What is reactivity?

Reactivity involves a dog reacting to a stimulus by barking, growling lunging etc. The stimulus can vary from dog to dog, it can be other dogs, people, cars, motorbikes, trolleys and more. Reactivity can look aggressive, but a lot of the reaction is due to fear.

Beginning management:

• Arm yourself with yummy, high-quality treats. With reactivity training you will use a lot of treats and can fill your dog up pretty fast, you can either use their breakfast or adjust their meals to prevent over eating. The best treat to use is plain chicken cut into tiny pieces - personally, I use dehydrated chicken; it is the least fatty and salty treat and perfect for training.
• Start off in a pretty quiet area, but an area where you know your dog's trigger can be seen at a safe distance. For Evie, her triggers are people and dogs so we went and stood on a grassy patch a good distance away from a shop.
• If you get to your chosen area and your dog is already becoming reactive you need to create more space between yourselves and the trigger. Overtime you will get to know your dog's threshold well and you will know when something is getting too close. Remember that a dog that is approaching or is over their threshold will not take treats or focus properly. It is better to be further way and calm than too close and attempting the impossible.
• Ensuring that your dog is comfortable but interested in their surroundings, you can begin your session. It is likely that you will find your dog displaying avoidance behaviours such as sniffing the ground or looking away when their trigger comes into view. What you don't want to do is treat them for this, that way you are teaching them that avoiding looking at the trigger is good, when ideally what we would like is for the dog to see the trigger and get excited for the nice thing to come to them, so in Evie's case seeing a person = yummy treat from mum.
• As the dog looks at their trigger, treat them. You need to catch it quickly at the beginning before any reaction begins - what you're doing is creating the association that the dog has acknowledged the tigger and is being rewarded for no reaction. You are likely going to use many treats to begin with so ensure you have lots on hand. You need to be quick with your treat delivery, the longer you allow the dog to stare at the trigger the more anxious they will become and the more likely they are to react. Ignore any reactions, do not tell the dog off or shout, say 'let's go' and lead them in the opposite direction, taking some steps away and start again.

Evie is very good at sitting still and being rewarded for not reacting to dogs or people as they walk by (it took us a while to get there), however, being on the move can be a bit more difficult for us, especially if we need to cross the road but another dog is coming along or a person is close by.

With a reactive dog you need to be on alert for triggers and you need to spot them before your dog does. For example if you spot a postman coming around the corner, you need to start with the treats even before the dog spots the post man - we are rewarding for calm behaviour.

It is best to avoid close encounters until your dog's tolerance level has really been improved. Although Evie is doing well, if we have to walk closeby to another dog or person she can become overwhelmed very quickly and lunge toward them barking. If you can calmly corss the road, do so, if there's an empty side street you can take, do so, if there's a patch of grass for you to retreat to and stand treating your dog as the trigger passes, do so - no, we understand that it is not ideal and walks will take much longer but you are stopping your dog from becoming overwhelmed and damaging your hard work.

For all Rommies, an unknown person entering their home, walking into their space and touching them is incredibly overwhelming. We will have discussed the Visitor into the Home Process with you in your viewing and highly advise using it for every new person the dog meets in the home. Click the following link to be taken to the page: Visitor Process.