Training A Dog : Don’t Give It Your Phobias
This was inspired by a walk in Eskdale a few days ago.
We’d all been out for a lovely long walk along by the river. ’We’ being myself and the 4 dogs (Kylah, Arwen, Vinnie and Blue). After a lovely stop at the Boot Inn (where I had coffee and they had chips) we were on our way back to the car.
About 10 minutes from the car we caught up with a middle aged (I’d say early fifties) couple with a Jack Russell terrier puppy.
Arwen did her usual thing which was go up and be all friendly and kissy. The other dogs followed suit.
The man immediately picked up the puppy and held it away from the dogs. I walked past and quietly said “you’re teaching that dog there’s a problem“. The man looked at me like I was from Mars.
There was no problem except in the man’s head. My dogs were fine with this tiny puppy. It was fine with them. It looked a bit wide-eyed, but it wasn’t cowering or afraid in any way. But the more this guy picks the dog up the more he is going to reinforce in that puppy’s head that other dogs = problem. And the more he picks it up the more it’s going to need picking up – because it’s never going to learn how to socialise properly. So in a few months he will have created a basket case dog that’s scared of any other dog it meets. And then he’s going to have to pick it up for the rest of it’s life – or give it some treatment to calm it down.
We went past and the man put the dog down again. Arwen was desperate to say hello – but every time she want back the woman shooed her off saying “No, No, No“. And as I went past she said as if to explain “our collie was attacked once and it’s not great with other dogs“. Well that’s no reason to put your phobia and your collie’s phobia onto your new puppy is it?
Actually we met the collie just before we got in the car. It didn’t seem to have any problems with my dogs. In fact it was delighted to meet them. My point?
The problem is with the owners. People like that will never learn and nor do they want to. All they do is create problem dogs where there was no problem to start with.
I never stop Arwen from saying hello to anything. I don’t care how grumpy the dog is – she has to learn. Yes it can be difficult because you want to be protective, but in the end it just does more harm than good.
So however protective or worried you are for your new puppy – don’t over protect it. Dogs generally have a way of sorting it out for themselves. They did it well before we came along remember!
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