My name is Dylan Atkinson. I have a soft spot for the unwanted, miss-understood & even aggressive. I understand the path many dogs take because I have lived it myself.

My earliest memory is of my first dog Haylen coming home from the shelter. Almost all my life I have been lucky enough to have a K9 companion. Haylen was my best friend & at times my protector. Childhood was a rough-time. At 15, thanks to addiction my mother decided to send my dog to the shelter while I was abandoned to live in woods.

After a short-time I had been lucky enough to be taken in by a family I had never even met before. I was introduced into a community, helped & given the support & skills I needed to succeed.

After graduating high school I became a professional Cage fighter. Fighting & coaching a youth MMA team for 8 years. Producing one IBJJF world champion.

Stepping away from the world of MMA in 2019, I set my sights on another goal, opening my own Rescue.

I was astonished to learn rescues do not train any of the abandoned dogs they get into their custody. This makes no since to me because the #1 cause of abandonment & death is lack of training. With over 90% of dogs in shelters being considered untrained. I knew my rescue would have to be different.

After 18 months of preparing & professional training courses, I opened the Abandonment Prevention Project a for-profit rescue aimed at training abandoned dogs & educating the public. My goal is to personally train & rehome 1000 abandoned dogs. Showing the world that a trained dog is a wanted dog. Lets give these guys the skills they need to succeed in society.