Transitioning a reactive/insecure foster dog to a new family
My foster dog was dumped by her previous family. Shes very fearful of new people, will lunge if they make eye contact. The rescue said the scars on her ears are indicative of fly strike and both them and the professional behaviorist have said her behavior makes them think that she was left alone outside for long periods of time. Shes really fearful of new people, and will lunge if eye contact or petting is tried (we haven’t let anyone try to pet since a first contact about two months ago, we don’t want to put her in situations that stress her out). I don’t know why she chose my partner and I to trust but she is not reactive to us at all. There is a couple interested and they know her behaviors and as much about her as we do, we think they are a good fit but we want to take things as slow as we can to make sure our foster dog is successful and as unstressed as possible. We’ve been working with high value treats every time she sees someone pass by, interrupting with a marker sound and treat before she reacts, and she’s been responding great. She doesn’t care when people walk past as long as they are 6-10ft away and do not make eye contact or try to pet her. I’ve enlisted my neighbors to walk by and she gets lots of praise and reward any time she sees them/anyone else in close proximity. She has seen a behaviorist and is responding really well to positive reinforcement and leash training.
We’ve done two meet and greets with her potential family in open, neutral settings, she is non reactive to them but also doesn’t seem very interested. She gets lots of high value treats when she approaches them and sniffs around their feet. We do not force interactions or proximity, she gets the treats if she willingly goes over and sniffs around them. We’ve been able to do a very short walk together as a ‘pack’ and she did great, completely ignored them. We’ve also had everyone just stand and ignore her together while we discussed her needs and training, and she did really well also ignoring them and taking lots of treats.
Are there any tips on how to continue this process of her accepting the new family? We are all willing to take as much time/meetings as possible to get her acclimated and used to them, just wondering if anyone has any additional pointers or advice