How do I stop my dog from being reactive to visitors?
Talon Smitham
2025-06-29 05:00:10
Count answers: 11
My advice is to keep your visitors safe and keep your dog shut away in another room when visitors first arrive. Try to keep your dog relaxed before they greet your guest so that the arrival of a guest has a positive association. You may need to train your dog to settle happily in this space before you use it to shut him away for visitors. You need to ask your visitors to make themselves as non confrontational as possible, so ideally sitting down, head turned away and avoid all eye contact with the dog. Put your dog on a lead where you have good control for introductions and you need to be really calm and confident as any anxiety from you will be passed to your dog and they may feel the need to protect you. Never approach visitors head on, but from the side or ideally come alongside in parallel and stay at a good distance. Give the dog lots of praise/treats when she is calm and non reactive. If she starts to show any sign of anxiety, then create some distance by putting yourself between her and your visitor and herd her away. It's not going to be an overnight cure, but each positive experience will help her build confidence and trust.
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