We recently took in a 13 month old swiss mountain dog puppy. She is very fearful of just about everything. She cowers when we are in public places and around any new people when we are at home or out in public. We have had he a little over a month and she still is getting used to my husband. We have 2 other large breed dogs who are friendly with everyone no matter where we are or who we see. She will finally take treats from hi which is a big step. To help her we make daily outings to some where with new people and settings. She finally lets some of the people at our local farm store pet her with out cowering and she will willingly get out of the car.
Any help on how to make my puppy happy would be great.
It sounds like whatever your doing is working if she is making these big steps but if she does have a "panic attack" you can try talking to her in a soothing voice, take her to a secluded area away from everything that's going on and let her just calm down and rest for a few minutes and once she is calmed down you can praise her and let her know she did good. hope this helped. good luck
She needs your help bolstering her confidence. For every tiny improvemnt like stepping towards someone, praise her. We have a Boxer who didn't know how to play. For every little positive behavior, we praised him while ignoring undesirable. It sounds like you are doing well, keep it up.
Take her out a lot; pets mart, doggie parks, and take her on long walks. She might've had bad owners who would abuse her, so she thinks everyone is going to abuse her. She is already starting to trust you, but you have to be patient.
It sounds like you are doing just fine with your training. She must have been pretty isolated before you got her, but she is learning, with your help, how to act around people.
Make sure you're not overwhelming her. It's usually a good idea to take baby steps rather than trying to thrust her into a wholly new situation. That way, she can handle each step successfully.
pets question and answers,www.5d2d.com
Work on counter-conditioning her to associate scary things with good things:
http://www.clickertraining.com/node/2327 (You have to sign up with the site to read the article, but as you'll see, it's free and simple to do so, so you might as well. Also, I know your dog isn't reactive as is described in the article, but the cause of her behavior is fear just the same, and the concept of counter-conditioning is still the same.)
Read this article:
http://www.positivedogs.com/articles/ove ... Consider doing something similar. Encourage all forms of improvement, even seemingly insignificant ones like how she's holding her tail or ears.
Instruct everyone to use calming signals around her to make things easier for her:
http://www.canis.no/rugaas/onearticle.ph ... pets question and answers,www.5d2d.com Basically, people should ignore her. They shouldn't approach her, reach out for her, make sudden movements, stare at her, etc. These are all actions that she's probably perceiving as being threatening.
Try getting people to give her treats when she acts social NO dog won't accept food. And don't act
tense or stress when you know how she may react in public setting. relax and pretend she knows better. it really shows improvement! my fearful mix use to be afraid of the vets-ha ha-but her fear st oped when i just relaxed and didn't stress about her being stress.another thing if she cowards away don't pity her this will make the situation worst st earnly NOT angerly correct her bbehavior
lastly get some friends to come over go by CCesar'srule no touch no talk no eye contact to the dog
this will help your dog get to know people by the dog meeting the person not the person meeting the dog if you have anymore questions just watch the dog wwhispereron National Geographic Channel or Nat-geo Wild
