Teach my youngest dog to stop scaring other dog owners with her signature scream!

And from the looks of it, she`s planning on keeping that up. It has to do with her insecurity really, and it has got a bit better. But I don`t think I`ll be able to make her stop it completely in the near future. I will focus on my goals of being creative in traning my dogs and remember to have fun with them, and hopefully that will improve her self-esteem and it might get better in time. Or, if I`m really lucky, she`ll outgrow it, she`s only 18 months still.

This isn`t going well. My dogs have now come up with a brilliant division of labour between them. One of my dogs is very self confident with other people and dogs, and has no problemt going up to them to check if they`re nice. My other dog is too scared to do that, but she is, on the other hand, a brilliant screamer.
So now, whenever I let them off leash, Cora is on constant watch for approaching people and/or dogs. Whenever someone comes near, she`ll spot them immediately and start screaming. Which alerts Agatha, who will join in with some barking and run ahead to have a sniff at the strangers and see if they`re nice or not. While Cora keeps backing her up from the background with enthusiastic screaming.
They are sweet, lovely dogs who has never shown any sign of aggression in any way, that`s not what it is, it`s just their way of making sure nothing dangerous happens to the pack. But I have no problem understanding that this whole spectacle can be a little scary to the unsuspecting stranger who happens to walk by. So it`s becomming difficult to let them off leash now, but they really, really need to run off leash to get enough exercise. Sigh.
I`m taking an obedience class this autumn which focuses only on teaching dogs to come when called in challenging situations like that. They say that class is a lot of work, but I hope we`ll manage to stop them doing this!

I`m considering putting this in the I give up category. And hope she outgrows it. She`s still screaming… I`ve tried doing obedience training with her when I see other dogs comming to keep her focused on me. Things like sit and heel, and then I give her really good treats to motivate her. Result: she tries to eat her treats and scream at the same time, which proves difficult, so I now have a screaming and coughing dog instead of a silent one. Hm. ;)

but that`s not what it is. It`s a high pitched screaming noise, she sounds more like some large bird or something than a dog. It`s really funny, I can`t help laughing when she does it, and so I haven`t focused on making her stop it. Also, it kind of works well, because all of her doggie friends and their owners knows her signature sound, so they can always hear when we are in the neighbourhood so they can come out and play. ;)

She does it whenever she sees another dog she doesn`t know well. The other dogs generally just look a bit puzzeled, she doesn`t scare any dog doing it, so if this was a dogs world, it wouldn`t be a problem. The owners on the other hand… Especially owners with small dogs, they tend to pick up their dogs and run… ;) Which obviously teaches my dog that this screaming thing works, she keeps scaring off dogs and owners doing it, and she`s very proud of herself. (becuase she`s not at all a tough dog, she`s really sweet and shy, and if the dogs she`s been screaming at comes closer, she`s very quick to hide behind big sister.)I need to figure out a way to make her stop doing it all the time. But how? Hm. I`ve tried the treat thing, doesn`t work. Must come up with other clever solution.