Running up and barking at strangers randomly when off-lead

[SDickson]

Hi, we have a 14 month-old Yorkshire Terrier/Maltese cross who we have had since he was 11 weeks. He has been socialised well...kids, cafes, beaches, dogs, holidays, crowded places etc. He gets on well with other dogs and plays equally well with small and big dogs. In general he loves the people he knows but is happy to ignore people he does not know until he warms to them, could be 10 mins or days, depending on the person. He has been to puppy school and was neutered at 11 months. His main issue is that he seems to think he is in charge of security  at home and is territorial of our property. However, after working with him and using a combination of rewarding him / distracting him when visitors come to the door this has become a lot better. He still does not like tradesmen,  but now grudgingly accepts them. His random barking at passers-by outside our property has also become a lot better after thanking him and checking to see the ‘danger’, before telling him it is ok. The one issue that remains and that I am struggling with though is that, when offlead, he can randomly run up to a stranger (particularly lone men without a dog) and bark aggressively at them. When I call him back his recall is about 70%. This never happens at a dog park though, as he ignores the owners and plays with the dogs, only when we are at a regular park. When he returns to me, I reward him for the recall, but am slightly concerned that he may think I am rewarding him for warding off the stranger? Would love some help with this. Many thanks. 

 

[Adrienne]

Hello and welcome to the forums!

I am glad to hear that he has gotten better with wanting to take the big responsible for home security. I am sure he must feel a good sense of relief in knowing that you are appreciative of his watchdog capabilities and that you let him know that everything is fine after you check things out. 

In regards to the issue you are facing, it sounds like he needs more training on this level. We usually do not allow off leash freedom to dogs until they are very reliable in not taking off and interacting with people or things unless we give them OK to (which should be perfectly under stimulus control after lots of training). The fact the he returns to you only 70 percent of the time is a further proof that he isn't yet ready to deal with this form of distraction and is over threshold. 

To answer your question, we may never really know what he thinks exactly when we call him back and reward. Chances are, he just thinks he's being rewarded for coming back to you, but it's also true that dogs also learn through associations other than behavior/reward contingencies and can chain one event to another, so it could be he may also come to think "every time I go towards a person and bark, and my owner calls me I get rewarded, I should keep doing that."

A similar issue can happen with dogs who jump, and then we ask them to sit and reward the sit. Are we rewarding them for sitting, or is the dog being rewarded for jumping up and then sitting when we ask them to? For some dogs, it seems like the latter occurs, as they quickly learn to perform behavior chains of jumping and then sitting in expectation of the treat.  So if you see your dog running towards people, barking and then sort of looking at you in hopes of being called in hopes of his reward, it could likely be this scenario is taking place, but he may also be looking at you in hopes of getting out of a sticky situation (which is rewarding too). 

For the jumping and sitting chain, we usually solve this by asking the dog to sit before the dog even has a chance of thinking of jumping. This therefore avoids that the jumping has any chance to partake in the chain. Other options are to only reward sits that aren't preceded by jumping or adding a delay so to confuse the dog and forget about the undesirable behavior performed before. 

My preferred strategy is prevention as it prevents the dog from rehearsing the problematic behavior not allowing it to put roots. So I would suggest a compromise if we want our dogs to have some freedom to romp around in parks and have some fun, but without engaging in undesirable behaviors (which may also startle the other party- I know, I know, your dog is small and adorable, but to some people small dogs can be scary ankle biters no matter how cute.. ugghh).

So I would suggest keeping your dog on a long line (long leash around 15 feet or more often sold in horse tack stores), which  accomplishes the following:

1) prevents your dog from rehearsing the problem behavior

2) prevents other people possibly getting upset 

3) allows your to work more on recall training (practice recalls on the long line despite distractions rewarding with high-value treats)

4) allows you to work also on behavior modification  (creating positive associations with lone men without a dog, if that's what triggers him). In such a case,  I would work on Look at That as soon as you spot somebody that may trigger him from a distance until you get a conditioned emotional response (dog looks up at you for treats rather than reacting). You can start practicing this from windows and them upgrade on walks on a regular leash and then at the park upon spotting certain men. Here's how to train it:

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/brain-training/university/look-at-that/

I hope this helps,

Let me know if you have any questions,

Best,

Adrienne