On leash, Off leash Reactivity

Hello, dog peeps. Jack here. Just a quick one before we get into this episode. You may or may not be aware that when I'm not talking dog stuff with Max, I in fact interview people who are incarcerated in prisons across the United States on a show called One Minute Remaining Stories from the Inmates. And that show has been nominated for an award in America. And I would love your support if you've got 60 seconds to click the link in the show notes of this episode and just vote for my show. That would be amazing if you could. Thank you very much indeed. Oh, and don't forget to verify your email address. Otherwise, the vote does not count. Thank you.

You're either all in on this model, or maybe you're building with another. You're either speed, or is it security? You're either custom, or are you ready to use? Or you're AWS AI. With hundreds of models, ready-to-use agents, speed and security built in, you don't have to pick a side. You can have them all. How will AI revolutionize your business? AWS AI is how.

It's the Dog People Podcast with your host Jack Lawrence.

Secretly, I decided to start this podcast for some free dog training advice. You know, Malinois seem to be like the dog at the moment. Like, I think people see them on Instagram doing these incredible things. Yeah. Go, oh my God, that's awesome. And then I get one like, oh my God, what the fuck?

And Max O'Neill.

You would not believe how many people I meet And I go, what made you want to get, say, an Aussie Shepherd? They go, I don't know. I go, had you met one before? They go, no. If you want to ask me how often I walk my own dog a week, it's only twice a week.

It's the Dog People Podcast, the podcast hopefully giving you a no-nonsense approach to dog training so you never have to shed. It's okay, it's friendly. My name's Jack Lawrence, Max O'Neill, the Down Under Dog Trainer. And of course, we are brought to you by the phenomenal superstar legends at Nose Pet Insurance. That's knose.com.au. They are Australian owned and operated, fantastic company. Check them out. Issued by Pacific International Insurance. Today, Max, we're going to continue on with our little series on reactivity. And this is kind of apt because only today I was out with Kira training and there was a gentleman, I could see him looking a bit wary as we were going through to this sort of off-leash dog area. He was keeping his dog very away from us. So I recalled Kira and put her next to me and walked past. He's like, oh, really sorry. This one's just a bit, you know, can get a bit funny, especially On the lead. He was concerned about his dog on the lead, and people have that problem a lot. On lead, off leash reactivity.

Yeah, definitely. It's a really, really, really common thing you see. And I think a lot of listeners will fall in one of those camps potentially. Some dogs can be reactive or aggressive both on and off leash. We can certainly see some dogs who are fine on the leash when they're being managed, but the moment you give them too much freedom can take the mick a bit, get themselves a bit overworked. But also we see this other group of dogs where you'll see them at the park, at the beach, playing freely, doing their thing. But the moment that leash comes back on, they're going at all the other dogs and it's a really, really common thing. So if that's you, we're going to break that down today and explain exactly why that's the case.

All right. Well, get stuck in. Why does this happen, first of all?

So there's a, there's a few reasons for that and we'll, in no particular order, we'll go through them. Probably the number one, the most common one we see is what we call barrier frustration. So, these dogs are super friendly off the leash. They, you know, love other dogs, but they love other dogs so much that the moment they're on the leash and they're confined, they want to get to it so, so, so badly that they just lose their mind. Now, this can start off pretty innocently or innocuously where the dog goes, hey, there's a dog. I really want to see it. They're a bit pulley, bit excited. The owner holds them back and it might just be a bit of a frustration like, oh, I really wanted to get there. But over time, it morphs more from I really want to get there and I'm so happy to see another dog, to it bleeds more into the, or leaning more towards the, I'm super frustrated part. And as we know, when we're frustrated, we can get snappy, lash out, things like that. So over time, what starts off as I want to get to the dog can turn into I'm so pissed off about this whole situation. I've kind of forgotten the reason in the first place. And now I'm just frustrated. And dogs, when they're in that state of mind, can go one of two ways. Sometimes if you drop the leash, remove all the tension, your dog gets what it wants. Everything goes. But often a lot of time they're so worked up by that point where even one of their friends or dogs they know, if they meet them, they'll take them on and fight and bite and go for it because they're just so worked up at that point.

Can this situation occur with the classic overexposure and allowing your dog to obviously meet too many dogs and every dog go past? It's like, so then, so when it comes to it and you're like, well, actually today, no, we're not going to meet this dog. It's like, what do you mean? Usually we do this all the time. No, I'm going over there. And then eventually they get dragged and dragged and they give up and then, and then so, and it just continues to spiral like all of these things.

