Gary Jackson has trained about 20,000 dogsas a full-time dog trainer since starting his career 33 years ago, but the world-renowned talent doesn't own his own dog.

That's because during the last 20 years he's been travelling around the world teaching dog bite prevention seminars to animal control officers and different government agencies. 'I treat everyone else's dogs as my own,” says Gary.

The talented trainer is taking time out of his busy doggy training schedule to headline Western Bay of Plenty District Council's Doggy Day Out at Western Ave, Omokoroa, on March 5.

Gary will bediscussing responsible animal ownership, dog bite prevention, behaviour problems and tackling the most common dog issues, including barking dogs.

'I think the biggest complaint council gets is barking dogs,” says Gary. 'So I'll be there the whole day just advising what the cause is and how to fix it. Hopefully, with all the people there and from what I talk about, they'll be able to put it to action, solve a few problems and stop a lot from happening.”

Barking usually stems from dogs being suspicion and overprotected by their owners, says Gary.

'That's all caused by dogs that are taken from the litter too early or too late, miss out on the socialisation period, or sleep in the bedroom. That creates dependant dogs, which then have a high suspicion and become overprotective and get separation anxiety and they relieve that through barking and howling at everything that moves.

'Just about every dog barking case can be stopped if dogs were socialised properly early in life and socialise with other dogs and people.”

Most of the dogs Gary works with are environmental protection dogs, drug and explosive dogs.

'They're all special to me,” says Gary. 'The biggest thing is when I go in and see a dog with a lot of problems and I walk out having all the problems fixed.

'It helps bring the owner and the dog a lot closer and when you see things like that that's gold for me.”

Western Bay of Plenty District Council's Doggy Day Out organiser Alison Curtis says the inaugural Dogs Day out in Te Puke last year was a huge success, so she's expecting a great crowd in Omokoroa.

'This year we'll also have Alfie our ‘spokesdog' to encourage people to have their say on what changes they'd like to see in our Dog Control Policy review.”

TheDoggy Day Out will feature plenty of pooch-fuelled fun including Mount Maunganui Dog Agility Club, dog competitions, dogadoptions, rescue dogs, on the spot microchipping, food and drink, and much more.

The Doggy Day Out is at Western Ave, Omokoroa, on March 5 from 10am-2pm.