So I've got an 11 month German Shorthaired Pointer. He's a great dog, submissive and obedient, but has got one problem.
We (used to) frequent a dog area (not a dog park, it's not fenced, not official) and he used to love it, loved playing with the other dogs. But then there's this unstable dog that goes there, and his owner was throwing a ball, my dog goes after it and the other dog starts running after mine, barking and growling, and then jumps up and latches onto the top of my dogs ear, and drags his teeth down to the bottom so my dogs ear almost got split in half.
ANYWAY. I don't comfort my dog or anything, I just talk to the owner of the other dog a bit (asking if the dog's got all his shots) and then put a harness on my dog and hop onto my bike and we go home.
The wound is healed now, but every time I go to that area again, my dog gets so frightened, of ANY dog there, that he just runs off and it's a pain getting him back. I've tried just having him on a leash and having him sit next to me just for him to work this out on his own but he seems just as frightened, ears way back, tail between the legs, shaking, drooling, etc.. It sucks because he used to love running around with the dogs there.
So what can I do? I know I can't just ignore this and go to another dog area, because that's just avoiding the problem, I wanna face it, but how?
We (used to) frequent a dog area (not a dog park, it's not fenced, not official) and he used to love it, loved playing with the other dogs. But then there's this unstable dog that goes there, and his owner was throwing a ball, my dog goes after it and the other dog starts running after mine, barking and growling, and then jumps up and latches onto the top of my dogs ear, and drags his teeth down to the bottom so my dogs ear almost got split in half.
ANYWAY. I don't comfort my dog or anything, I just talk to the owner of the other dog a bit (asking if the dog's got all his shots) and then put a harness on my dog and hop onto my bike and we go home.
The wound is healed now, but every time I go to that area again, my dog gets so frightened, of ANY dog there, that he just runs off and it's a pain getting him back. I've tried just having him on a leash and having him sit next to me just for him to work this out on his own but he seems just as frightened, ears way back, tail between the legs, shaking, drooling, etc.. It sucks because he used to love running around with the dogs there.
So what can I do? I know I can't just ignore this and go to another dog area, because that's just avoiding the problem, I wanna face it, but how?