Hi All,

My 6 month opld GSD is pretty shy of people and often backs away from people/kids/other dogs.

When they have gone past he often wants to go after them to play but it's the initial contact which seems to be the problem.

I have made the mistake of not socialising the bhoy as much as I should have and since there's no way i can go back to fix that I'm looking for a reasonable way forward.

i've already started asking strangers to give my dog a "treat" to get him more accustomed to people and he responds reasonably well but not as well as I'd like. Is there anything else I can do?

The bhoy does actually have good nerves in all other areas and I don't believe I have a major problem but I'd like to nip this in the bud ASAP and I do recognise this IS my fault.

Cheers

John

I had a Keeshond that tended to be that way with people she didn't know. If your dog is friendly, ask the person to hold a treat for him but not look directly at him and allow the dog to approach the person and take the treat. If the person's uncomfortable holding the treat for the dog, have him/her drop it to the dog when he comes to take it. As the person gives the dog the treat,they can gently scratch his chest at the same time. Be sure and give lots of praise when he does approach a person and greet them. I also found it helped to teach my dogs a greeting command. What I taught was if I said, "Say how do you do" the dog would sit and offer his/her right paw to the person. Being taught a greeting, seemed to give the "shy' ones some confidence and often impressed people we met. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

It can also be a genetic thing and just the way your dog is - socializing is a factor, but some dogs don't really need much socializing to be social animals. My dog was social right "out of the box" so to speak, it's always annoyed me how much enthusiasm he had for strangers, but he's calmed down now with age and won't go crazy running at everyone that raises the pitch of their voice and looks at him lol.

Keep doing the thing with treats, 6 months isn't too late to start socializing your dog and getting him out there. If possible, take him to as many public places as possible, not too crowded, but places where you can walk with him without everybody wanting to pet him, just get him used to walking thru crowds and being around lots of other people. When my boy was 4 months old I took him onto the sidewalk next to a busy road for a walk, he was walking backwards the whole time because he wanted to see where the noise was coming from that kept coming up behind him, after a while he realized it was normal n just walked with me nicely like he would anywhere else.

Hi John, don't forget that dogs go through thier 2nd fear period at around this age too. This often lasts about 3 weeks and appears sometime between 4 and 11 months for most adolecent dogs. If your pup was previously confident in social situations this may explain the behaviour. Lots of positive reinforcement. Set him up to succeed and reward his courage. Whatever you do, don't punish him for it. If it is a fear period, a negative experience can have lasting adverse effects. If you run a google search on canine development or fear periods you should be able to find lots of information. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Hi Folks,
Thanks for the replies.

Mike: His parents and other members of his bloodline are rock solid. VERY nice temprament on all of the dogs and very social and confident so I doubt it's genetic. I'm gonna take him out a lot more than I have bene doing. How long do you think before I should see results?

Mel: Not a great believer in "Fear Periods" but not having much in the way of experience I could be wrong.

I always give plenty of encouragement when we're out anyway and NEVER punish him outside unless he tries to run into the street or something crazy like that. I will give more positive reinforcement and carry treats everywhere from now on.

Cheers

John

Only time will tell, maybe a week, maybe a month, just keep having lotsa people interact with him and make every interaction a positive one. Also, people standing over a dog or reaching over the dogs head can be very intimidating to a dog, if possible, have people come down to the dogs level and if they pet him, pet him on his side or on his shoulders. If people act excited and happy it makes a big difference on the dogs perception of the situation too - if you're telling him to go say hi to someone who's standing there kinda scared thinking he's gonna get bitten by this GSD, your dog's gonna approach them with caution because he can see that it's a nervous situation - if you have someone (and girls are especially good at this) kneel down and act all hyper and squeeky and enthusiastic, your dog's gonna think "hey this chick is really excited to gimme a treat!". I've met some female dog trainers that really get on my nerves because they are too good at the squeeky excited thing - but their dogs are always much more excitable and enthusiastic than dogs owned by guys that have no enthusiasm or emotion in their voice - sometimes dog training means acting like an idiot, n strangers don't often like acting like an idiot in front of people they dont know <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />. If I approach my dog and say "hiiii cujo!!" in a happy excited voice, immediately his tail starts to wag, if I approach him n just say "hi cujo" he's gonna stand there n be like "ok.. and? the grass that smells like pee over to your left is more interesting".

I know it's not the cleanest food to handle, but hotdogs work exceptionally well for this type of stuff, dogs tend to "like" dry cookies, but they go CRAZY for hotdogs <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> So if you run into people who are willing to handle a small piece of hotdog, it has a very strong smell that has a much more dramatic effect on the dog than an almost scentless dry cookie.

Keep at it, eventually it'll click. Let your dog go up to other people, don't have them approach your dog, teach him a "go investigate" command, I tell my dog "ga kijken!" n he'll run ahead and look at whatever it is I told him to look at, it helps communicate to your dog what you want from him.

Positive re-inforcement is the method to use ..... over the years training dogs I have seen alot of pups that wont do a thing when the treats run out if trained in this manner. Only my experience.