Renowned dog behaviorist opens unique facility in Tupelo
Aug. 5—TUPELO — With more than 40 years of experience in the pet industry, Bryan Bailey has done quite a lot, including being a K-9 officer, a veterinary assistant, a veterinary hospital owner, showing AKC dogs, Schutzhund training and ring sport training.
"There's not a single thing I haven't done in the pet industry ... boarding, daycare, obedience training," he said.
But his specialty now is canine pharmacotherapy, which according to the Veterinary Information Network, is the use of medication to "help to alleviate the underlying fear, anxiety, arousal, panic, impulsivity, reactivity and hyperactivity to normalize the pet's mental state, improve the pet's emotional health and create an environment in which the pet can learn and behavior can be modified."
The use of anti-depressants is a commonly prescribed medication, for example.
"Without these medications, these dogs are immune to any kind of training," Bailey said.
A nationally recognized, award-winning author, dog aggression expert, and canine pharmacotherapy behaviorist, Bailey and his wife, Tupelo native Kira Coleman Bailey, opened Taming the Wild in Memphis in 2012. Recently, they opened a location in Tupelo.
Taming the Wild combines the experience of Bryan in the field as well as Kira — herself a professional dog trainer among her other accomplishments — to provide a unique dog training and rehabilitation center.
Raised in Alaska, Bryan Bailey says his interest started early, as he was accustomed to seeing plenty of wildlife, from bears to caribou to bison and everything in the air and the water. But one animal piqued his interest — wolves.
"This was back in the 1960s, and I was able to observe wolves in the wild and noticed the similarities to them and my sled dogs I had at the time," he said.
Bailey studied canine problem solving and pharmacotherapy at Cornell University and studied wolf behavior and social dynamics at Battleground Indiana and Ely Minnesota wolf centers. He also performed extensive research on lion and East African wild dog social behavior in Tanzania and Kenya.
"Today's dog, even though it's a distant relative of the wolf, on a genetic level, they're still a wolf 99.98% ... and anyone that studies genetics knows the role it plays in behavior, not just your skin tone or eye color," he said.
The genes from the wolves are displayed in dog behaviors via instinct.
"Why do dogs jump on people sometimes? Why do they naturally want to pull ahead of us when we're walking? Why do they howl when a siren goes by?" Bailey said. "So much of this is wolf related. A good catchphrase for what we do is taming — meaning creating great behaviors, obedience — the wild that still resides in your dog."
And thus, Taming the Wild came to be.
It's a homegrown business in which the couple splits duties. Kira is in charge of the virtual program that extends over the globe, while Bryan is in charge of the brick-and-mortar locations.
"Our mission is to create the dog that you want to live with," he said. "We don't train for show ... now we address any pain points a dog owner has, so we satisfy needs first and get rid of any pain that you have, and then we can start adding wants. We create the dog that makes your heart go pitter patter, and the one that lowers your blood pressure doesn't raise it."
What sets Taming the Wild apart from other training and obedience operations is the level of customer service the Baileys seek to deliver to every client. Kira comes from a family of entrepreneurs that include father Don Coleman and her brother Wilson. For several years during her impressive career, she was sales and marketing coordinator for the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company in New York City and Washington, D.C, and where customer service is paramount. Those type of standards were put in place at Taming the Wild.
"My wife wants you, every time you step into a Taming the Wild, to get the Ritz-Carlton experience ... because of the aesthetics, the way it looks, and because of the customer service you get whether you call or when you come in, to the time you pick up your dog," Bryan Bailey said.
Taming the Wild in Tupelo is located at 3901 Westgate Drive, an ideal spot for the facility.
"One we're at Ballard Park, which is a dog trainer's dream," Bailey said. "We've got baseball, soccer, ducks, geese, ponds and everything at our disposal. And second we've got a great veterinary hospital just around the corner."
Formerly the Arm Farm, the 5,000-square-foot building was gutted and renovated to suit the Baileys' needs for opening Taming the Wild.
"Slowly but surely, we're becoming a specialized center, but I see this in the future becoming more of a rehabilitation center," Bailey said. "But for now, we do everything the Memphis location does — private lessons, mostly boarding and training lessons."
Bailey said the typical customer is a dog owner seeking relief, someone who wants to start obedience training with a dog that's young. But others have waited too long and are seeking immediate relief.
"I think Taming the Wild is selected over others because of our reputation," he said. "We have over 500 five-star reviews, and there's our sustainability, our longevity, our knowledge."
Bailey has written three books — and currently writing a fourth — and has hundreds of YouTube videos sharing his knowledge and experience.
"We're not Joe Dog Trainer; when you come to Taming the Wild, you're coming to get educated," he said. "Even when we do a board training, the owners have homework.
"It's like building a car," he said. "They deliver the car parts to us, and when they do I send them home with an owner's manual. And while they're at home, we assemble the car. And when they return for their turnover lesson, they learn to drive the car. And to make sure the car drives well and they keep up with their lessons, we give them free refresher training for the lifetime of the dog."
The greatest fear of dog owners is that once the dog is trained, it will forget everything it learned and not transfer that knowledge over.
Fear not, Bailey said.
"Training is transferable and we go to great lengths to supply them with the information they need, guidance that they need, and more than anything, support," he said. "When you do that, you have sustainable transformation."
Said Kira Bailey, "We create incredible connections when we are open and honest with each other. The more connected we are, the more we trust each other and, in turn, the more effectively we can work together to benefit the dog, the family, and the community."
