My 6 mo Aussie is a dream dog at home, but with other dogs in different places its rough... Feeling defeated. Any help appreciated

[hoops122712]

I have a 6 month Aussie and he is pretty much the definition of a perfect dog at home with me. Very calm, relaxes and sleeps a lot, doesnt destroy anything even when left alone free roam in the house, doesnt counter surf, hardly ever bites or barks, listens extremely well and can do obedience commands very well.

I brought him to my brothers house for Christmas though, and it was rough. My brother has a senior 18 yr old dog and my Aussie is pretty reactive to dogs. He gets very excited and demand barks in dogs face when they dont play with him. My bros dog obviously has zero interest in playing at 18 years old which is where the issue is. My Aussie keeps trying to entice playing with deman barking in his face. Sometimes he is chill and leaves him alone, but most of the time hes following him and then starts getting excited and barking in his face. My brothers dog gives him all kinds of social cues to back off. Shows teeth, growls, nips, pins, and ignores my Aussie, but he doesn't understand or listen to his cues to stop. I pull my pup away when he starts barking and being annoying to the senior dog every time and tell him to "quiet" which he knows at home means stop barking and he listens to that at home. Then I release him. He will be chill for a few mins, but then eventually will bark and bow and try to play with the senior dog. My Aussie for hours would not settle, always panting and trying to play. He would do it forever if I let him.

I had to eventually bring him home and remove him because it was just getting too exhausting for everyone and the senior dog.

He does the same to some dogs at dog park, barking in their face. I stop it immediately and try to disengage him to teach him when he does that behavior play time stops. He still continues.

I do training to try to reduce his excitement and reactivity. I do engage disengage practice on the outside of dog parks and getting him attention on me when he gets near threshold. I try to reduce distance, but its very difficult.

I am going to be trying this method (different than the method I've been using) https://static.wixstatic.com/media/...1/3b73f2_71a8d5ce92774fff81afb5730fafbb48.png

and see if it helps.

Is he just not listening to the dogs social cues to back off because hes over threshold and too excited to care? Like even full on teeth showing and pinning my Aussie to stop and he doesn't care.

Also in other peoples house he doesn't follow the same rules as home. He jumps on counters, trys to bolt out doors, jumps up on people, demand barks, etc. Do I need to train him in every house I go to to not do these things? It was hard enough to train him these things at home.

I don't know what to do anymore. I was considering getting a professional trainer, but for some reason I feel like I could teach him myself if I just learned how to do it. He is such a smart dog at home and can learn things very fast and easily. I just don't know how to teach him to leave dogs alone that don't want to play with him.

Is he just too young still to try to fix this? Are my expectations too high that he will leave a 18 year old dog alone? I see Kikopup's dogs all be so calm with eachother and some are old some are young. There must be a way I can help him understand.

 

[lizzrr]

@hoops122712 Wow there is so much I can relate to in this post regarding my dog’s personality! And I think I can forward some of the things my trainer taught me. If your dog gets over aroused and too excited with another dog around you should either 1) train a consistent “place training” involving a mat (you need to ofc bring) which you can send your dog too and stays or 2) leash your dog to give him a sense of security and a reason to settle next to the calm you, or do both. Before visiting friends (with or without dogs) you need to get his energy out so this becomes easier, you can’t expect him to stay still otherwise. It’s good to interrupt play when your dog gets too demanding but I think oftentimes you should straight up leash and go. Crossing the line needs a consistent action. How often do you let him play with other dogs off leash? Maybe it’s too often? I feel he is too young to go to the dog park regularly, personally I wouldn’t go at all and only meet with dogs who I know are well behaved. The method you posted works great, for me especially with a clicker cause it helps me get my timing right. In other homes ofc you need to explain your puppy the rules as well. But since you’ve already trained it at home it won’t be as hard. You will see even correcting the behavior once mid-action (once you see the intent but before she actually did it) will work. Some dogs need more repetitions but I’m sure she’ll understand quickly Last but not least, she is still very young and thus full of energ, also just hitting puberty so testing boundaries is somewhat expected. Hope this helps!