspection by a professional, it was considered to be supportive enough for the structures above it and was allowed to remain in its original form. The only difference now is that instead of a the basement being a storage area for furniture, food, and equipment, it is now a fully functioning underground training facility for working dogs. Most forms of training begin in this very basement, everything from protection and search to obedience and bite work. This controlled environment stays cool in the summer and is very easy on the A/C bill. The professional grade rubber floors are a brand new addition to the space, serving to both cushion the joints and provide additional grip for the dogs.
Training items are all around the room and there is a chain-link pen off to a corner. Additional chairs are always present for class members, potential buyers, and visitors who have come to watch the dogs train. There are various jumps and pieces of furniture scattered throughout the room as well as a steel pipe for tying dogs in aggravation training. The forced air heating and cooling system is supplied with updated installation throughout. We often host classes and demonstrations in this room, but for the tasks that require even more room, we use the Training Fields.
Training items are all around the room and there is a chain-link pen off to a corner. Additional chairs are always present for class members, potential buyers, and visitors who have come to watch the dogs train. There are various jumps and pieces of furniture scattered throughout the room as well as a steel pipe for tying dogs in aggravation training. The forced air heating and cooling system is supplied with updated installation throughout. We often host classes and demonstrations in this room, but for the tasks that require even more room, we use the Training Fields.
The Outdoor Training Fields
The outdoor training fields offer us the most useful space in the entire property by allowing us to work our dogs in a very flexible environment. We have a number of different areas included under this title: the main field, the fenced run, an agility course, a private lake, an acre of backwoods forest, and a tracking field. These areas surround nearly every side of the kennel except the front drive. We took great care in choosing this location, which was once a well-known lodge and adjacent crop farm, and have hired architect students from a reputable school to come and reconstruct the lodge into a working dog kennel. The remaining areas around the kennel did not go to waste.
The main field is just beside Aethon Stud and works to facilitate a number of things. It is a vast, open, grassy area that is mostly used for individual and group obedience and attack dog training. Much of the foundation work is learned right in this field. We host fund raisers, competitions, and fairs once in a while in this area. Needless to say, this is also where our dogs become accustom to sirens, gunfire, bomb detonation, and helicopters. Farther down the hill is the wooded area that we often employ to our intermediate and advanced tracking dogs. Cadaver dogs and police or schultzhund trained shepherds often navigate these woods off-leash or on a long lead to find their target.
The main field is just beside Aethon Stud and works to facilitate a number of things. It is a vast, open, grassy area that is mostly used for individual and group obedience and attack dog training. Much of the foundation work is learned right in this field. We host fund raisers, competitions, and fairs once in a while in this area. Needless to say, this is also where our dogs become accustom to sirens, gunfire, bomb detonation, and helicopters. Farther down the hill is the wooded area that we often employ to our intermediate and advanced tracking dogs. Cadaver dogs and police or schultzhund trained shepherds often navigate these woods off-leash or on a long lead to find their target.
To the north is the agility course and fenced in yard where our dogs are released to run and stretch their muscles without restriction. Our agility course is large and mobile enough to move the pieces of equipment around and produce complicated courses for competitions, or can be broken down enough to facilitate beginners in a non-intimidating setup. Lastly, we have a lake towards the back of the property that we use often in the summer. It is important that every one of our dogs is as confident in the water as they are on land, so we train our dogs to win in the water. We sometimes use a dock to encourage leaping, a boat for real-scenario work, or a decoy charging through the water. It is not much fun for the decoy wearing the heavy padding soaked in literally a lake of water, but our guys will do anything for the benefit of the dogs.
The "S. Block"
The "S Block" is the slang reference to the extra buildings on our property that once were used for a variety of agriculture processing and home living. These abandoned structures are now employed as a makeshift neighborhood that provide a wide variety of possible scenarios in a controlled setting. It is the scenario block, hence the name. This is the area where our working dogs graduate to after they have mastered bite and restraint in open areas such as the indoor facility and fields.
The first step a dog must take is to see and bite the decoy outside the front door of a building. Once in that mindset, the transition starts as the decoy waits just beyond the door, visible to the dog who is staring down the bad guy and prepared to attack. Slowly, we increase the distance from the front door to the position of the decoy in various buildings until the dogs are confident enough to know they will always win, no matter how big or small the space is. This is crucial for them to function in any situation they are put in once they leave our facility.
Each building has a specific purpose, a specific internal structure that works well to facilitate certain scenarios. Everything from a repelling wall where the dogs are placed in a harness and learn how to be calm as they are lowered right off a 4 story building. More buildings act better for scent detection, search, and bite practice. There are a total number of 9 buildings; 3 being abandoned houses, 1 shack, and the other 5 structures including a small barn, a very old hotel, a trailer home, and two buildings once used to process grain for sale. Some of the buildings date back a hundred years. We take great care not to damage the structures, and even include these historic buildings in our tours of the facility for visitors. However, they are a distance from the main kennel, so golf carts or cars are used depending on the number of visitors.
This area is in a rather difficult area and somewhat spread out over the land but serves as the perfect tool to work our dogs on site. Not far to the south of the S. Block is the main freeway and a favored destination for police speed traps. It is nice to know that the authority figures regularly check in on the old buildings for vandals, as many of them know the purpose of these recycled structures today.
