Advice/Rant: That one house on the walking route
Advice/Rant: That one house on the walking route
For the past several months I’ve been walking my dog (Cocker Spaniel) at least twice a day. We usually get about 2 total miles in. My neighborhood is an old racetrack and it’s a nice walking route.
I’ve also been using the time to train her to behave when strangers and other dogs pass us, and overall she’s been responding very well. She is scrappy like Spaniels tend to be, but she’s improved a lot - I can hold her attention and reward her with praise and a treat when we pass people and dogs and she doesn’t bark or growl, which is now most of the time - often even when there’s another dog that is reacting badly.
But there’s this one house… They have two medium/small dogs that are almost always left unattended in a fenced yard. They start barking at us before we turn the corner onto their road. The dogs are up against the fence, barking and snarling and nipping at each other. They are extremely loud and relentless. When the owners are present, it’s 50/50 if they scream at the dogs to stop or not, and even then it’s with mixed results. But lately they are just letting it go. I am getting the impression they are upset that someone dares to walk on the street past their house.
This is the only time I lose control of my dog. She behaves fine until we’re right at the fence, then she reacts by growling and lunging toward the fence, and eventually starts barking back. It was so bad a few days ago that I picked her up and faced her away, but she wriggled out of her harness and jumped off me. An Amazon truck had to stop to avoid hitting her, which I couldn’t even hear coming behind us because the other dogs were barking so loud. I was livid and embarrassed at the whole situation.
I’ve tried everything I can think of passing this house - stopping and holding tight till my dog stops reacting, which she does only until we start moving again, or holding the treat in front of her face to try to hold her attention, which doesn’t work. I’ve even thrown the treat away in front of her while she’s barking, which only makes me feel bad.
The obvious solution is to avoid walking past this house, but that would mean I can’t walk the loop. And at this point I don’t want to give the owners the satisfaction of intimidating me and other dog walkers away from walking on their street.
What other training methods can I use to help my dog ignore them? I’m afraid it’s just too much for her. Should I bother making a complaint? Any and all advice is appreciated.
When I had a neighbor with agressive fence running dogs, I asked the owners permission to bribe their dogs with treats each time I came by the fence.
By chatting with them I found out what treat brands were acceptable, and what frequency was acceptable and safe for their dogs.
The owner was relieved that I had a plan.
With the dog owners blessing, I just did normal dog training stuff with their dogs each time we went by. I rewarded their rare few moments of not barking with treats, and eventually reinforced their calmly coming up to the fence with treats.
In my case they were barking at my kids, and I did have to plan extra visits without my kids to give the dogs a better chance to succeed and get a treat. You might need to take a pre-walk walk solo once or twice to get some "wins" in so the barky dogs get the idea that being quiet (or just a tiny bit less aggressive) earns them treats.
Eventually I didn't even need the treats, anymore - but of course by then I liked those dogs and didn't want to disappoint them.
Thanks for the reply and the good advice.
I didn’t mention that this house has a giant “Trump, a real American hero” banner on the fence facing their neighbor’s house, who is an elderly Latina woman. So I’ll have to overcome my own pre-conceived assumptions about what kind of people they are and how they treat their dogs. I was hoping to resolve it between me and my dog on our own, because it seems like it would be valuable for her to behave well even in difficult situations like that. I’m also concerned they’ll take any discussion about their dogs badly. But I guess if that’s the best option then I won’t know till I try.