We brought our 12 week old Sheepadoodle on a post dinner walk around the block last night. It was going great. He had just started to enjoy his walks this week and was confident and sniffing around. Then on a fairly quiet street, we encountered a man walking his dog, who was a good bit away. His dog got excited, started barking really loud and was uncontrollable. Our puppy was startled and started sprinting. The man brought his dog out onto the street, away from the sidewalk. We passed each other with parked cars in between. We tried to offer high value treats to our pup but he wasn't interested at all, even a good few minutes after the incident. He was fine once we were back home, he was playing for a bit and then went to bed.
This morning when I brought him out for a potty break, he wanted nothing to do with being outside and wanted to head back in. I brought him across the street but his eyes were glued to a man walking towards us. A few hours later I brought him out again and he seemed pretty anxious, afraid and wanted to immediately head back inside the apartment building.
I'm worried and wondering if this would have a lasting impact on him? How do we help him gain his confidence back? Thinking of going back to keeping walks short and just sitting outside the apartment building and let him observe.
submitted by /u/ich-habe-hunger
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