The first step a dog must take is to see and bite the decoy outside the front door of a building. Once in that mindset, the transition starts as the decoy waits just beyond the door, visible to the dog who is staring down the bad guy and prepared to attack. Slowly, we increase the distance from the front door to the position of the decoy in various buildings until the dogs are confident enough to know they will always win, no matter how big or small the space is. This is crucial for them to function in any situation they are put in once they leave our facility.
Each building has a specific purpose, a specific internal structure that works well to facilitate certain scenarios. Everything from a repelling wall where the dogs are placed in a harness and learn how to be calm as they are lowered right off a 4 story building. More buildings act better for scent detection, search, and bite practice. There are a total number of 9 buildings; 3 being abandoned houses, 1 shack, and the other 5 structures including a small barn, a very old hotel, a trailer home, and two buildings once used to process grain for sale. Some of the buildings date back a hundred years. We take great care not to damage the structures, and even include these historic buildings in our tours of the facility for visitors. However, they are a distance from the main kennel, so golf carts or cars are used depending on the number of visitors.
This area is in a rather difficult area and somewhat spread out over the land but serves as the perfect tool to work our dogs on site. Not far to the south of the S. Block is the main freeway and a favored destination for police speed traps. It is nice to know that the authority figures regularly check in on the old buildings for vandals, as many of them know the purpose of these recycled structures today.
The Nursery
We are primarily a working kennel but sometimes will breed our older dogs. Because of this, we have invested in an appropriate K-9 nursery for our operation. The new and spacious nursery of prefinished hardwood White Oak flooring that is treated to be both stain and scratch resistant. We use a forced air heating and cooling system to monitor and adjust the temperature of the nursery as well as the rest of the kennel. To record everything that happens in the nursery, we use our own closed circuit television (CCTV) video surveillance camera that monitors for the duration of the litters stay in the room.
The built-in whelping box is carefully positioned just inside the door and faces the viewing room window. The walls of the whelping box are 3 feet high with an additional foot of tempered glass fencing the top, preventing injury to the mother should she try and jump up, and allows a view of the young pups with minimal disturbance to the dam. Once the puppies are mobile enough, the door for the whelping box is either opened or removed depending on the age, and the young puppies are then able to explore the full length of the room under careful supervision by one of our trained staff members known as Litter Companions. Three floor-to-ceiling windows overlook the west deck, main training yard and distant tracking forest, providing natural light and an excess of stimulants.
We have also decided to add in a mounted television in the nursery. Research suggests that dogs enjoy certain types of music and some are thought to relax dogs. We, in the proactive journey to try and make the best working dogs, value this research and employ the findings on the dogs and puppies in our care. While no one is physically in the room, the puppies listen to calm classical music or no music at all, as we do not want to hypersensitize our dogs to seek out music or noise when it is not present. As caretakers start their socialization shifts, they have control of what is played (music, movies, sitcoms, etc.) to start desensitizing the puppies to common household television.
A small area between the main door and the whelping box is gated off to serve as an additional boundary to keep cunning or swift puppies from racing out of the nursery and into the main area where our working dogs commonly walk. In this gated off area is the cabinet with a shallow sink, cleaning supplies, disinfectants, extra towels, first aid kit, medical supplies, and a scale for the puppies weekly weighing. Growth charts, important dates, and activity/behavioral notes are posted on a board and reviewed or updated by each of our litter companions at the beginning of their shift.
Read more about the work of our Litter Companions and their roles on our Operation page.
The built-in whelping box is carefully positioned just inside the door and faces the viewing room window. The walls of the whelping box are 3 feet high with an additional foot of tempered glass fencing the top, preventing injury to the mother should she try and jump up, and allows a view of the young pups with minimal disturbance to the dam. Once the puppies are mobile enough, the door for the whelping box is either opened or removed depending on the age, and the young puppies are then able to explore the full length of the room under careful supervision by one of our trained staff members known as Litter Companions. Three floor-to-ceiling windows overlook the west deck, main training yard and distant tracking forest, providing natural light and an excess of stimulants.
We have also decided to add in a mounted television in the nursery. Research suggests that dogs enjoy certain types of music and some are thought to relax dogs. We, in the proactive journey to try and make the best working dogs, value this research and employ the findings on the dogs and puppies in our care. While no one is physically in the room, the puppies listen to calm classical music or no music at all, as we do not want to hypersensitize our dogs to seek out music or noise when it is not present. As caretakers start their socialization shifts, they have control of what is played (music, movies, sitcoms, etc.) to start desensitizing the puppies to common household television.
A small area between the main door and the whelping box is gated off to serve as an additional boundary to keep cunning or swift puppies from racing out of the nursery and into the main area where our working dogs commonly walk. In this gated off area is the cabinet with a shallow sink, cleaning supplies, disinfectants, extra towels, first aid kit, medical supplies, and a scale for the puppies weekly weighing. Growth charts, important dates, and activity/behavioral notes are posted on a board and reviewed or updated by each of our litter companions at the beginning of their shift.
Read more about the work of our Litter Companions and their roles on our Operation page.