Less Leash Reactive When Part Of A Group?

[christinepi]

Tracker (our only dog) is decidedly leash reactive (we're working on this). He's fine off leash with just about anybody (within reason). So whenever I walk him I know he'll react more or less strongly, depending. However, one morning recently, I met with an acquaintance who has 3 dogs, they met for the first time, things went well (her dogs are very mellow), and we set off on a walk in a wide open space near the ocean. So they're all trotting along, minding their own business, for ca 30 minutes, and along comes a woman with two off leash little white fuzzy dogs (quiet, mellow critters for once). Now mind you, Tracker isn't particularly bothered by small dogs, but still. He paid them no notice; neither did the other two dogs in our group. Just registered their existence and kept going. I was stunned. I wonder--had I been alone with him I'm SURE he would have had something to say. Was it that he was part of this group the members of which he only had met 30 minutes prior? I have no other explanation. I've not walked him in a group since, so this has been my only experience.

Edited March 1, 2012 by christinepi

[Fruitycake]

It could be very well that he felt comforted by the fact that no one else got excited or upset by the other dogs, and was taking his behavioral cues from them. It also might have been the fact that since her dogs didn't give him any reason to be upset (completely neutral or calm/unthreatening body language when they met so he felt calmer there) that it might have put a little nugget of "hey, maybe all dogs aren't bad" in his brain, and the behavior of the other 3 when meeting another reinforced that little thought.

 

Is there any way you could walk with her and her dogs more often? It sounds like it might be really good for Tracker!

[christinepi]

It could be very well that he felt comforted by the fact that no one else got excited or upset by the other dogs, and was taking his behavioral cues from them. It also might have been the fact that since her dogs didn't give him any reason to be upset (completely neutral or calm/unthreatening body language when they met so he felt calmer there) that it might have put a little nugget of "hey, maybe all dogs aren't bad" in his brain, and the behavior of the other 3 when meeting another reinforced that little thought.

 

Is there any way you could walk with her and her dogs more often? It sounds like it might be really good for Tracker!

 

Yes, there definitely is. I'll do that and I'm really curious what will happen.

[Guest mariah]

We had good results when we did this with our previous dog. He wasn't very reactive, but he was extremely uncomfortable around strange dogs. Walking with another dog who was indifferent to them seemed to relax him. We did have to be choosy about who we walked with, though. My parents' dog is very friendly towards strange dogs, and walking the two of them together was a disaster. Bobby would be trying to entice the dogs to come closer and play, and Chips would be posturing and growling at them to keep their distance (something he wouldn't do when we were walking alone).

[RedHead]

My old malamute was leash reactive as well and was always fine walking around the dog park or at events with lots of dogs around. If however, we were walking down the street and one lone dog was coming she went nuts. I have now come to understand it was more MY behaviour than hers. By leashing dogs and pulling back/tensing up we often send out messages that we are nervous, as well as blocking a lot of their natural greeting behaviour (e.g. sniffing). When we were at an event with lots of dogs I was relaxed and there was no tensing on the leash, or "getting ready" for an attack. Dogs are very in tune to what we, and the dogs around them are thinking. You probably felt more relaxed walking with a group and so did Tracker. Definitely keep up the group walks if possible as dogs learn so much from other dogs

[christinepi]

My old malamute was leash reactive as well and was always fine walking around the dog park or at events with lots of dogs around. If however, we were walking down the street and one lone dog was coming she went nuts. I have now come to understand it was more MY behaviour than hers. By leashing dogs and pulling back/tensing up we often send out messages that we are nervous, as well as blocking a lot of their natural greeting behaviour (e.g. sniffing). When we were at an event with lots of dogs I was relaxed and there was no tensing on the leash, or "getting ready" for an attack. Dogs are very in tune to what we, and the dogs around them are thinking. You probably felt more relaxed walking with a group and so did Tracker. Definitely keep up the group walks if possible as dogs learn so much from other dogs

 

 

I will keep up the group walk, thanks.

 

I can totally see that the fact of being leashed is maddening to some dogs because it restricts them for their natural greeting/interacting behavior upon meeting a new dog. But why, then, when meeting other greys (with ONE exception), he's always been quiet and polite? I know this is common for greys. But my question is: doesn't the fact that meeting other greys on leash doesn't cause him to yell make it look as if it's not about being leashed, but rather about the breed of the other?

 

Furthermore, there have been occasions, when I walk him alone, when he'll encounter dogs of other breeds and he won't even look at them when walking by. With others, including some he's seen a million time in our neighborhood (plus butt sniffed), he's super tense. And with some, he'll yell at them one time, and ignore them at another. This has me so confused.

 

That's why I also don't think this is related to anxiety on my part (I don't even know what I'd be anxious about, especially if the other dog is leashed also. Tracker will yell, we'll move on, and everybody goes back to normal. The leash is mostly even slack when he goes over threshold w/o me having pulled it taut once--I do this consciously. I need to add that I stopped setting myself and him up that way almost a year ago by choosing where I go, so these over the threshold situations rarely happen anymore, and, like I said, I had good success with counter conditioning before he goes over threshold).

 

And lastly, while I would describe him as leash reactive, I'm not even sure this is always the appropriate term. He'll playbow, make growly noises (they sound exactly like when I rub his butt and he's thrilled, or when he happily tosses dirt around with his paws after he's eliminated, so "growling" is not exactly the right word), but also rushes into other dogs' faces, sniffs their butts but gets upset when they want to sniff his, barks--so there are elements of seemingly wanting to play, but he's rather grumpy and unkind at the same time (he's sent a fair number of dogs onto their backs to appease him). He does that with cows or sheep, too. He'll playbow, "growl" and bark at them, too (though they never roll onto their backs). I wonder whether he's just so unsure what the heck this other dog breed IS or even what kind of other mammal this cow or whatever is, so he just yells proactively. But then what doesn't fit into that picture is that he'll be much less tense when let off leash with other dog breeds to run. It'll be tense alright at first, but mostly he'll ignore them. That would indicate to me that it is indeed a leash issue. Oh well.

Edited March 2, 2012 by christinepi