Testimonials

You know when your instincts kick in and tell you something before you have proof?…I knew Lara Joseph was unique and special before I ever even met her. And now that I “have” met her and chatted at length with her, I endorse her 100 percent. A woman with heart, patience and a sense of humor, she is going to take this field by storm… Look out world, you have been gifted with a rare and gifted soul. What I like best about her professionally is that she gives animals what we as humans all want for ourselves…quality of life through communication, love and play. It was an honor to meet you Lara …Thank you for your dedication and look forward to crossing paths with you again soon.

Thinking of you on Thanksgiving Day and everyday. Sending Love and Gratitude for the myriad things you do for bettering life whether for humans or non humans. Meeting you last Feb was life altering for me. I have learned so much from you and I intend to put it to good use. Your passion is contagious. I love your conversations, use of words and your sense of humor and I often laugh out loud during your livestreams. You are blessed with many gifts. Thank you for sharing them and putting your love and expertise out for the world to see. You are part of Social Media’s Best!

I can’t tell you the difference your toys have made in the life of this older YNA.  He used to never forage and never eat anything fresh.  I’ve got him foraging for stuff all the time now and started with getting him to do this with one of your Berrie Blocks.  He has graduated to more complex forms of foraging where items are now hidden from view and he must “hunt” to find them.  This toy of yours was a good learning tool to teach him this.

As a person who works with non-releasable wild animals that are kept for education purposes, I am always looking for ways to reduce their stress in being at in captivity, and to get them to participate willingly in their own care, such as allowing grooming, going into carriers, and coming to a human’s hand, for example. Positive reinforcement allows me to ‘communicate’ with the animals, and empowers the animal to make his own choices.  Lara’s blogs and videos have been very helpful to me in learning the fundamentals of operant conditioning and positive reinforcement, which has allowed me to improve my own training skills.   Her videos and blogs illustrate the concepts clearly, and I am most impressed by the helpful videos and descriptions of case studies of real animals learning in this way, which bring the concepts to life in an easy-to-understand, lively way.

Thank you Lara for the wonderful work you do at the Animal Behavior Center. You are a “Deliverer of Awesomeness”.

Before meeting you, I had been successful at clicker and target training with positive reinforcement that worked well in some birds and animals that responded to my few methods.
For all the ones that didn’t respond to my early learned methods, I ignorantly thought them unteachable and dismissed them. Oh, how I was wrong. My gosh, I just didn’t know and I’m still learning.

Lara, you opened the door for me years ago to understand the science and application of ABA and OC. I get it, and I love it. Over the past few years I have been successfully reaching most any animal with whom I come in contact (wild, domestic, exotic, young, old, angry, disabled, afraid, etc.). My confidence and my ability as a trainer have risen to levels I never thought achievable. My personal relationships with people are also benefiting. I am such a behavior geek now and look every opportunity to provide +R where appropriate. I continue my education, passionate and thirsty for new data and understanding. Having experienced ABA and OC, I see it as much an Art as it is a Science and that has allowed me to venture away from textbook training and recipes and to explore my artistic side. Rewarding artistic improvements in my methods, however small, has led to some accidental leaps towards my own self-improvement as a person and a trainer.

I encourage anyone who desires a stronger relationship with their pet/companion or who wants to delve deep into behavior analysis to check out the help, training and resources that Lara and the staff at the Animal Behavior Center provide.

I strongly recommend looking into the training provided by Lara Joseph at the Animal Behavior Center. One of her programs is called The Pig Project. I’m a member and it is absolutely worth every penny. She is an awesome trainer with years of experience and amazing insight into why our piggies do what they do, and how we can shape their behavior through positive reinforcement.

Being a member of this group has been life changing for my birds and me. We have gone from questioning my ownership of one of my birds to getting behaviors that I had only dreamed of having with all of my birds. They accept showers that was unheard of before, they can take liquids from a syringe, they know how to target and station and are easily moved from place to place with no force at all, and so many more things! I highly recommend this group to both novice and expert bird owners – there’s always something to learn to give your bird a better life! Lara can help you to do that!

If you have a deaf dog, angry parrot, bonded pigeon or frustrated vulture (it’s illegal to take injured or orphaned animals from the wild, please don’t do this ?), Lara is a non-judgmental, start-where-you-are professional. The best way to help an animal you love with issues they have is to work on how you communicate with them; we weren’t all born knowing how to speak sign language or pigeon or vulture. So please, PLEASE ask a translator for help, if you can’t understand the animals around you. Lara is a translator; it’s her life’s work and clearly what she was put on this earth to do.

I never thought in a million years that I would be able to sit in the same room with Pear, my African Grey, in her cage, not screaming. But here I am, one day after your consult and a few Parrot Project videos about Differential Reinforcement. Now I’m able to sit on the couch, write this email, with her happily talking in her cage. I was able to achieve this in one hour after watching your videos. My parrot is now less anxious. She may stop plucking, she may not. But I am thankful that my bird was smart enough to communicate that something was not right. And I am thankful that you were able to be our translator. What a gift you have.

Thank you again and again.

As a board member and co-conference chair of the Ohio Wildlife Rehabilitator’s Association we have had Lara speak at our conference the last two years. The first year, we had Lara teach a one hour session and our attendees told us that they wanted more. The following year, we had Lara offer a half day workshop and it was very well received as our conference evaluations indicated.

We were able to watch Lara work wild animals. Lara also offered us an opportunity to observe her in action but  more importantly we were offered many hands on opportunities to put in action her methods of positive reinforcement training.

Upon our return to our facility I began to implement the methods that I learned from Lara with some of our education animals. I was totally amazed at how readily our animals took to the training.

I would strongly recommend Lara’s trainings  as she is a wonderful teacher and truly has a gift working with animals.

As a professional trainer, I believe that continued education is really important.  I also think it is important to be thoughtful about where you invest your time and money in terms of learning opportunities.  Travelling from California to Ohio to spend two days doing Lara Joseph’s Day with the Trainer was so worth it on so many levels.  I learned so much. Lara was very committed to working on what I wanted to focus on.  She made me feel comfortable and relaxed in her coaching and teaching.  Lara and her animals are wonderful teachers and I have every intention of going back to train with them again as soon as I can!  I highly recommend this program to anyone who is interested in animal training or behavior.

I’m getting so much from my membership!  As a wildlife rehabilitator, parrot rescue (currently with 9 that ALL have major behavior to modify before they are able to be adopted), and a pig mom.  We really need this thank you!

Thank you for everything!

You provide a huge amount of information that cannot possibly be learned from theory or books.  I am enjoying the course immensely and feel my knowledge has grown massively in just a year.  Plus stuff I already know is gelling better – I have a better understanding of it and how it works in practice.  There is something to be learned in every video and the Q&As.   I LOVE the podcasts too which are easy to listen to when I’m cleaning out the cages

I missed a few years if Euphemia’s growing up beautifulness because I did not know enough about pigs. Actually, when it comes down to it , I knew nothing because what I had learned was incorrect and damaging to our relationship. This caused Euphemia stress which resulted in her causing me great stress and sadness also my husband was very unhappy about it all.
I am so thankful to Lara Joseph you have given me the information and tools to slowly but surely create a happy harmonious life for Lady E myself and my Husband. Although I still have a long way to go before Roderick can have an actual relationship with Lady E , he can see the difference in her and can understand why I love her so much . He can see that your teaching methods work Lara.