Hands up if you’ve ever ended up in tears as a result of your dogs’ behaviour.
If you’ve said no I’m willing to bet that you either have a well-balanced dog & stumbled innocently upon this ode to the reactive dog while getting your canine net hit (you’re very welcome by the way :-)) or you’re a man. Sorry to stereotype here, but our dogs have pushed Other Half to the limit and he’s not blubbed once, so I’m assuming it’s a predominantly female thing.
Yep, I blubbed. In public. I blubbed as I trudged through the woods while rummaging in my dog walking bag for tissues without bits of dog biscuit on them and overall failing miserably to put on a brave face. The incident which sparked this bout of self-indulgence was wholly avoidable, but I got it wrong. So did the other owner but she must have a hide like a rhino as she didn’t seem to give a damn that her dog had just caused utter chaos.
Dive bombed
The scenario played out like this. We’re wandering through the woods when I hear a woman call her dog. I can’t see the dog but call Little Bear to me and seeing her bend down, I assume she’s put the lead on her dog so I did the same.
There’s nothing worse than letting your dog run up to another one that’s newly tethered – not only is it rude, but if that dog has been put on a lead for a reason, your dog is now in possible danger.
Lead aggression is a common problem and is, if you think about it a logical, if not desirable reaction. We all respond to stress with a split second ‘fight’ or ‘flight’ decision, but leads take away the flight option, which for a stressed dog only leaves one course of action.
Three guesses how Little Bear reacted when a super excited Mini Schnauzer raced straight into his face through the ferns. Yep. He went nuts. Lunging, growling and barking and all the while this little dog kept on coming back. His owner wasn’t a bit bothered and didn’t even try to recall him!
Unable to fend him off I had to resort to picking LB up, something I hate doing as it’s a further confinement, but while being relentlessly dive-bombed I was left with little choice. Said hooligan then started jumping all over me while his owner just puffed on her cigarette and shuffled off without him – charming!
Getting it wrong
There are so many things I did wrong. I should have turned tail and headed in the other direction. I should have called to her to check if she’d put her dog on the lead. If she hadn’t, I would have let LB off the lead as he’s met this dog before without incident. I should have thrown some chicken on the floor for the marauder and run with LB the other way. I should at least have given her a piece of my mind… but of course, in the stress of it all I did none of those things. Instead, I ranted and raved and then cried hot tired tears while wondering if I was ever going to be able to get my darling boy to a state of calmness.
The whole incident is in such stark contrast to the progress he’s been making lately that I think it was even more upsetting than it might have been. It’s left me under a cloud and kicked off a headache that looks like it’s settling in for a long stint, but we’ll plough on. I may get it wrong frequently, but the biggest mistake I could ever make would be giving up.
Hi, my name is Sarah and I have an 18 month old miniature schnauzer called Alfie who sounds as if he could be Little Bear’s twin! I stumbled across your blog by accident whilst playing around with twitter and it made me jump for joy. Thank you so very much for sharing your experiences.
My family and I all love Alfie to bits and I cannot think of how life would be now without him. Indoors he is a perfect dog, friendly to visitors, calm, cuddly and well trained. However, as soon as we venture out and he sees another dog he changes persona completely and barks, growls, lunges until I often end up, like you, in tears. We live in a tiny village in Warwickshire and it feels as if everybody is judging us and our pet.
We did everything by the book when we got Alfie (he is our first ever dog). I devoured puppy training books, spoke to the vet in depth about getting things right from the start and therefore headed off to a local (recommended) puppy training class. And this was where everything went wrong. On the first meeting we came across two Jack Russells who were extremely vocal and sent Alf into a fearful trance. But we continued to go …. believing we were doing the right thing by him, even though he spent 50% of the sessions hiding under a chair and the other 50% barking crazily.
We hoped that he would grow out of this phase and continued with the everyday obedience training tasks. But Alfie’s aggressive nature towards dogs simply increased. We then contacted a one-to-one trainer who seemed to work miracles on his first visit but we soon realised that all he did was instill absolutely fear into Alf with intense negative training.
