Bodhi, the Gray Poodle

The Problem

Imagine a very large, gray standard poodle walking quietly with his owner down the street until he sees a dog in the distance. His body stiffens as he gets closer to the dog and he begins to bark while madly pulling and lunging at the end of his leash. While not afraid of a small dog, Bodhi was fearfully aggressive especially with taller, larger dogs. His owners admitted that they were very nervous about walking him in public.

How we helped

Instruction and homework began: teaching the owners about how to be the leader to Bodhi. We did this quickly by providing a new leash system that instilled confidence and gave more control of Bodhi’s behavior to the owner. We began setting up situations for Bodhi to see a larger dog and give him positive and negative reinforcement to his response (praise for calm behavior, turning him around and giving distance or a touch correction for negative behaviors).

We progressed to having Bodhi walk with a few dogs, then having the owner walking Bodhi on one side and another dog on the other side. He was given time to observe how dogs run and play while on a long line in a fenced back yard.Soon, we gave him the opportunity to play with a mix of smaller dogs and calm, larger dogs. Gradually, we introduced more dogs to the play group. Again, any signs of the beginning of aggression meant a negative consequence--perhaps play ended or perhaps he was put in the house away from the other dogs and then returned to play as long as his behavior was positive.

Today Bodhi can run at top speed with other dogs or just hang out afterwards with his friends with his tongue hanging out. His owners are now confident when they walk him in public.