If you practice the "Let's go" several times each day on your way to the park, for instance, it should become automatic.

Does she like toys? Very often, a scared dog won't take a treat but may just join in a game.The reason being that if you're up for a game, there's nothing scaring you so it must be ok.

My dog knows that when I say "Ooooooh" in a happy voice, I'm going to whip a toy out of my bag. It's a good attention getter. Get her well used to it before you try it in a sticky situation.

Hopefully she'll grow out of her fear stage soon.

Thanks Guys,

In answer to your questions..this is a dog I am working with, I am a trainer/Behaviourist, The owner is very good and handles the dog very well. The dog is approx 18 months old so still growing up really. She is fine in most situations and has no real "history" as she was raised from a pup by the owner, she just got a little sensitive as she got to adolescence. We had a session together today and she was much better, just working on keeping her focused and positive, and "playing down" any triggers.

I enquired about Frk9999's dog (on another post) as I was interested to know what advice her Behaviourist gave, its always good to hear other peoples ideas and experiences.

Thanks for the video clips Egroeg, I will have a look at these.

As for the interfereing public....Still Grrrr! ......

This really annoys me too.

I haven't had any problems in terms of aggression but I make Penelope sit and wait for people or other dogs to pass on the pavement unless there's enough room to walk quite far away.

I taught her to do that because she was a horror for lunging at everyone (being friendly) but it was very dangerous because she's surprisingly strong and the sudden jolt meant the lead could sometimes almost slip out my hand.

The number of people who would see me go Penelope, sit, now wait then go awhhh, they can see her shuffling her bum dying to jump so they what do they do?
they call her over!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
She jumps up they give a big fuss, tell her how adorable she is then have the audacity to say things like we had better leave you to your training now.
?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

The worst I think thats happened to me was whilst working with a dog outside a local cafe, the owner and I were sat with drinks and trying to train the dog not to bark at passers by using food and toys as distractions/rewards.

The cafe owner thought it would be fun to tease the dog by woofing at him every time he came in and out to clear tables???

Needlessto say... we left the cafe (sadly our drinks too!)

Some people are just stupid. I remember taking my dog to the beach for the first time, we found a nice quiet place on a deserted beach. We interspersed some training with playing in the sand and paddling in the sea. Then, about a mile away, we noticed this person with a dog walking towards us, she walked all the way to us and when she arrived asked "are you training him". So having now had to put him on the lead, I said "well I was". After she had gone I just thought, what the heck was that all about, with all the beach to play with her dog why come to our bit?

Ha Ha Ha Ha ....

"Our Bit"......I Love it!!!

I used to get cross sometimes when people would 'interfere' while training but after thinking hard about why this was realized it was me redirecting my embarrassment at being with an unruly dog into annoyance with the people.

My gran told me that we need two types of sense when keeping dogs, common sense and a sense of humour. People will always say things or act inappropriately, that is being out in the world for you.
Yeah it can make it hard to do what you have set out to do and it's annoying but that's life, stay cool

I'd say that's people just trying to be friendly and make light of the situation.
The general public are a never likely to act just how you want them to, they don't have a clue what you want or don't want. But I do get that it's frustrating.

Am loving your Gran's two types of sense very intelligent lady I'd say

I had someone have a go at me the other day. Pippa can sometimes be dog reactive when she decides we have 'claimed' an area. At a dog show she was with my friend and I minding our own business, she was on a very short lead. Someone walking past let their huge Alsatian come right up on a long lead and Pippa growled and did a little air snap. He made no attempt to remove his dog and of course Pippa became noisier and snarlier. She didn't bite his dog just made a big show of it. Eventually he pulled his dog away and had a massive go at me for not "telling her off" saying she'd continue to do it and will then attack another dog. I didn't quite know what to say. I realise we have an issue which is why she was on a short lead and unbeknownst to this man we are booked on a Reactive Rovers course in August. But what sort of 'telling off' does he expect? I'm not going to shout at her or physically punish her as her issue is anxiety based and this would serve to heighten that. I am looking forward to learning some good techniques but until then her warning should have been enough for the man to remove his dog. Instead he let it continue to stoop over mine (she is a chi cross so pretty small). Of course Pippa does get told off in various situations where an "uhuh" is suitable, but I don't think this was one of them.