It's a very simple recipe. It's, it's usually a one-way road there. It's too many leash greetings and just too much exposure to other dogs. If every time your dog sees another dog, they're expecting a super high arousal meeting, that's what's going to happen when they then see a dog. So example, a big one is, is a lot of daycare dogs experience this. They're fine at daycare all day, they're off leash, but their body's conditioned to think every time I'm around a dog, it's super high intense play. So what happens is they're going for a walk, they turn and see a dog, and completely involuntarily and subconsciously, their body's giving them a giant shot of adrenaline in the arm and going, oh my God, get ready, we're about to be chased, we're about to do the chasing, we're about to wrestle, like, let's go. So they prepped for that. Then what starts to happen at some point, they go, oh, there's a dog, I'm not getting to see it. Boom, their body gives them a big shot of cortisol in the arm. So now they feel really heightened. And super stressed and they've got nowhere to channel it. They hit the end of the leash and then it's just bark, bark, bark. It's like putting a Mentos in a Diet Coke and then trying to cram the lid on and contain it all. It just—

And as we know, like, you know, especially when it comes to dogs and working things like protection and stuff like that, the idea is like you put the tension on the leash because you want to create that frustration. And people are not meaning to do that. But as soon as that dog hits the end of the lead, it's then creating the frustration and it's building and building and building and building and building.

Spot on. Yeah, exactly right. Like, um, what we'll do is when this episode goes live, which might be today, tomorrow, something like that, is I'll put up a video of Nelson doing some bite work and I'll show you guys, like, to intentionally piss him off and make— make him more aggressive and more likely to bite, we will backtie him and put the thing he wants, the sleeve or the decoy, out of reach. So exactly what we do to intentionally encourage aggression, you guys are— well, it's not you, all of you guys, but some people are doing Not realising just how damaging it is. So we take the thing Nelson wants, the sleeve. He goes, I know I can get it. I get super heightened whenever I see it, but it's out of reach and I can't get to it. And that's pretty much what barrier frustration is on leash.

So you talk about dogs who go to these daycares tend to have this problem quite a lot. And we've spoken about doggy daycares, and I think we've spoken about in the past how to find good ones and that sort of stuff. So if someone has got a dog that's going to a doggy daycare, 'cause they're like, oh, you know, I just need to send my dog somewhere during the day, but they don't want this to occur. Like, what can they look for? In the place that they're going to, to ensure that they're not going to get problems.

Yeah, cool. So we'll talk about what you can look for in a daycare, and also what you can do outside to make sure that we don't eventually go there. So everything in life is about balance with our dogs. Okay. So a good dog daycare will spend just as much time playing as they will doing downtime. If not, the scales might be leaning slightly heavier towards downtime. It might be like a 60/40 split and we might go, oh, well, I don't want to, if I'm sending my dog to daycare, like I want them having the best time. I want them really draining their batteries. And the problem is, I was like, sometimes it's a, you know, more exercise, more stimulation isn't always better. As we spoke about in one of our other episodes last week with our guest Sarah, is the more you chase your tail, that the more overtired, the more they're awake and playing, the more they're going into a sleep deficit. That's when they get overstimulated and crazy. Their emotional regulation goes out the window and they're more likely to explode. So if I was sending my dog to a daycare, I'd be like, hey, what does a day look like? If they said, oh, we just let them have the best time, they go all day, they gas themselves out. I'm like, yeah, Red Cross, not for me. If they go, oh, we get a morning shift and then they all get an hour's nap in their crate or on their beds, some downtime, and then we bring them out, but we don't let them play. We just do like calmer sniffing things and then some rest. And then maybe one final play in the afternoon. I go, that sort of thing sounds perfect.

So it's hilarious because I know I always refer the dogs back to the kids, but it's no different. Like I'm thinking in my head, like when I'm like, I took my kids to a specific daycare, which I won't Name, but you walked— we went there to pick them up in the afternoon and it was mental. It was chaos. Like the kids were just running around and screaming and throwing things. And my kids was just like not happy. They just hated the whole experience. They came home, they were on edge. They were, you know, there was tears and all sorts of stuff. The one we ended up putting them into was for not— you would turn up and everything was calm and everyone's just doing some coloring and some playing. And they come home just like, yeah, had a great day. And they were just chill. And again, I know I do this all the time, but it's just so funny how similar it is with the— The parallels there. With everything to do with dogs and having children.

Some daycares need every day to feel like a birthday party.

Yeah, it's mental.

