The Ball State

The next common issue is your dog sits down making it virtually impossible to move. This again comes about from a build up of triggers as mentioned above. Your dog firstly will slow down as a first sign, when this occurs you need to hold the lead shorter and snap them out of this mood. If your dog doesn’t snap out of this mood and turns into ball which you can’t move then do your best to get it upright and walking past the approaching dog in a calm state. To get your dog out of the ball state you can try to touch them under the stomach and often this will get them onto there feet. If this works then simply snap them out of the state and walk past the approaching dog in a calm state. Continue this as you walk past anymore dogs on your walk and never make a big issue about any dog approaching. If I’m approaching a dog on the street I often look around the street ignoring the approaching dog. I find this helps me forget about the thoughts that go on in your head like “oh no here’s another dog how’s he going to react to it?” Also stops me from pre-empting any bad situations that have occurred in the past.

If your dog curls into a ball and won’t move or you are just having no luck then you may need to address this in role playing situations. Use a friendly dog it knows in neutral places – such as your back yard. Attach both dogs to a lead and replicate the approaching dog scenario. See if the nervousness behaviour is replicated or if it’s much happier in this situation. Once it gets use to the dog approaching it and doesn’t show a sign of the nervous / scared behaviour then move to the streets doing the same scenario with your friend’s dog approaching yours. Replicate this till it is done successfully. Once you feel confident your dog is happy doing this then take your dog for a walk see how it handles random dogs approaching. If it doesn’t work then continue with the role playing / training situations. The more you do this successfully (i.e. your dog walks past an approaching dog without showing any signs of nervousness) the more likely it will lose this behaviour when on walks.