Fear Related Aggression Reactivity

Thank you, I can relate actually! She is a very high energy collie and has to play a certain amount of ball or do a certain amount of running/playing/swimming a day or she becomes very hyper. The only problem that we have is that we live bang in the center of town so we have to walk to any fields through town or to wherever the car is parked (street parking can be quite hard here so it’s often quite far away) and she reacts on that part of the journey often setting herself up for a bad day as once on high alert she stays there. We play ball at home with an indoor ball and lots of mental stimulation, we play ball outside too.
After her ball time in the fields if she meets another dog she is often much better! I hadn’t really thought to mention that so far. If only we could get her this calm before leaving the house. One day at a time..

 

Aww she sounds adorable, I know the scream you are talking about I’ve heard that one with nervous springers before hehe.
Yes sometimes I agree that it’s best just to adapt to the dog, in starting to see that ours will always be the nervous type and so some adapting will be needed to ensure she’s happy and calmer on walks.
Something may have happened to her when she was a pup too, the breeder fed her on cornflakes and milk so he really had no idea about dogs *rolls eyes*.
Our other dog Eli is very nervous of men in flat caps hats actually and the man we picked him up from (he was an unplanned litter from a rather unsavoury character) wore a peaked cap. So no guesses what happened there. He’s actually much better with that now as my dad and bro wear those types of hats and have been very kind to him. If he sees a man in one in the street he will see duck behind me though and if they try to touch him to pet him he will cower and back away in fear. It’s sad what can be done to a pup that will scar it for the rest of its life :-(
Thank you for taking the time to share your experience, I’m glad we are not alone in this xx

 

That’s such a brilliant idea! I wonder if we could find something like this for her to do. We already have an agility course in the garden (cheap Aldi thing) which she’s gotten quite good at so maybe we could get her to weave around trees at our local wood. We often ask her to jump on things and she poses for photos for me for my Instagram which she enjoys, she loves sitting in trees that none of the other dogs can get in to and if the ball gets lost she knows it’s her job (self appointed) to go and retrieve it (from down a hole, in a briar thicket etc) it’s hilarious to see her spring in to action! Collie’s really love having a job huh!
We recently took our other younger collie mix to a little agility course and he LOVED it. He’s a little nervous of other dogs but friendly unless they try to dominate him so hoping he would be okay in those circumstances? We’d never compete anyway so I guess it would be fine and good for him to see more dogs (obviously with our reactive one it cuts down the times that Eli can socialise as we have to think of her).

thanks so much for taking the time to reply! I think we may need to think about giving her more ‘purpose’. She would have been an amazing sheep dog I think (on the hill farm she came from) she’s got that intense stare and is very focused when she wants to be.

all the best

 

This is a great way to look/think of it! I can see now that this is the same for her! If only there was a way to calm her enough to get her from the house to the car (which is often parked a few streets away because we live right in the center of town)...

 

yes I 1000% agree. Collie’s are wonderful and so so clever and affectionate but can be very sensitive too. I’ve found that our labrador trains best in an entirely different way to the collies, he wants me to be very firm with my voice and very snappy with my fingers and abrupt movements. Whereas the collies like a gentle voice, no fast hand movements and just a generally softer approach. Our collie mix boy who’s 2 will respond immediately to me simply asking him to do something, I hardly ever have to raise my voice and if I have to he’s instantly at heal and ‘sorry’. He’s the absolutely sweetest, love him to bits. He also loves the whistle, he must have seen other dogs in his breeding place as it was a farm. When I first brought him home I used a whistle to get him to come to me and he responded before I even trained him! Sorry, off on a tangent about how much I love collies, oops.
Thank you for the reply, it’s all interesting to know!