ABOUT US

Welcome to the 4-Legged Friends website!!

4-Legged Friends Pet Services, LLC prides itself in providing top notch in-home pet care and dog training services since 2007. It was established in 2007 when Katie Ervin, the owner of 4-Legged Friends Pet Services, LLC, moved to Hagerstown with her husband Bryan and their fur babies to offer area residents and their companions a necessary and unique alternative to boarding. Since than it has expanded its dog training services to group classes held at their 4-Legged Friends dog training center.

The 4-Legged Friends Staff

Katie Ervin, CPDT-KA, PMCT

Alison Whitmore

Katie opened 4-Legged Friends out of a lifelong passion and love for animals. Shortly, after graduating from college with a BA in Psychology and BS in Business Katie learned that corporate america was not for her and began to explore opportunities that would allow her to follow her dream of working with animals.
Since 2001 Katie volunteered her free time training and caring for shelter animals and has almost 20 years experience training dogs using positive reinforcement based approaches. In addition Katie has been teaching & coaching people to train their dogs since 2007 in the areas of good manners, rally obedience & tricks. Katie believes that training should be fun for both the human and the dog. Katie has been a Certified Professional Dog Trainer since 2009 and believes that continuing education is key.
Katie is currently owned by 7 fur kids. Her pups include Lucky a border collie/shepherd mix, Arlo a hound mix & Chloe a cocker spaniel. Lucky loves participating in Rally Obedience and Agility. He also loves learning new tricks and is working on mastering riding his skateboard. Chloe also loves doing agility, rally obedience and tricks. Her favorite trick is putting away her toys and retrieving a tissue when her mom sneezes. Arlo is the youngster in the group. He is also super smart and loves to learn new things. He also loves doing Rally Obedience, learning new tricks as well as going swimming which is his #1 favorite. He can also sometimes be seen in the Outdoor Adventure class working with Alison. The kitty Silly also enjoy learning through clicker training and being a distraction for when the dog are working on their mat exercise. The two guinea pigs Clover and Chance also love learning through clicker training especially some tricks such as go through a tunnel or spin in a circle. The newest family member is Legato, a thoroughbred, who has also learned some tricks and has done some obstacle training.
Certifications & Accomplishments
Certified Professional Dog Trainer-Knowledge Assessed
Certified in Pet First Aid
Pat Miller Certified Trainer
Certified Pet Care Technician through the ABKA
Honor Student at Peaceable Paws Intern Academies
Successful Graduate of a comprehensive apprenticeship under the distinguished trainer and author Pat Miller

Professional Memberships & Affiliations
Association for Professional Dog Trainers International
Certification Council for Professional Dog Trainers
The Pet Professional Guild
Pet Sitters International
International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants
Mid Atlantic Association of Professional Positive Pet Trainers

Alison Whitmore joined the team at 4-Legged Friends in 2023 as a dog walker/pet sitter as well as assisting in training classes.

She has had a love for animals since she was young and has always had a home full of pets. In 2016 Alison completed Hagerstown Community College’s Veterinary Assistant Course and worked at an animal shelter for several years where she learned about many different animal behaviors. In 2019 she completed Hagerstown Community College’s Professional Pet Grooming Certification and began grooming her own pets as well as animal shelter pets. She has continued to learn more about pet grooming with a focus on helping animals to have a comfortable and less stressful grooming experience.

Alison currently has two senior rescue dogs; Nolan a poodle schnauzer mix and Tucker a papillon mix. She has been working on cooperative care practices with the dogs to allow them to have more fun and choice with grooming and veterinary care. Alison also has five cats Princess Peach, Katniss Rue, Fang and Antiago.

Alison has assisted in many training classes and loves watching dogs learn and seeing the spark in their eyes when they finally understand what is being communicated with them.