SophieYoung

Thank you so much for all of your advice! 💛

Oops, I forgot to add: Is there a particular way to react/respond when she does run and bark or simply barking (if on leash, at home or in the car)? This is where I am worried I may be reinforcing if I don’t react correctly.

Hi Adrienne (and everyone) My pup Maisy is a koolie x staffy and is almost 2. She is the sweetest, smoochiest dog when she is at home with people she knows. She was a pretty well behaved puppy, she was mostly off leash when out for walks etc. She has always had trouble understanding children but left everyone else alone, however lately she has developed a really intense fear of men. It began with one or two random incidents of her seeing a man walking alone and running to them, circling them and barking. Her recall is really good and would come back almost straight away. As time has gone on, its almost every man she sees walking alone and its not just off leash anymore. If she is in the car and we are in traffic or stopped at a light, if she makes eye contact with a man on the street or a man is walking strange/wearing accessories/has facial hair/is pretty much doing anything she barks quite aggressively. Same goes for some men while she is on leash and especially when my housemates have men over she hasn’t met before. Every day she seems to get worse, she isn’t allowed off leash now except at a fenced dog park where she is usually calm. If she ever barks at someone there its usually not aggressive and if I reassure her straight away and use “leave it” she comes right back and ignores them for the rest of the day. I want her to feel safe and comfortable every where she goes, and I miss my well behaved pooch. I always have toys and treats for distraction, and every chance I get I work on training her to look at me as we walk past distractions and we practise walking past men without putting her over threshold. Sorry for the long message! I just want to make sure there is nothing I am accidentally doing to reinforce the behaviour because it seems unusual for this fear to begin later in life. Thank you 😊

Wow thank you so much for all the info! We have been working on look at that through the window and it has helped so much! On walks and at the beach I have been keeping her under threshold and rewarding her for looking at me and ignoring the children which seems to be helping! Where we live its currently stage 4 restrictions so having her meet any children is nearly impossible right now but hopefully once everything eases we can work on it more! Thanks again, your program has already made such a difference to my pups behaviour! 😊

Hi there! I was hoping for some guidance on how to teach my pup to be comfortable around children. Her name is Maisy and she is a 1 year old koolie x staffy and for the most part her training is going really well. She is quite shy when meeting new adults but just leaves them alone, however children cause her to bark. She won’t jump on them and usually stays a metre or so back from them but begins to bark and if we are at the park/beach she will run around them in a circle and then come back to me or continue playing elsewhere. On occasion a very calm child has been able to pat her at the beach, she will let them come up to her and gently say hello. However when I was at a friend’s house recently, her 7 year old niece was there and at first Maisy did not bark but after some time she would run at her from the other side of the room and start to bark. I cannot seem to read whether it is a nervous or aggressive bark but as she is shy I would assume its nervous? Her recall is very good and she always comes back but only once she has gone up to them, sometimes she spots them from the other side of the park and she runs over. I have to avoid most parks and beaches at certain times of the day otherwise she can’t have off leash play. I am also in my twentys and my friends will have children sooner or later and I really want Maisy to be comfortable with them. Thank you so much and the program is amazing I’m already seeing results and we are fairly new to the course 😀