Max (13 months) is nervous of strangers who enter our home and people who talk to him when out walking on lead. He shows no anxiety when he meets people when off lead. When we have visitors at home that he has not met before he will usually just do a couple of barks and then as long as the person ignores him he will eventually approach and make friends. When out walking on lead he is absolutely fine if people walk straight past us. He is also ok to sit while we talk to people. He is not ok if the person interacts with him, eg talks to him or crouches down with their hand out. This results in him barking and backing off. I tell people that he is nervous but should I be more forceful and tell them not to talk to him? It sounds so rude, especially as these people tend to be dog lovers! Any tips as to how I can deal with this? I should mention that this reaction only happens if the people do not have a dog. If they have, Max seems to think they must be ok and is very happy to approach them. I feel a bit down about it tonight. The man he barked at this evening seemed really surprised at his behaviour because "Labradors are normally so friendly".
I understand you feeling a bit down about it. Max may well gain confidence and become more relaxed about it as he gets older. In the meantime I'd just go at his pace, and try to keep this as stress-fee as possible for him when meeting people. Yes, that might mean telling people in a firm way not to look at him or hold their hand out. Max is your priority, not other people's feelings It's not that unusual for dogs to not like strangers staring at them, in fact I'd say that all dogs find it odd to some degree. We humans certainly don't like it and find it scary and odd if a stranger stares at us. You could try a little experiment and ask the next dogless person to take a treat from you and have them just casually drop it on the ground without looking at Max. If he finds that ok and eats the treat that may be something you can get people to do - this will give them a job and may even help to make Max feel that dogless strangers might be ok after all.
If you like books, you might like Patricia McConnell's "the other end of the leash". It's all about what humans look like, and feel like, to dogs - and how scary and confusing they can be. She has a great bit in the book on why primates have a strong urge to rush up to dog, hands reaching for their face, staring them in the eyes - and why dogs naturally pretty much hate that. (Some learn to live with it, some even enjoy it, but it's not a natural dog way of carrying on at all).
I have a very similar problem with my two. They started behaving like max at about six months after veterinary treatment. They are now four. They have improved a lot but still don't like strangers trying to touch. The vets is a nightmare !!! I can highly recommend the book Why Does My Dog do That ? By Caroline Spencer. It works. At least it has for my two. It explains how to build trust and more importantly how to teach your dog to understand you will deal with the scary monster they don't have to. I know only too well those comments 'labradors are usually so friendly' and I know it feels rude to tell people to keep away. Even if you ask people to ignore your dog it's amazing how difficult they find it or you meet people who think they will be the one to fix your dog and it will love them. The best thing is to keep moving preferably in a different direction so you aren't heading straight towards them. You need to choose the 'flight' response which is what max would do if he wasn't on a lead but because he can't he feels he needs to bark to scare away the monster. Once he trusts you to make the right/safe decision he will start to feel more confident and eventually you won't have to change direction or keep moving.
Thank you for your responses. I'll have a look at the books you've suggested. Max does seem to be quite a reactive dog but we've seen quite a bit of improvement over the last few months. It's people crouching that he seems to particularly dislike. I presume with most dogs it makes the person seem less threatening but for him it's obviously quite scary!
My two don't like people crouching down either. Your right for most dogs it makes people less threatening because they aren't standing over them but for some reactive dogs it's worse because it means direct eye contact. My dogs do not like strangers making direct eye contact. In dog language direct eye contact is a dominant/ aggressive signal. if people stop to talk to you try and keep their attention off max and keep moving him around so they can't make eye contact with him.
Hi there, Dexter has always barked when people come in our house ,whilst he's not unfriendly when he knows you ,he doesn't particularly like people and doesn't rush to them to be petted or given attention.When we had visitors I would either put him in his room behind his gate if I was alone or c&t him for sitting on his bed and being quiet if I had an extra pair of hands.Last year when he was just coming up to 2 years old I had a dog trainer come to my house to come out on a walk with me to help me work on Dexter's reactivity in the lead,she said his Showing anxiety about people coming in and to ALWAYS put him behind his gate and reward him for quiet calm behaviour..in doing so I was giving him a 'job' to do which would distract him from the anxiety he was feeling as people were welcomed in.We spent a lot of time on this.....the gate wasn't opened until he was totally quiet,visitors were asked to stand in a certain place and ignore him and he was told to go to go his bed and rewarded for doing so...if he didn't go to his bed or started to woof again he went back behind his gate and the process started again.... If he did sit quietly on his bed ,he would be released and was either food rewarded by me standing close to the visitor if they aren't that keen on feeding him...or I give dog friendly people some treats to feed themselves.it takes time ,,it's not the best when you are trying to be polite and welcome visitors in but it has worked.Dexter runs to his room now and sits when he hears the door bell ...he will bark but I have a 'Quiet' cue that will pipe him down ....until I open the door and he hears voices,that sets him off again .....he will stop though after a few seconds because he knows there's no 'open sesame' of his gate until he's quiet.The time it's a fail is when visitors don't follow instructions ..... Dexter also used to bark at men that spoke to me in the street,I adopted the same process,as soon as someone was headed to wards me looking like they had the intention to talk ,I'd ask for a sit ie give him a job to do and just give him a stream of treats for staying like that and not barking ......it meant for a while I would be talking to someone whilst not looking at them and looking at Dexter but I usually got time to explain quickly what I was doing ....it's been worth it,2 cars stopped on our walk tonight,one driver got out and started really striding towards me,that would have unnerved him when he was younger but now he sits down and waits while I talk. Hope that helps x
