Stephanie
Stephanie came to GARD in May 2013 and began training Maya, a German Shepherd/Siberian Husky mix, in July 2013 for Air Scent. In March 2015 they became an Operational Air Scent team and began responding to searches throughout Virginia.
Stephanie and her husband, Andrew (HRD K9 Handler), decided to start a family and Stephanie left the team for maternity leave and retired K9 Maya. However, she stayed engaged on the side with testing or problem solving. She decided to rejoin the team in Spring 2019 as a ground member and to assist with K9 training.
Outside of GARD, Stephanie likes to be outdoors. She can usually be found chasing her daughter around the backyard, hiking, or hunting with Maya, family, and friends. She has repurposed Maya to trail wounded deer and locate deer antler sheds. Maya has also been trained on her human sister’s scent and still rides along to trainings to get lots of pets and attention from the team.