So I have this labrador who is seven years old, he has in the past been attacked by larger dogs and is now weary of them. He particularly hates dogs that want to jump on him and play fight or dogs that slowly walk over to him and stare at him.Sometimes when he comes across a large dog he will cower with his tail on his belly and scream high pitch, other times if a dog comes over to play fight or runs over happily to him he will growl and rarely bare his teeth but won’t go further then that but most of the time with large dogs he will run over barking at them wanting to play.I can never tell how he will react with large dogs, he either cowers , bares teeth , or does a friendly approach . How can I help stop him from being fearful of random dogs ?
Fear aggression can be difficult to deal with. I would strongly suggest seeing a behaviourist and in the meantime, can you keep him put of situations where big dogs can run up to him off lead?
It may be difficult to get over his scare because of some bad memory or experience, similar to humans. However, it can be reduced by some tricks and enough patience. To re-build a good impression on large dogs, your pup should first lower alert to the huge enemy. And the simple way to reduce alerts is to distract his attention by some treats. Here is a guideline you could refer:http://bit.ly/dog-socialization-training-tips I have another idea, could you foster a large-breed puppy with your pup? So your boy would get used to its size when it grows up to an adult!
