Certified Dog Trainer (ABCDT), Owner of No Hassle Dog Training

Amanda VanTassel is a certified dog trainer through Animal Behavior College and the founder of No Hassle Dog Training. She specialises in leash walking, trains and certifies therapy dogs, and works from Halifax, Nova Scotia and online worldwide. Her own dog is called Mabel.

H3: Key Takeaways

  • Amanda VanTassel is an ABCDT certified dog trainer, listed in Animal Behavior College's professional directory.
  • She founded No Hassle Dog Training in January 2021 and has worked with over 400 dogs.
  • Leash walking is her specialism, and the subject she is most often asked to speak on.
  • She also trains and certifies therapy dogs.
  • Her approach is reward-based throughout, with no corrections or aversives.

Background

Amanda founded No Hassle Dog Training in January 2021, wanting to help dogs take part in more of the things their people were already doing. She has since worked with more than four hundred dogs and puppies, and narrowed her focus to the problem that stops most of those activities happening: walking.

Alongside the training practice she trains and certifies therapy dogs, and she is a long-standing mental health advocate who has spoken about the overlap between wellbeing and life with a dog. She has appeared on The Pet Care Report podcast discussing why dogs pull and how to stop it. She works in person around Halifax, Nova Scotia and online with clients anywhere.

Areas Of Specialism

Almost everything Amanda writes comes back to the walk, either directly or through the things that make a walk impossible.

  • Loose-lead walking, pulling and equipment choice.
  • Leash reactivity, and what is actually driving it.
  • Therapy dog training and certification.
  • Attachment, bonding and the dog-human relationship.
  • Puppy foundations and early routine.
  • Everyday care questions owners worry about.

The Walk

Amanda's position on walking is unusually concrete. Most advice starts with the dog; hers starts with the equipment, because a harness that restricts the shoulders or a lead too short to allow any natural movement will defeat the training before it begins.

Her five steps to relaxed dog walking runs through the equipment audit, the length of line worth using, and the goal-setting that keeps owners going long enough to see a change. It is the most practical thing on her page.

Leash Reactivity

The dogs that bark and lunge on lead are the ones whose owners have usually stopped enjoying walks altogether, and often stopped walking at all. Amanda treats that as a problem with a cause rather than a temperament, which changes what you do about it. Owners in that position have generally been told their dog is dominant, badly socialised or simply difficult, none of which points anywhere useful on a Tuesday evening with a dog already over threshold. The lead itself is usually part of the mechanism rather than a neutral piece of equipment, and that is the part almost nobody mentions.

🤔 Think about:

a dog on a four-foot lead has almost no way to make a decision. Adding length gives them the option to move away from something rather than react to it, and a dog with an exit is a dog that needs the bark less.

Her guide to the real causes behind a leash reactive dog works through frustration, fear and rehearsal, and why the lead itself is so often part of the mechanism. Where a case has gone past what an article can address, her piece on dog classes for aggressive dogs sets out what a good class actually looks like, who it helps, and the questions worth asking before booking. Not every reactive dog needs a class, and some are made worse by the wrong one.

Attachment And The Bond

The other strand of Amanda's writing is the relationship itself, which suits a trainer whose stated reason for starting was helping dogs join in with their people. She has covered whether dogs feel love, why a dog picks a favourite human, and why some dogs follow their owner everywhere.

The through-line is that attachment behaviours are readable rather than mysterious, and that most of what owners interpret as devotion or clinginess is a dog making sense of safety and predictability. It matters practically as well as sentimentally: a dog who follows you from room to room because it cannot settle alone is on a different path from one that simply likes your company.

Puppies And Everyday Care

Her puppy writing is aimed at the first few weeks, when owners are least confident and most likely to be handed advice that will cost them later. Her puppy training tips that work in real life covers the foundations in the order they actually matter, which is rarely the order a new owner expects. Sit and paw are easy wins that change nothing; settling, being handled and coping alone are the ones that decide what the next decade looks like. Owners are rarely told this, because the easy wins are what make a puppy class feel like it is working.

💡 Tip:

the puppy behaviours owners rush to correct are usually the ones that resolve on their own with age and structure. The ones worth acting on early are the quiet ones — a puppy who freezes, avoids handling or will not settle.

She also writes the practical questions that come up between training sessions: how long you can leave a dog alone, why a dog is throwing up and when it needs a vet, and which small breeds suit which households. None of these are training questions exactly, but they are the ones that arrive at eleven at night between sessions, and a trainer who answers them is a trainer people keep reading.

Why PawChamp Works With Amanda

Amanda is the contributor whose credential is easiest for a reader to check: Animal Behavior College lists her in its own professional trainer directory, so the qualification is confirmed by the body that issued it rather than asserted on a profile. That is a low bar the industry clears less often than it should, and it is worth stating plainly on a page about trust. Dog training is unregulated almost everywhere, so a listing in an issuing body's own register is one of the few things an owner can actually verify before booking.

"Instead of a standard 4-6-foot leash, consider your new standard an 8–10-foot leash."
Amanda VanTassel, ABCDT
  • She is specific where most advice is vague. Lead lengths, harness fit, biothane over nylon, one or two written goals stuck to the fridge. Owners can act on it the same afternoon, which is the difference between advice that works and advice that gets agreed with.
  • Four hundred dogs and one specialism. She narrowed deliberately to the problem she saw most, and depth on a single subject is worth more to a reader mid-problem than breadth across twenty.
  • Therapy dog work sets the standard. Certifying therapy dogs means assessing whether an animal can genuinely cope in unpredictable public settings. That is a high bar for temperament, and it informs how carefully she writes about what to ask of a dog.

PawChamp trains on positive reinforcement alone, and Amanda's work needs no adjustment to fit. Her instinct on a difficult walk is to change the equipment and the distance, never the correction.

🔍 Fun fact:

biothane leads are waterproof and, as Amanda puts it, stink-proof — which matters more than it sounds if your dog's favourite part of a walk is whatever is in the ditch.

Articles By Amanda

Walking and reactivity

Attachment and bonding

Puppies and everyday care

Find Amanda Elsewhere

A note on veterinary care. Amanda is a dog trainer, not a veterinarian. Vomiting, sudden changes in behaviour and any suspected illness belong with a vet. PawChamp does not diagnose or treat medical conditions.

Bottom Line

Amanda VanTassel is an ABCDT certified trainer who founded No Hassle Dog Training in 2021 and has worked with over four hundred dogs. Her specialism is walking, and her writing for PawChamp reflects it: change the equipment, add length to the lead, set one or two goals, and give the dog room to make a decision before asking it to make the right one.