Nervous and Easily Spooked

[Quincy]

Hi everyone. I need some help and advice if possible.

I have a border collie who is almost two. We rescued him from a farm where apparently he was going to be shot if no one wanted him. He was left abandoned in a barn with rotting meat and a dirty bowl for water. His skin was dry and full of sores. We weren’t sure how old he was when we got him. However the vet said he was roughly six months old.
When we got him home he was extremely shy and wouldn’t let anyone near him and was scared of our other dog who is very friendly and was excited to see him. We left him alone and made a comfortable secure space for him in a crate and left him to come to us in his own time. Then we had the problem of trying to get him out the house for a walk. This took us weeks.

Now almost a year and a half later he has completely changed. He can’t wait to go out for a walk and even loves the vets. They commended us for the work we put in and they said it could have easily went the other way.

I thought I would give some background information on him to see if this has resulted in the problems we’re having now. Even though he loves going out. He doesn’t get on with other dogs apart from our other dog and my parents dog. When he sees a dog he goes crazy completely wild and at times squeals to the point where it sounds like we’re hurting him but we’re definitely not doing that.
Another problem we have is that any noise spooks him very easily and he started barking a lot and his hackles are up. We have a large garden for him to play in. However our neighbours have two greyhounds which constantly jumping up at the fence which provoke him and then the barking match begins and nothing gets him back in the house unless I pick him up. The problem is the neighbours do nothing when their dogs are up at the fence at times they just stand there and watch it happen even though they can see us trying to stop what’s going on and get him back in the house. There has been two occasions when one of their dogs has gone to attack him. We have tried talking to them but they have yet to do anything about it.
We are in the process of getting a higher fence put in so neither their dogs or him can see over the top.
Once the fence is in we have the other problem. Noises as I mentioned before, any noise or people talking sets him off with him low growling and hackles up and barking. Even when it’s dark when someone puts a light on or opens a window it sets him off.

We just don’t know what we can do to prevent reacting to noises. Once the fence is up. We don’t want our dogs missing out on the garden as it’s not fair that they can’t enjoy their garden while next doors are always out all day everyday. We check every time before letting him out and at times on his lead just in case their dogs are out as we don’t want to risk him getting injured from the other dogs.

We have tried a dog a dog trainer but he has some personal health issues which stopped his training and now with the virus. We can’t have a trainer. We just don’t know what to try and we need help for the sanity of us and the dogs.

I forgot to mention. In the house with us and family he is the most loving dog ever. He loves being hugged and attention and is very obedient

sorry for the long post but I hope what I have said makes sense and any help and advice will be gratefully received.

 

[Hemlock]

Sounds as if you are doing a wonderful job, and honestly there are plenty of collies that haven't had a bad start in life that would be reacting as yours is.

I won't write too much as I don't want to overwhelm you, but understand the neighbours who should be doing something aren't ever going to do it - that takes a lot of pressure off you and means you are in charge of your own garden but can't expect help from them. So I suggest as well as a higher perimeter fence, you create an inner fenced area just around your back door away from these neighbours. Space is a lifesaver with reactive dogs.
Same with him going mad at other dogs you meet out walking. He may never be a social butterfly. He doesn't like dogs coming near. So - you are taller, you can see further, when you see other dogs, move well away from them. Keep him on the furthest side of you. Distances will vary - some dogs will need 100 yards distance, some less, some more, but once he trusts you to keep him at a distance where he doesn't feel he has to drive them away, he WILL respond to you and the distance should reduce in its own time.
People will tell you to distract him with a 'Watch Me' but if you decide to do this, make sure you are a good distance (his judgement not yours) from the other dog before you distract him, because if you ever distract him and another dog gets too near, your trust bond is disrupted.

 

[Quincy]

Thank you for the reply.
The inner fence idea is good. As we have quite a large patio area that is separate to the grass. We are going to use the old fence panels to block the two off and give him access to the paved section for now as it’s closest to the door and then he won’t be to see in next doors windows etc.

it’s the small subtle things that we just don’t know what to do like the lights switching on or even when we answer a phone call he starts barking. We just have no idea what has made him do this as he wasn’t always like this.

Also when we have the dog trainer within minutes he had him off the lead following him around the field outside our home and a another time he went up to another dog walker and explained the situation and Samson our dog barked but stopped and just sat down so it’s not like he wants to hurt the dogs. Another time we were in an enclosed field letting him run around. Within knowing another dog walker came in with their dog off the lead and he ran over and just trotted next to the other dog. He just seems to go mad when he’s on the lead or if he sees another dog off the lead while he’s on his.

 

[JoanneF]

Being on lead makes it really scary when other dogs come close because he has nowhere to escape to, so he can't get away and has to put on an even bigger display of 'I'm big and scary, don't mess with me'. And it generally works for dogs, the scary thing usually does retreat so it becomes a reinforced behaviour.

He will have an invisible radius of space around him where he feels secure. It's called flight distance, anything within that space triggers his fight or flight stress response, which you may have heard of. Find out what that is and keep him far enough away from other dogs that he is relaxed. Reward him for being calm.