And so, we continue to try and train Alfie everyday, using various distraction techniques and we have good days when I rejoice that we have passed another dog with no great traumas, and bad days when I scurry home completely embarrassed, crying into my collar!
So, I just wanted to say thank you for making me realise that we are not the only ones coping with difficult dog behaviour and thank you for making me smile with some of your Little Bear tales.
I’m sure, like me, you wouldn’t swap your schnauzer for the world!
HI Sarah,
thanks so much for the lovely comment and for sharing Alfie’s story. You’re right, they could be twins!
I can so relate to the feeling of being judged. It’s funny and sad that the most judgemental can often be other dog owners, but it’s never what I call the ‘real’ dog people. People who know dogs know their behaviour and see fear in their reactivity, but the most judgemental I’ve met have been the owners of super chilled lap dogs who seem to assume that their dogs horizontal temperament is entirely down to them; completely ignorant to the fact that genetics and a heap of luck might have had something to do with it too!
Fearfulness can be inherited, so don’t believe people who say ‘oh, it’s always the owner’, genetics plays a huge huge part! It took me a long time to stop blaming myself, but I got there in the end. I messed up on numerous fronts and I’m sure it didn’t help, but I’m back on the horse so to speak and I’ll never give up trying. I’ve also got a thicker skin now – it does grow I promise. 🙂
It’s never too late to work on their training and at 18 months, he’s still a youngster. Little Bear is five tomorrow and he’s made huge progress just in the past year 🙂
I get so mad when I hear about negative trainers, it’s like they prey on unsuspecting new dog owners like vultures and they make everything ten times worse. Finding a positive, supportive trainer is so helpful though. I’ve just found a new class with two behaviourists that are completely on the same page as me when it comes to training and I feel 100 times better knowing that I have somewhere I can go to for support. Have you checked out local trainers on the APDT website? Having help and support is so important.
You might have read a lot of the following, but just in case it’s of help, even if it’s just a reminder that lots of people have problem dogs and you’re by no means alone 🙂 The fact that we hang on to our problem dogs and persevere says a lot too so pat yourself on the back for that! :
http://www.fearfuldogs.wordpress.com/
http://notesfromadogwalker.com/ – the home of DINOS – dogs in need of space
http://reactivechampion.blogspot.co.uk/
http://clicktrickdogs.wordpress.com/
http://schnau.cwordshop.co.uk/ – the Schnauzer Forum, lots of lovely mad Schnauzer lovers on here, many with reactive dogs!
http://www.patriciamcconnell.com/ – my dog behaviour hero – her books are amazing too
Emma Parsons’ Click to Calm is excellent too – I read the intro and cried out loud as it’s written by a dog trainer who’s dog became fear aggressive. After reading that I thought, well if it can happen to a pro, then maybe it’s not all my fault.
I’m waffling now, but always happy to chat about Schnauzers! Thanks again for sharing your experience with Alfie, let me know how you get on and you can always email me if you want to chat 🙂
Thanks for sharing your story. I can totally relate, and it makes me crazy when other people’s mismanagement of their dog causes my dog to react in a way that is not of my liking. One of my dogs, Lulu Belle, is a fearful rescue. She especially shows leash aggression. I really have problems because several of my neighbors allow their dogs to roam uncontrolled. So, here I am walking my 2 dogs when other dogs with no humans, approach, and run, and run around us. I have spoken many times to the unruler humans, but to no avail. So, Lulu, must learn to not react. Now that is a hard one. Glad I found you in a Blog Hop. I look forward to reading about Little Bear. Love the name. – DogDaz
It’s awful how irresponsible people can be isn’t it?! I always assume that fellow dog lovers would want to help other dogs but maybe that’s the difference between dog lovers and dog owners 😦
I feel for their dogs too as they’re bound to get into trouble. Poor Lulu, that must so so tough for you both, I hope your neighbours eventually come to their senses. Thanks so much for the comment 🙂
Hands up who’s cried on a walk? Me, Me! Stumbled across your blog when looking for info on muzzling, not found that bit yet, lol, but am enjoying (if thats the right phrase) wading through your story. We took on our ginger ninja, a 14 month old terrier, 3 months ago thinking she was a well balanced friendly dog, naively not taking into account she had only ever experienced farm life. We handled her introduction to real life very badly and now have a reactive dog on our hands. The training has all been left to me which just leaves me in despair somedays (most days!) I am not allowed to obsessed apparently and it causes lots of agro between me and my husband, I get the point to a degree, I do need to stop thinking about it 24 7 but until I feel I have a management plan its very hard. We now have a behaviorist and have signed up for a course in feb. I look forward to reading more about you and little bear.
