What is a Reactive Dog?

In most cases, a reactive dog is a dog who displays aggressive behaviors when meant with a fear trigger. Oftentimes, this trigger is the sight of a human or a dog. Usually, this aggressive display is done because the dog is attempting to create ‘space’.

Think about it, if the your dog is fearful of something, they don’t want it to come any closer. Most humans or dogs are not going to approach another dog who is displaying aggressive behaviors such as growling, barking, snapping, or lunging. Therefore, the dog who is reactive learns that displays of aggression is a useful tool to get what they want… space or distance from the triggering stimulus.

The bad news is this behavior often will not get better on its own. In fact, it usually gets worse over time because the behavior of showing aggression to create space becomes reinforcing. The good news is that reactive behaviors are quite common and are not too complicated to fix.

About 40% of our clients have some level of reactivity that we help them fix. Our reactive protocol has a greater than 95% success rate of solving the problem through training. However, sometimes the behavior is much deeper than a fear behavior, and usually this calls for some type of veterinary intervention. A Veterinary Behaviorist is a doctor who specializes in behavioral medicine. Sometimes, pharmaceuticals can be valuable in helping with training in the short term, or even for long term management of behavior.

Either way, our team is very knowledgeable, skilled, and experienced in rehabilitating dogs with reactivity and you can get started with us today by enrolling in our private training B.A.S.E program. Today, is the best time to get started so you can help your dog to not live stressed or in fear any longer.