Jethro's prong collar is a god-send for me. It has made a huge difference and it gives me confidence that his neck isn't going to get injured when he has gone into hyper-arousal.

I think I will probably get one for Amber.The Herm spenger and the Starmark both seem relatively gentle and I think Amber's "tunnel" vision will be more redirectable.

Amber continues to do well, and we are trying to avoid dogs. When she was at the kennel leaving the other day, we couldn't avoid a dog who was coming in and although they passed very close she barked once and didn't even lunge, before becoming focused on me, Do I think this is due to my great training? No, probably more that she just wanted to get out of there and go home with me. But it did show me she IS capable of focusing in the presence of another dog-Hope!
She does have another issue that I should probably work on at the same time, She LOVES people and if they walk past her quickly in order to get their attention she will try to paw, and nip. I think maybe this is some herding instinct. I've tried to do the stand command with her which worked so well with the cars, we try to avoid people and she isn't reactive more attention seeking. do you think stand might not be the right command for this? Should I try a more submissive posture, this sounds crazy but she is very proud of her adult teeth and loves to click them, doesn't really bare her teeth just play snaps, she has made contact with clothes. any ideas on how to discourage this. I've tried giving her a toy, and other distractions.

Hi Jodi, We have worked on teaching Jethro to sit quietly off the sidewalk on the grass to let people pass, especially those with strollers, or elderly people. We taught him Watch - which means you can watch what is going on but you must remain calm and you can't get involved.

Leslie McDevitt talks about dogs crossing thresholds and building in a habit of looking to us for direction as part of the process. I had a problem with Jethro going out the front door and barking from the front porch at ... anything off the porch - whether there was anything to be seen or not. I had a few ugly situations where just as we were exiting the front door someone happened to be walking by with a dog on leash. Ugh.

I put another "Place" (a bedsheet folded to the right size) on the porch. Our door leaving exercise is now to have Jethro go from a Sit/Wait inside the house with both the front door and screen door open, to Place/Wait on the front porch. Depending on the action in the big wide world, there might also be a Watch and some recall thrown in. Once I have him settled, then I open the porch gate, and he is called to Sit/Wait at the top of the steps with the gate open. I go down onto the sidewalk and give him an enthusiastic Jethro Come! and he comes roaring down the steps to me, into a front sit. It's a lot of fun and a lot better than the barking, lunging, wrestling match of before.

I don't know if you can devise a system with Amber so that the moment of the kennel gate opening signals a Wait, and then, when you call her, you are off to the side with treats so she has to come out and veer toward you right away, no time to mix it up with other activity outside the kennel?

I think the way the kennel itself is devised would make it impossible, and the problem really isn't at the kennel more when we are walking downtown and people are passing, just wants the attention and pats. I do think the "watch" command may be one to try, when I tell her stand she will, and then when they get behind me, she will sometimes break and try to get their attention. I know that she is just trying to say LOVE ME! But on occasion the people think she is saying "I'll eat you!"
She has been acting a bit weird since she came out of the kennel last week (I was able to avoid her going there for almost 2 weeks) and I don't know if someone yelled at her or what but she is decidely off, seems to be a little more timid, usually very outgoing, and poor appetite, no temp, no obvious signs of illness. If she doesn't seem better tomorrow we'll go to her "dogtor" I've already decided to not use that kennel again. I think today we'll do all 100% positive work and see how she does.

Update: I took Amber on an extra long walk today, and we she did well. Unfortunately, towards the end a woman walking a little dog was coming from the other side of the street, Ambi saw her before I did and got off two barks but was more than willing to follow me. We originally retreated to an area next to a building and I was able to get Ambi to do a sit but than the woman starts approaching us, with little dog in tow, so I retreated farther, while Ambi started barking again, we went down an ice covered hill and all the way down an ice covered dead-end. I was able to get Amber out of "the hot zone" and actually got a decent sit, well until the woman again started coming at us. At that point I actually have to say Amber was confused, she knows we retreat now, and she was kind of back and forth and seemed to be looking for a way to avoid them then just started barking. We had no place else to go, the road was blocked or we could have jumped in the harbor...

I probably shouldn't have done this but by that time I was so aggravated both from trying to keep my feet on the ice, holding onto Amber, and this woman who seemed to deliberately be provoking Amber, so I decided we had to keep moving. I brought Amber forward and right past her and I said "My dog is aggressive towards dogs, if she breaks free, I'm not responsible for what happens." Probably not the best thing to say but when you see someone has made quite an effort to avoid you why the heck would you follow them? I then brought Amber out of her hot zone and had her do a sit-down-stay, then repeated it, all with a lot of praise. When we got to our road home there was another woman walking a little dog, I saw it first and we were able to change direction and Ambi never even knew it was there and it nicely added a 1/2 mile to the walk.

Amber has seemed to make a little bit of improvement I'm happy to report. When we retreated she was running to keep up with me, still had her hackles up but I'd say 40% of her attention was on me, the other 60% on the other dog whereas before it was 100% on the other dog. She is not bracing herself on the leash anymore, and previously after an incident like that she would have gotten so frustrated she would have taken it out on me, or a car. Today she listened to ME and ignored passing cars! We at least seem to moving slightly forward, not backward. Tomorrow I wear my ice spikes.

Jodi, your doing great! Keep a positive attitude, and it will filter down to Amber in so many ways. Remember that your frustration in certain situations are understandable, but can also lower her threshold to becoming reactive. What she sees is "Mommy is mad" or "Mommy is anxious" at this person & doggy, maybe I should be too.

Calm and confident in a stressful situation will send the right message to Amber, and show her that your in control. Think of it better this way, your emotions and feelings travel down the leash and into Amber. If your stressed, she will be too. When you get into a stressful situation, put her in a sit, stand in front of her, take a deep breath (or two!), and regain your composure.

Just on a side note - next time your out on a walk, and its quiet and peaceful. Put Amber in a sit, and take a seat next to her on the ground. See what she does. =P