"I would also not allow him to balk and stop/refuse to go forward. It's not about moving toward the truck, as much as it is moving forward with you when you say so. For example, if a truck was parked in a 'strange' spot and he was getting worried about it, I'd play Follow The Leader where he must pay attention to me while I walk in circles, change directions on a straight line, walk backward. "

I agree.

March past it. March past it again on the way back. Let the unusual thing be unusual. Behave as if all is well (which it is) and ignore it.



"I would also not allow him to balk and stop/refuse to go forward. It's not about moving toward the truck, as much as it is moving forward with you when you say so."

And the simplest desensitizing of all involves working with the dog at the edge of the trigger's zone of reactivity.... NOT inside the zone. If it's a strange truck, I'd handle it exactly as I would a strange dog barking behind a fence. Work on focus and ob at a point where the dog can do it (outside the reactive zone) and let the trigger become nothing but background. (The trigger zone is of course individual both to the dog and the particular trigger.)

JMO, though.

"SO I guess my bigger question is how to correctly handle a situation with him where he is afraid or unsure of something." My answer is to march past it, and then do it again later if you can. If it's not a temporary thing, my answer is to work on focus and upbeat Ob (with m&r!) outside the trigger zone. That trigger zone will shrink.

Ditto on this too:

"BTW, the object of Follow The Leader isn't to get the dog past a certain point that he's refusing to walk past. It can be the eventual result, but it's perfectly fine to move away from the source of anxiety as long as the dog is following your lead instead of making up his own mind to move away. Behaving as if whatever he's upset about isn't a big deal is key. You're just walking around and expect him to follow."


Behaving as if whatever he's upset about isn't a big deal is key. You're just walking around and expect him to follow.

I know this will work, what you all are talking about. We have done the exact same thing, minus anxiety-add in "there's another dog!" excitement. The neighbor's have 5 yippy dogs behind a fence. At first he really wanted to look at them, and cry, and would have liked to go sniff through the fence, which is not allowed. We did closer and closer OB, ignore them, look at me and yummy treat, and now we walk by and I can sit him in front of their fence and walk away. Not too far away, but enough he knows I am not on the other end of the leash.

We will have to just take advantage of when we meet the unusual in the normal surroundings, and play the game. ALong with Samantha's idea about "playing" with unusual objects in familiar surroundings. I live on a semi farm. I can find lots of weird stuff he hasn't seen before.

I get the idea completely on making him walk, and I can tell by body language when he is going to not want to come along before he lays down. Unfortunately the shocking incident spot is going ot be a little more difficult to deal with, but it will come along. There is only about a 10 foot path that leads back there unless we go through the pasture and he is NEVER allowed in there. SO I can't do anything like a sideways approach, but we can go a little in and a little out, a litttle bit farther in and a little out. it will work, he is smart and I have all the time in the world.