Very afraid of big dog...

[mcemily]

Lerwick hates it when other dogs bark, too. He'll be on his way towards making friends with a dog, and then the dog will bark. Total deal-breaker. That mean ol' dog may as well have bitten a big chunk out of him, LOL. The dog doesn't even have to be barking at Lerwick. Any bark for any reason, Lerwick's done.

That said, Lerwick has really come out of his shell since spending that weekend with my in-laws' dogs. Last weekend we took him to the dog park, and he was completely unfazed by the hordes of dogs running around (I have never seen so many dogs and people there), and his tail was constantly wagging as he and the other dogs went through the sniffing routine. He's also much more confident and gregarious with unfamiliar leashed dogs (on a walk, at the vet's, at the pet store, etc.) than before. Now whenever we encounter another dog on a walk, Lerwick is the one straining to greet the new dog, wagging his tail off. He does this with bigger dogs too, now.

The real test will be the Boxer. On our walking trail, we regularly encountered a certain jogger, and a couple times a week he'd have his Boxer with him. Lerwick is utterly terrified of that Boxer (who has never so much as barked at him, btw). We haven't seen them lately, but next time we do, I'll be interested to see if Lerwick's reaction is different.

 

[labgirl]

Was it big dogs, or the amount of dogs? To be honest, you have to just keep at it, slow and steady. I wouldn't try shows but get to know some big dogs on walks, if you have a good training club nearby that is the best place for mixed socialisation.

The best thing you can do is go up to a big dog and make a fuss of it. I learned this tip via a training sesson with a dog nervous terrier. It was amazing the difference it made the owner coming over to make a fuss of Cadbury. Don't force Mozart to go with you, however, just let him watch from a distance. Soon he'll want to be in on the action, hopefully.

By the way, Mozart is a great name! My first cat was called Mozart, I had him when I was about 8, I miss him tons.

 

[bwibwigouza]

Since we live on the farm, there's quite a few families around us that has big dogs. However, the timing of our walk never works out to meeting any of them. The only training class around our area is PetSmart most people there has small dog. Mozart has no problem with them at all. Maybe when the weather gets better I'll take him to the downtown of our small town to walk around the park. Hopefully, by end of April he'll be desensitized from meeting big dogs since I'll need to take him along with me to farmers' market.

 

[dextersowner]

Mine is terrified as well.

My sheltie Dexter is 11 mos. old and is also terrified of large dogs. I also own a female border collie to whom he is extremely attached, but she's not a large breed. When I took them to a large dog park this weekend, he began shrieking and flailing around when approached by several large breeds. This has been building for months as he would much rather run to the other owners rather than socialize with other dogs.

What can I do to remedy this situation? I am unaware of any incident which would cause him to fear dogs larger than he (though completely comfortable around dogs his size or smaller).