You know, bringing your kids home after a party, it's just like, oh my God, just like, yeah, treats all day, same as daycare, stimulation all day, same as a birthday party and daycare. It's just like, it's just too much. So if your dog is in daycare, it's fine. We're not saying pull them out, we're just saying find a good one. They are out there. And how you find a good one is looking at like, all right, what's their numbers? Is it like You know, 200 dogs in a warehouse or in the one enclosure?

Packing them in.

Do they separate it based on energy levels? Do they break the day up? All those sorts of things. And then if your dog does go to a daycare, again, balance. If half the week is spent with lots and lots of play with the dog, we want to make sure we're balancing it out with experiences where we're being around a dog and doing nothing. And right now your dog might not be able to handle that. So you might have to go further back and work on a bunch of training foundations. There's heaps of episodes here showing you how to do that before you can get closer. But that's, that's one, one source of unleashed aggression is barrier frustration.

You're either all in on this model or maybe you're building with another. You're either speed or is it security? Or you're AWS AI. Don't pick a side, pick them all. AWS AI is how.

Honey, that flu keeping you up?

Yeah, I don't got this.

You need NyQuil Intense Flu.

Undo your flu symptoms with NyQuil Intense Flu, the nighttime sniffling, aching, aching fever, best sleep with the flu medicine. You do got this. Use as directed. Keep out of reach of children.

I love football season. The games, the rivalries, the food, getting everyone together. No game day feels complete without a trip to Total Wine and More. I can find everything from cold beer and canned cocktails to wines and spirits for the whole crew. And if I want to bring something different to the watch party, the Total Wine team always has Plus it's nice knowing I'm getting the lowest prices. Get your game day lineup ready at Total Wine and More. Spirits are not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly. Be 21.

Uh, so, okay. So let's tackle this now when we're out in the real world and we've got a dog that suffers from this situation where they are reactive on the leash. What's, you know, what are the steps we can go through to start working on that?

So number one is engagement. It's like the old saying, like, don't look down, don't look down if you're afraid of heights. Like if there's something that your dog wants and you're letting them fixate on it, every second they're fixating, that adrenaline's building, you know, desire for that thing is building, frustration's building. So number one, what you've got to work on is engagement. You're— it's the old cliché, your dog needs to see you as the, the more interesting, fun, exciting thing in the environment. If your dog's staring that other dog out, they're showing you pretty clearly where their intentions lie, where the desire lies. So play, hand feeding, you know, a bit of what I call a dog detox. Like, pull your dog out of dog daycare for a bit, or take them on walks. They're not going to see dog for a bit. Like, really build value in you and like reconnect with your dog. And then going and listening to our thresholds episode, starting off in your green and just edging into yellow. Chances are like your dog's red zone's gotten blown out of control and it's way bigger than you think. And you might think you can get 20 meters from a dog where your dog might need double that. So just starting small and just working away incrementally, just working on, hey, there's a dog around, but you're going to pick them or pick me over them. And we're going to show our dog that they get far more value out of engaging with us than they do engaging with the dog. And we're going to do a whole other episode on diving into that topic and more around adrenaline in a moment. But, um, before we do that, there's a couple of other reasons why dogs can get, uh, a bit aggressive on leash versus off leash. And that can come down to what I guess some people refer to as like on-leash anxiety. And this can come from one of two directions. So number one, this can be a learned behaviour, as in our dog goes to the beach every single day, has the time of their life, and they go, oh, dogs are great. But maybe one time walking back to the car, another dog had a go at them, maybe one of these barrier frustrated dogs. And then they go, ah, okay, dogs are fine when I'm off leash, but if I'm clipped to here, I'm more likely to be attacked. 'Cause again, our dogs can be very contextual and can understand different parts of a situation. So they go, hey, mum, get me off this rope. Like I'm trapped. Like this is where things are going to go wrong. So it could be from learned experiences, or it can just simply come from our dogs inherently understanding I'm a bit trapped here. So if we haven't taught our dog proper loose leash walking and they're not comfortable with the leash, they don't accept it. They're pulling on it. They're back and forth. They're all over the place. They're not fully comfortable. They're not conditioned to the leash. That's when our dogs can be more uncomfortable and more likely to snap. They're not necessarily barrier frustrated. They haven't been attacked, but just that simple discomfort of being on the leash and sort of not being able to move the way they like and not fully comfortable in that setting, that can also be a source of on-leash aggression as well.

One thing I've always avoided with Kira is any sort of on-leash greetings with any other dogs at all. I mean, you see it all the time. I mean, people are just constantly, and you know, and you just, you You see the tension in the leash between the 2 dogs because they're sort of like pulling towards each other. The sort of owners are sort of like leant back and holding on.

