Advice please. Our 14 month dog has always been a bit nervous (traffic, noises,...) and earlier on used to bark at cars, jump up at people, and get madly excited when meeting other dogs,... It can run around a bit in our vegetable garden, there is a field not too far away where dogs can run off the leash (which it enjoys). We went to the seaside earlier this week, second time in a month and my wife put it on a long leash, whereupon the combination of waves and people passing by with dogs once again made it a bit nervous so it started pulling on the leash and barking at people with dogs (it never hurts anyone, I hasten to add). I go for a walk with it twice a day (a short one near some ponds in the morning and a longer one in the forest in the afternoon). Today, in particular, it barked at one or two people, and kind of sidled up nervously and kind of pounced to say hullo to other dogs, which obviously puts off their owners (and me). Shame as the dog (female) was getting better and better. Advice would be welcome.
Trying to work with a reactive dog can be very frustrating. We tend to think "if I just keep taking them out around whatever they react to, they will get used to it and settle down". Unfortunately that tends to make it worse in a lot of cases. Learning to read your dog's body language before she reacts can help you figure out what the cause for the reactivity is. Dogdecoder.com is a phone app that uses illustrations to teach you how to read your dog. That's a great first step. By knowing her body language, you can determine if she is fearful, anxious, over stimulated, or just hyper friendly. Knowing that can help you find a solution. For example, one of my dogs is afraid of other dogs. Her reactivity is because she is afraid of being attacked. Continuing to bring her around other dogs is making her reactivity worse. Instead, I keep her at a much greater distance, put myself between her and the other dog, and such. I am her protector. She will never get over her fear unfortunately, so I manage it by reducing her exposure. On the flipside, my other dog gets over stimulated. He is so eager to be out and about, that he gets overwhelmed with all the scents, sights and sounds. For him, I try to start him off in a boring spot for a few minutes until he can calm down. Reducing the stimulation at the start of the walk settles him so he can better handle things when there is more going on. Each cause of the reactivity will need a different method to work through, so understanding why she is reacting is a good starting point. With just what you've mentioned and her age and breed, I think it's likely over stimulation. In that case, including some training before and during the walk can help her focus on you rather than everything else. Giving her lots of mental activity can help. Things like agility, tracking, tricks, etc. You don't have to go all competition-style with it, just make up games involving things like following a scent (hide and seek is great for this. Have a friend or family member join you on a walk and have them hide up ahead and ask the find to "find X"), or teach her to go over or under a bench, etc, or to twine around a group of posts, and so on. Always give her tons of praise and encouragement for the things. As she learns to focus on her task, she'll start to ignore everything else more. But definitely study her body language to make sure why she reacts. If it's not over stimulation, we can offer other ideasfor you.