Thanks so much for finding the blog and commenting and congrats on the new addition. I’m loving her nickname. My mum has a cat she calls the ‘ginger whinger’ because he’s so nervous and always whining, but I’m digressing!
I think we’re all naive at first, but why wouldn’t we be? Unless we were fully qualified, very experienced dog behaviourists most people wouldn’t assume that getting a farm dog would be a problem. I know plenty of people with very well balanced, chilled out rescue dogs, farm dogs and ex-puppy farm breeders so it’s not your fault. It’s just who she is and it sounds like she’s really fallen on her paws by being adopted by someone so obviously willing to do the best for her.
I can so relate to the despair and the arguments! OH won’t mind me saying this but we mainly argue over the dogs! All those surveys that say couples argue most over money? They didn’t interview enough dog owners!
It’s hard not to obsess when you care so much but the one thing I would say is that once I started taking control of how I was feeling and behaving, the dogs improved.
It didn’t happen overnight, but I tried to channel my frustration (and obsession!) into learning. I signed up for a dog behaviour course, but I could have done it just by reading good books (I have a top ten somewhere on here I can dig out if that will help?) and that gave me the reassurance that it a) wasn’t all my fault and b) the tools to know how to handle things. I’ve a tonne more to learn but it helped hugely. I also started the blog as a way of keeping my obsession away from OH, friends and family who were probably sick to the back teeth of my dog woes! Before going for walks I’d take time to relax, I’d take Rescue Remedy and visualise a really positive walk ahead etc.
It’s fantastic that you have a behaviourist on board and a course booked. It’s still such early days too – snoring beside me is our own Ginger Ninja, Annie who we adopted over two years ago. Three months in we were tearing our hair out and I actually considered (for a second!) rehoming her on the grounds that two reactive dogs would be an uber nightmare. Thank goodness I didn’t, because she’s an absolute joy now. She still has her moments, but we can deal with them and she’s a completely different dog to the one we first met.
Keep up the great work and please know you’re not alone and you’re not at fault. There are plenty of us out here going through the same thing and with work, it will get better.
Ah thank you for the welcome, its not so much a nickname as what she is called lol. She was bought from some gypsies at 5 weeks old and became known as Li’l Ginge because she was. I find myself calling her Ninja more often than not as she takes flying leaps onto your lap when you are least expecting it (but she does also get called ginger whinger too 😉 ) My Mum hates it, doesn’t think its pretty enough for a lady dog (she hasn’t spent much time with her yet !! ) so we let her think its Ginger Rogers.
I am a member of a forum which gives great support and advice and also keep a journal online which is helping to channel my nerdy obsession. Please recommend some books, I have When Pigs Fly, Scaredy Dog, Don’t Shoot the Dog, On Talking Terms with Dogs and am still reading Feisty Fido and Culture Clash.
Sounds like you’re pretty much sorted. Wow, it took me a couple of years to get that organised!
Here’s the post I did on the top ten https://thelittlebeardogblog.wordpress.com/2011/06/05/my-top-ten-dog-books/ although it’s been a while so could do with an update now.
Thanks for your list, few there I’ve not read that will now be going on the Christmas list 🙂
Keep up the nerdy obsession; dog nerds of the world unite 🙂