Gradually, over weeks and months, not days, work on reducing the distance. This may mean you have to be selective where you walk - choose places with good visibility so you can give other dogs a wide berth, or where you can turn and walk away easily. But - be aware that if your dog has had a stressful episode the stress hormone can stay in the body for up to 48 hours so a distance he was comfortable with the day before might be too close that day. So the safe distance can change, watch his body language.

Trainers describe behaviour like this with reference to the three Ds. Distance, as above but also be aware of Duration (your dog might be tolerant for 10 seconds, but not 15) and Distraction - how distracting the stimulus is; a calm dog might not trigger any reaction at a given distance but a bouncy one might.

Alongside that you could train a 'watch me'. As your dog looks at you, mark and reward the behaviour. Ask for longer periods of watching. Then if a dog approaches, after you have worked on the distance issue, you can get your dog to focus on you and not the other dog. BUT - some dogs find this scary as they cannot see the thing they are anxious about so you need to judge your dog.

 

[JudyN]

Is it the phone ringing he doesn't like, or you actually speaking into it? You could do something like call the phone on your mobile and the moment it rings, give him a treat. Depending on how reactive he is, you might have to start at the other end of the house, or even in the garden - you want him to be at his 'comfortable' distance. When he's happy to hear the phone ring because it means he'll get a treat, you ring the phone from closer to, and also starting to make a move towards it and ultimately to picking it up - and them speaking into it. The less you have to deal with 'real' phone calls during this time the better, so maybe ask everyone to email/text you instead and when it does ring, check the caller number and ring them back later.

You might even try giving him the treats in a particular place - his safe 'den' - so he learns to go there when someone rings.

You might be able to do a similar thing with lights - start by turning them on and off in the day, when the change will be barely noticeable, and giving him a treat. This will get him accustomed to the sound of the switch. Then do this later in the day so there's more of a difference in lighting, and build up gradually to turning lights on in dark rooms.

You could also try a pheromone plug-in/spray like Adaptil - some people have good results.

The more you can reduce his stress the better so even though you feel he should be able to play in the garden, you're better off taking him somewhere else, or taking him in the garden to avoid 'incidents' as much as possible. Stress hormones are cumulative and can take days to drop, so an incident on one day will mean he's more likely to react to triggers in the following days (google 'trigger stacking in dogs' for more info).

 

[Quincy]

Thanks for all the replies. These are all great advice and we are going to take action with them and see how we get on.

In response to the phone. It’s not the actual ringing. It’s as soon as you say hello. He’s up and running around the house and then starts barking.
My partner works from home and is on the phone a lot and can get quite stressful at times.

The light situation. He’s fine when it’s our lights going on or off. It’s when any of the neighbours turn them on and off when it’s dark it spooks him.

A big problem that even the dog trainer said was that it’s me. As Samson is picking up on my stress and anxiety it’s effecting him. I fully understand that and do realise how stressful I am getting with this and I know it’s not his fault. I just don’t know how to control myself to remain calm. As I’m the one that walks them most of the time and see the reactions from Samson and other dog walkers and they’re not always good some people understand but most give horrible looks etc.

 

[Hemlock]

Other people can look how they like - ignore them. The first time is the hardest.

 

[JudyN]

I have mastered the art of Zen-like calm when my dog kicks off. I have stood there having a nice chat with someone in a garden centre while my dog has been having a massive tantrum, jumping up at me (he's taller than me when he jumps up) because he had a close encounter with the garden centre's resident cat which I had had to ask the staff member to move so we could escape. Then there's the 'tra, la, la, it's only the pizza delivery' because I know if I jump up and say 'Ooh, pizza!' he'll react. We have all sorts of 'tra, la, la' moments but me being calm (but prepared to hang on to the lead for grim death) has really helped Jasper stay calm.

I don't know what the secret is though - in my case it was directly related to losing all those hormones that regularly turned me into a stroppy reactive bitch

 

[Quincy]

Thanks for all the replies everyone.
I have an update. The new fence is finally up and he can defiantly not see over the top and neither can the two next door which is gold.
The only problem now is that the noises. We have let him off the lead in the garden now. The first two times were fine he just went out to do his business. However the third time he decided to have a barking fit and tried to jump at the fence even though they wasn’t any noises and the dogs next door weren’t out. I know the new fence will probably confuse him for a while but it’s how do we stop him reacting to any slight noises. Our other dog isn’t bothered at all by noises or even the other dogs. We also have a little porch on the front of the house which has a sliding door and then the main front door. He goes mad any time he hears the slide. It’s driving us crazy. We don’t mind him barking as he’s a dog and dogs will bark it’s just the constant excessive barking which then sets all the other dogs off in the street. I know dogs have much better hearing then us. As I was trying this we were all in the living room and he just suddenly starting his wining and low growling when nothing happened that we heard of. It really is stressing us out and driving us crazy but we feel bad. With him being a rescue and has problems from his past we don’t want to keep telling him off.