- Home
- Board and train
- Can my dog do board and train if they go to another daycare?
Switching facilities
Can my dog do board and train if they go to another daycare?
A dog with daycare experience often arrives better prepared for a stay, and with a paper trail worth using. This page lists the records to gather, shows how to read another facility's notes, and explains why the last week in a group matters.
Where you start
Another daycare is no barrier, but its evaluation cannot replace ours
Before daycare, Dogtown Academy, overnight stays or walks, every dog completes Dogtown's own free evaluation, and a board and train dog sleeps here, so it is no exception. Facilities run groups differently, with different sizes, matching and rules, so another building's yes cannot tell us how your dog will do in ours. Our evaluation is a temperament test plus a few supervised hours in a group, and it starts the playgroup match.
Experience still helps. A dog used to arriving, playing in a group and resting in a busy building often settles faster on drop-off day, and its daycare history gives the consult a fuller picture. Tell us how often your dog attends, how big its group is, and anything the staff have said about it, good or bad. Gabriella Pope uses that to plan when group time might start during the stay.
- Our free evaluation, whatever your dog's history
- Weekdays, 6:30 to 9:30 AM, by appointment
- Your daycare's notes shared on the training form
- Group time planned from both
Two sets of records
Gather two sets of records: the required ones from your vet and town, and the useful ones from your daycare
The required set is short: proof of Rabies, DHPP and Bordetella, which your vet issues, and a current dog license, which your city or town issues; in Gloucester that is the City Clerk. Your current daycare may hold copies, but bring them from the source, because the expiry dates must cover the last night of the stay. Massachusetts law also requires a commercial boarding or training kennel to keep license records for every dog in its care.
The useful set comes from your daycare, and you will usually have to ask for it. Report cards or notes from the last few months, the size and type of group your dog plays in, any incident reports, and any time your dog was moved to another group or asked to sit out. None of it is required, but each piece saves the consult from guessing, and a pattern in it can shape the plan.
- From your vet: Rabies, DHPP and Bordetella records
- From your town: a current dog license
- From your daycare: recent report cards or notes
- From your daycare: incident reports and any group changes
Reading the notes
Another facility's notes help most when they describe what the dog did, not what it is
Daycare notes often lean on labels: bossy, dominant, a bully, shy. A label records how someone felt about a moment, not what happened in it, so translate it before you send it. Ask the staff for the example behind each word. Bossy might mean your dog stood over the water bowl; shy might mean it spent most of an afternoon by the gate. Those two details point to quite different plans.
Worked example, invented for illustration: a note reads too rough with small dogs. Asked for detail, the staff say the dog body-slams during chase games and does not stop when a small dog yelps. That becomes a specific goal for the stay, coming away from play when called and pausing on cue, and it tells the evaluation which group to try first. Send the original note and your translation together.
- 01
Ask your daycare for the last few months of notes
- 02
Underline every label: bossy, shy, rough, reactive
- 03
Ask the staff for the example behind each label
- 04
Write the behavior next to the label
- 05
Send both on the training form before the consult
The week before
In the week before drop-off, tell us about any cough in your dog's group
Kennel cough spreads where dogs mix closely, through droplets from coughing and sneezing, direct contact and shared items such as bowls. Cornell's College of Veterinary Medicine puts its incubation at typically 2 to 10 days, so a dog exposed at daycare the week before a stay can start coughing in the middle of it. The usual sign is a dry, harsh, honking cough, and most dogs recover within about two weeks.
So tell us the last day your dog was in a group, and whether the daycare has mentioned coughing dogs lately. A dog that starts coughing before drop-off should see its vet and stay home; Cornell notes that diagnosis usually rests on an exam and the dog's exposure history, so mention the daycare to your vet. Whether the stay then moves, and on what terms, follows what was confirmed at booking.
- The last date your dog was in a group
- Any coughing dogs the daycare has mentioned
- A vet visit, not a drop-off, for a coughing dog
- The daycare exposure mentioned to your vet
At Dogtown
When your dog joins us from elsewhere
The free evaluation opens board and train, overnight stays and daycare at Dogtown alike.
Asked and answered
Questions people ask about this
Short, complete answers you can act on today. More in the full FAQ.
Will you accept my current daycare's evaluation instead of yours?
Can my dog keep going to its daycare until the stay?
My dog was asked to leave another daycare. Can it still do board and train?
Should I tell my regular daycare about the training?
Do you require the same vaccines as other daycares?
More questions? Read the full FAQ
Sources
- Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine: the risks of kennel cough
- Massachusetts General Laws c. 140, s. 137A
- City of Gloucester: dog licensing
Rules and dates change. We re-check every beach, licensing and ordinance page each spring and fall; the source above is the current word.
Keep reading
Next step
Bring the whole history.
Send the training form with your dog's daycare notes, translated into behavior. The team replies within one hour on business days.
- 01Free evaluationWeekdays 6:30 – 9:30 AM
- 02Book a dayOnline, in the app or by phone
- 03Play, rest, repeatReport card at pick-up
