Please tell me it gets better
So around 2 months ago, I moved in with my partner and their 3yo dog. To preface this vent, he is a very good boy 90% of the time and awesome in the house/untriggered. I feel it’s also important to mention that all my previous dogs I got as puppies, and thanks to my father who has quite a bit of dog training experience which he’s passed onto me, they’ve all been very solid citizens with no/very limited reactivity.
Now moving in together I knew that the dog was going to have some issues (terrible leash manners, reactivity on walks, blowing off his recall) as I had spent a lot of time with him previously, and tbh most of these we worked through pretty quickly.
My issues as of right now is his threshold for dealing with triggers is so lowwww. Dogs he’s gotten a bit better with, and to be clear his reactivity is due to excitement, not aggression or fear. If I have him sit as the dog walks by or go to the other side of the street he’ll stay neutral and I’ll reward him for interacting with me. But if we’re say crossing the street and I can’t get distance or stop him, his attention is out the window and best believe my arm is halfway out of my socket.
But here’s the real issue. The MF SQUIRRELS. Omg I did not hate squirrels before having this dog, but best believe those are now my mortal enemies. Not only does he lunge at them at close range, but if he sees one across the street, he’ll start stalking it even if it’s 50ft away, and he will literally search the trees as we’re walking to try to find one in there. Once he’s laid eyes on one, there is absolutely nothing I can interest him in to redirect his attention. The only thing that seems to work is forcing him to sit until the squirrel is far out of sight or literally just dragging him away. It’s also very difficult to get him to come down off the excitement of seeing one.
My partner is very much aware that they have kind of ignored these issues as they were able to exercise him off leash for the majority of his life and/or is OK just dealing with the pulling.
So yes, he has definitely gotten much better at some things. But I feel like we have hit such a block, and I am tired of being on high alert every time I take him out of the house. Not to mention how embarrassing it is to have your dog dragging you around town.
Anyways, this is mostly just a vent. I do plan to continue to try and stay under his threshold and reward him for his attention, but I think this is just one of those things where he has too much prey-drive and not enough training as a puppy :(