Bendogs fear aggression

[bendog]

Bens fear aggression is so so much better these days. I still put him on lead to pass other dogs, but if we are far enough away i can leave him off lead and he will make the choice to avoid other dogs, rather than going into attack mode. He is still scared, I don't think he will ever be comfortable with strange dogs. He offers appeasement gestures if one gets too close and often after passing a dog he will suddenly go really playful which is either anticipation of his reward (a treat or ball throw) or else an attempt to dispel the stress I'm not sure.

But just as an example of how far he has come, we bumped into a dog walker with 8(!) dogs all but one Airedale off lead. I moved off the path slightly and Ben manage to not react except with the tiniest of growls when one approached. A year or two ago I'm sure he would have been a lunging barking mess. It was still unbelievably stressful for him, but he dealt with it nicely without going into meltdown which is a huge improvement.

[OnceInAWeil]

Yay for Ben! That's wonderful.

[Nettle]

Wow, that is so good well done!

[JudyN]

Brilliant!

[ClareMarsh]

Go Bendog (both of you ).

I will confess to being a bit freaked out at the thought of someone walking 8 dogs at once though

[bendog]

Clare I know, 4 is hard enough!

So proud of Ben though. When he sees a dog and he's off lead he stops and looks at me to see what to do. he still needs some destress time after seeing lots of dogs so i try to mix up busy walks and quieter ones so he isnt swamped everyday. But basically these days he only properly blows up at dogs charging around, or being too in your face, they ignore him, he will ignore them no problem.

[jacksdad]

very cool. sounds like ben is starting to "get" all the work.