Introducing TRACE
It’s 11pm. Your dog did something today that you still can’t explain.
So you search for it. Or you ask an AI. And you get an answer that is confident, generic, and doesn’t quite fit the dog asleep on the floor next to you.
Some of the advice contradicts itself. Some of it is fifteen years out of date. None of it knows anything about your dog.
I’ve been working with dogs since 2015. Over four thousand of them. Almost every owner I meet has been through some version of that 11pm search.
That’s what TRACE is for.
What TRACE is
TRACE stands for Training Rooted in Animal Care and Enrichment.
It’s an AI tool, but it isn’t a general one. It has been built on my case library, my frameworks, and the way I actually work through a behaviour problem in a session.
When I assess a dog, I’m running several things at once. Who this dog is at a fundamental level.
What need is going unmet. What is keeping the behaviour going right now. And whether their nervous system is even in a state to receive help.
TRACE works through the same thinking. It’s the reasoning I’d bring to a consultation, made available at 11pm on a Tuesday.
Behaviour is communication
Everything TRACE does sits on one idea. Behaviour is communication, not defiance.
A dog who barks, lunges, destroys, or won’t settle is telling you something. They aren’t being difficult. They are responding to conditions.
From there, almost every behaviour problem traces back to an unmet need on some level. Whether that's physical, emotional, mental or anything about their enrichment needs and wellbeing.
TRACE understands this. It works backwards from what your dog is doing to what is actually driving it, rather than handing you a technique and hoping it sticks.
How this differs from asking a general AI
This is the question I get most, so it’s worth answering properly.
General AI tools are trained on an enormous amount of the internet. That includes excellent dog training material. It also includes dominance theory, punishment-based methods, and advice I would actively tell a client to avoid.
The tool has no way of knowing which is which. So the answer you get depends heavily on how you phrased the question.
TRACE only draws on my methodology. No punishment. No dominance framing. No quick fixes. The answer you get at 11pm is consistent with what I’d tell you in your living room.
There’s also a person watching. I monitor the conversations. If TRACE gives an answer I wouldn’t stand behind, it gets flagged and corrected. The tool improves because someone is checking it - me. I'm still there, behind the scenes tracking as many of the conversations as I can. Still teaching it, still jumping in to help in person where I can.
That matters more than it sounds. A general AI will usually attempt an answer to anything, and a confident wrong answer on one of those topics can do real harm.
What people are using it for
Puppy training, reactivity, excessive barking, lead pulling, socialisation, adolescence, intrdoducing rescue dogs to homes which catches a lot of owners off guard.
It isn’t only a question-and-answer tool. It builds training plans tailored to the dog you describe, rather than handing you a generic protocol.
How to try it
You get ten free questions. No card required.
After that, membership is $20 per 28 days, or $200 for a year, which works out at two months free.
The first hundred annual members also get access to Canine Caregivers.
Why I built it
TRACE isn’t a replacement for training, and it isn’t a replacement for me. Some problems need eyes on the dog.
But there is an enormous amount of ordinary confusion that sits between sessions, or before anyone ever books one. The questions that come up at 11pm. The thing your dog did on Tuesday that you’re still turning over.
Most owners in that position aren’t failing. They just haven’t been given a clear explanation of what is actually going on.
Because in almost every case, it isn’t a bad dog. It’s a dog who hasn’t been understood yet.