Like water skiing.

Yeah. And it's just, it's almost, it's building again, that whole pressure on them and they're feeling the pressure from the lead and all that sort of stuff. And I just feel like, you know, if you, if you, if you're doing greetings with dogs, I would suggest avoiding doing it with them on lead.

Like 100%. Yeah. And your dog doesn't need to meet every people. Like, that's the other thing Jack and I always say, like, Neither of us can imagine anything worse than going for a walk in the morning and saying hello to everyone.

Every single person coming up to you wanting to say hello. Yeah, that is— no, stop.

Yeah, I'd honestly move to a non-English speaking country if that started to happen to me. And it's the same for our dogs too. Like, most of our dogs are pretty introverted and don't really feel like that. So the more times we do that, the more likely they get pissed off and snappy or run into another dog that's also feeling that way. And then it's just, you know, super volatile. But you don't need to do on-leash meetings. Like, If we think of those typical meetings where the dogs start off nose to nose, they kind of walk to the end of each other. So they're sniffing nose to bum. They're that little yin and yang where they start to kind of circle around at each other. And you and the owner are quickly swapping leads back and forth and oops, sorry, over you.

Well, that's how they always say it, haven't they? They always tangle and then away we go.

So the reason why that happens, guys, is you've all probably heard the expression fight or flight, right? Fight or flight. The problem is, is most of our dogs are wired to flight before they fight. That being, you know, the exception generally being guardian breeds and whatnot are wired to be like, no, no, I'll go take this problem on head on. But a lot of our dogs, even really soft-natured, can go— and just the other day I saw a crazy fight between 2 golden retrievers who had an on-leash meeting. Again, they're bred to be super passive and back off and be like, sorry, after you, be super polite. But they're both stuck. They would— one tried to pull away, it couldn't, it got pissed off, it snapped, and then it was a huge fight simply because Flight was no longer an option. So fight becomes a default. So on leash meetings, we just, just don't do them. And if someone's coming up to you and going, oh, can our dog say hello? If you're feeling too uncomfortable, tell them your dog's got parvo.

I just, I say my dog's aggressive. I'll say, she'll bite. Sorry. And then they're like, why have you got the dog out then? I'm just like, because of the amount of times someone will be being dragged across the road towards me and they're like, sorry, just wants to say hello. I'm like, I just, I don't, I'm sorry. I don't want a part of that. Imagine humans did that. They just come running up to you. Sorry. I'm just like, hi, I need you. What are you doing? Get out of my face.

Oh, I had this lady this morning. You'd honestly think that I'd, you know, called her mama names.

I know, people, they take it so personal.

I was like mid-session with a client. The dog was clearly like reactive and not loving it. And she walked right up with her dog going, oh, can they say hello? I was like, nah, like we're, we're training like that.

And then they get so offended.

As in like, you're abusing this dog, depriving him of social interactions. Like, does he look like he wants to? Dog is shitting his pants like, oh my God.

Oh, deary me. Dog owners, we love them and some of them we don't.

Yep. Yep.

All right. Well, that is obviously another episode in the reactivity series that we are doing. Of course, any questions, the Dog People Podcast Facebook group, and don't forget Max O'Neill, Down Under Dog Trainer, has a Reactivity Rewire course that you can get involved with. You don't have to live around where we are either. You can do it online. So make sure you check that out. We'll have the link to to that, uh, in the show notes of the episode. The Dog People Podcast is a Mashed Pumpkin production hosted by Jack Lawrence and Max O'Neill, edited, produced, and audio production by Jack Lawrence.

You're either all in on this model, or maybe you're building with another. You're either speed, or is it security? You're either custom, or are you ready to use? Or you're AWS AI. With hundreds of models, ready-to-use agents, speed and security built in, you don't have to pick a side. You can have them all. How will AI revolutionize your business? AWS AI is how.

Whoever said fork in the road must have been hungry for the Sorento and Sorento Turbo Hybrid. Their 3-row seating and 10-year, 100,000-mile

limited powertrain warranty. With a capable Sorento and Sorento Turbo Hybrid, every way forward Kia is the right way. Visit your local Kia dealer today. Kia, movement that inspires.

Call 800-333-4KIA for details. Drive safely. See retailer for warranty details. There's a fire inside you you can't ignore. Stand still? Not a chance. You're a lifelong learner who's come this far. Now we're here to help you keep going further. Capella University. What can't you do? Visit capella.edu to learn more.