We have a 16 week old golden retriever puppy and we’ve been doing small walks around the cul de sac we live in, as there’s only fully vaccinated dogs in the street and no one else comes down our end. Initially we learnt he’d do whatever he wanted on these walks, unless we had treats and then he was brilliant. He had the basics of loose-leash walking down pat!
Then about a week ago, we were doing our little routine and two kids on e-scooters came up behind him quite quickly and quite close to him, and understandably he got scared. I waited a short while to see if he’d settled once they’d left but he just couldn’t so we went back inside and relaxed. However, ever since then, every time we go outside for a walk he gets super skittish when there’s scooters, bikes and now even cars! It’s generally when they’re coming from behind him, and he can’t even be distracted by food anymore – which is huge, because he LOVES food. He’ll then pull for the remainder of the walk and can’t focus back on us for longer than a second and appears anxious.
I don’t want him feeling overwhelmed every time we go outside because that’s horrible for him! Has anyone gone through this, is it the fearful stage people mention or are there things I could be doing to help him adjust? I’ve been playing desensitising YouTube videos of car and street noises while we’re at home, we sit in our front yard and I hand feed him while cars go in and out of driveways and I’ll start doing this at our local park too but I am open to any and all suggestions to help!
submitted by /u/adihgr
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