Phyllis Walsh, MSW, ACSW

Phyllis has worked in the field of human behavior for over 25 years. She is an accomplished practitioner in the area of Social Work. Phyllis has concurrently been fascinated by the study of animal behavior. These interests did not come lightly as she achieved a BA in Zoology in 1963, and has been involved in training both dogs and horses all of her adult life. Her specialty is training horses using the classical riding methods taught by the German Dressage trainers, and training Golden Retrievers for field competition. She is currently the Field Editor for the Golden Retriever News, the journal of the Golden Retriever Club of America. She writes field-training articles, which appear in her column in this magazine. Phyllis has twice received an award for outstanding service to the Golden Retriever Club of America.

James E. Walsh, Jr. BEE, MS

Jim has a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering and a master's degree in Education. He has taught on both high school and college level. He has also been training and competing with dogs for many years and has placed in both obedience and field trials. Jim also ran a Dog Obedience School from 1978 to 1982.

The Corbec Program

Both Phyllis and Jim have been training retrievers for competition in field trials since the mid-1970's. In the mid-80's they also embarked on a journey of learning how to train their German Shepherd Farah von Mack-Zwinger, VB, AD, SchI, SchII (Ina) using the motivational approach of top German trainers. They have incorporated into their field-training program the basic training principles of these trainers. Some of the differences between the Walshes and other field trainers is that their program is motivational and they identify the level of basic drives in the dog, then strive to keep the dog balanced between these drives through exercises especially developed for this purpose. These methods have enriched their already popular field training program.

Phyllis and Jim believe that when taught properly, dogs become happy workers who know their jobs and are serious about performing tasks to the best of their ability. The Walshes start with the dog's raw talent and then methodically expand the dog's accomplishments. This is a slow process, but dogs don't washout of the Corbec Program, the training program developed by the Walshes. Instead each dog is taken to its maximum level of accomplishment as this special breed of dog was born to do.

Feel free to send Jim and Phyllis a message using our handy Contact Page.