Canine companionship: Program helps dogs socialize at Sandwich dog park

Beau and Traci Bartulis know the importance of teaching a dog how to socialize with other dogs and their owners.

The couple owns BTK9 dog training facility in Sandwich. They have teamed up with the Sandwich Park District to put on K9 Social Sunday from 10 to 11 a.m. June 1 at the Park District’s Troeger Dog Park.

The class is designed to help guide dog owners and their dogs through proper socializing skills and techniques.

“It is an opportunity for the public to kind of dip their toe into the world of dog training,” Traci Bartulis said. “Sometimes, people don’t necessarily need a full training session to be able to understand what their dog needs. And then other times, they don’t know where to start.”

Troeger Dog Park, which opened in the fall of 2023, is the Sandwich Park District’s first dog park. The couple was at the park’s grand opening event.

“Whenever we work with clients initially, we’ll talk about the basics of how to read a dog and how to understand their body language,” she said. “So that’s some of the first steps that we jump into when we work with clients. That’s what we’re going to focus this Social Sunday on, just that basic understanding of, hey this how dogs communicate and this is how you can easily communicate back to your dog.”

The cost for the class is $40 for Park District residents and $50 for nonresidents. Troeger Dog Park is open to both residents and nonresidents.

Those who want to participate need to register by May 23. In order to participate in the class, dogs have to be registered for the Troeger Dog Park so the Park District can verify and confirm vaccination records to maintain the safety of all involved with the class.

This the first time the couple has officially partnered with the Park District, but they hope it won’t be the last.

“If this is a success, we’re looking to be able to do more of a structured obedience class that might run multiple weeks,” Bartulis said. “Either that, or we could potentially do a summer session. Every week in the summer, we would have one event that’s going on. We definitely wanted to test the waters with the Social Sunday event.”

The event is rain or shine, unless there is severe weather the day of the event. To register for Social Sunday, go to the Park District’s website at sandwichparkdistrict.org.

The maximum number of participants is 13. Troeger Dog Park is located in Milestone Park, 1375 Castle St. in Sandwich.

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