About Rochelle
Rochelle grew up in the Blue Mountains in the house where she has now established Bark Park. She had always had dogs, adored them and really knew how to get the best out of them. She moved to Melbourne and did her degree there, working for a time in IT support and had various other jobs. She moved back to the Mountains in 2016 and started walking dogs, minding them in other people’s homes and doing pet taxi services as well as other services under the name ‘Errand Girl’.
In the meantime the home where she had grown up was being fully renovated and she started planning to landscape the grounds with a view to starting a doggy daycare.
Then Covid hit and the doggy population expanded, so in 2021 when life returned to a semblance of normality and people had to go back to work either every day or for some part of the week and some dogs had never been left alone, Rochelle opened what is now known as Bark Park and the rest, as they say, is history.
Our process
Rochelle is very careful to ensure that she assesses every dog for sociability with a dog pack. With her adaptable facilities, extensive grounds and her dedicated band of assistants, she asks new clients to come for a free ‘meet and greet’ where she gradually introduces their dog to the current day’s pack and notices any sign of shyness or fear.
If the dog is calm and sociable, Rochelle asks the owner to leave for half an hour to see whether the dog has any separation anxiety and to quickly reassure the dog that the owner has not abandoned it. If the dog plays happily while the owner is away, Rochelle can schedule daycare or overnight stays without further assessment.
If the dog takes longer to settle, Rochelle asks the owner to repeat the brief encounters, each getting longer until the dog settles before longer stays can be scheduled.
If there are dogs that do not get along, they can be entertained in separate settings and over-excitement can be managed in a quiet and comfortable room if a dog needs time to calm down.
There are no cages on the property. All dogs are accommodated on dog beds or human beds for overnight or longer stays. The atmosphere for each dog is that he or she is in a comfortable home with loving human carers and plenty of doggy mates.
Rochelle and her assistants interact with their doggy charges, walking around the grounds, throwing balls, frisbees and dog toys for the pups to fetch or to bury in the sandpit and when it is time to rest there are plenty of long-chew items like hooves scattered around for dogs to gnaw on before falling asleep.
