Scentwork with Bugsey

Some of you might of seen my other thread where I briefly mentioned how one of my labs, Bugsey, is reactive and has fear aggression.

We do alot of training and behavioural work to help him but this is often very isolating solitary work. We can't attend group classes. I can't just go for a walk, it needs to be planned in detail. We can't just take him to the pub with us or dogs shows or do any of the things we thought we would be doing together.

BUT we do find time to have fun together, above all it really build that trust and bond, anxd our favorite thing is scentwork.

We were extreamly lucky to be able to attend a workshop this weekend with scentwork southwest, the other dogs/people where cleared out of the room when it was our turn.

As you can see Bugsey loved it:

Amy104 said:

Some of you might of seen my other thread where I briefly mentioned how one of my labs, Bugsey, is reactive and has fear aggression.

We do alot of training and behavioural work to help him but this is often very isolating solitary work. We can't attend group classes. I can't just go for a walk, it needs to be planned in detail. We can't just take him to the pub with us or dogs shows or do any of the things we thought we would be doing together.

BUT we do find time to have fun together, above all it really build that trust and bond, anxd our favorite thing is scentwork.

We were extreamly lucky to be able to attend a workshop this weekend with scentwork southwest, the other dogs/people where cleared out of the room when it was our turn.

As you can see Bugsey loved it:

Click to expand...

What a busy lad he has been

Do you know his history and what may have led to his fear aggression ?

We got him at 7 months when his owner went into rented and couldn't keep him. He was always very busy, mouthy and air snappy but we just thought it was puppy behaviour as we were new owners and had no idea. It wasn't until he hit adolescence when he ran and barked at his first person. Aparently this is normal in reactive dogs, his busyiness was because he was anxious and not settling but puppies are naturally submissive, once he hit his teens they realise that actually they can do something to intimidate the scary things and keep it away.

When we had him accessed it was noted that he didn't use calming signals (growling, lip licking, avoidance) - this is usually because they have been ignored so it is strongly believed that he was possibly hit before he came to us.

The dog issue only came once we restricted him to his lead because of his fear of humans. So many dogs rush up uninvited and a dog on lead feels more vunerable as they cannot get away if needed. He still has daily group walks with dogs hes familiar with and we can introduce new ones if done gently.

The muzzle is mainly for his protection as it deters people and keeps them away - we had too many people trying to grab him even if we said no because 'all labs are friendly'. He hasn't ever bitten, but a scared dog is unpredictable so we also felt it was sensible to muzzle train him.

Amy104 said:

Some of you might of seen my other thread where I briefly mentioned how one of my labs, Bugsey, is reactive and has fear aggression.

We do alot of training and behavioural work to help him but this is often very isolating solitary work. We can't attend group classes. I can't just go for a walk, it needs to be planned in detail. We can't just take him to the pub with us or dogs shows or do any of the things we thought we would be doing together.

BUT we do find time to have fun together, above all it really build that trust and bond, anxd our favorite thing is scentwork.

We were extreamly lucky to be able to attend a workshop this weekend with scentwork southwest, the other dogs/people where cleared out of the room when it was our turn.

As you can see Bugsey loved it:

Click to expand...

Lovely to see these action shots Amy

You have a lot on the go with all your animals, don't you?

Yep, if I'm not with the bunnies, piggies or dogs you can usually find me riding my friends horses.



As you can tell I'm not really a people person, and have no social life. :lol:

Amy104 said:

Yep, if I'm not with the bunnies, piggies or dogs you can usually find me riding my friends horses.

As you can tell I'm not really a people person, and have no social life. :lol:

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Well actually when I first saw that photo I thought you were a policewoman

It's a great photo - lovely lovely horses x

Who needs a social life anyway? Here today, gone tomorrow :lol:

We wear the high viz that say polite - they are designed that way on purpose as people are more inclined to slow down if they think you are police. :lol:

Sadly I do a boring admin job.