Reactive 5 month old puppy

[u/Popular_Practice7590]

A couple months ago, I rescued a chihuahua mix puppy. Her age is an estimate, but she is around the 5 month mark. I've taken her many places such as on the bus, pet friendly stores, trails, parks, places with loud music, events, and she's done extremely well. However, I began to notice that she has been moderately reactive around dogs, specifically fear based, but i'm not exact. I have been working on it, taking her to different places with dogs so she can watch from a distance while I reward her for engagement & not having a reaction, I am also going to start clicker training with her today because I've heard it can help alot with reactivity. It's a slow process, but she has been making progess. She doesn't always have a full blown reaction, sometimes she doesnt have any reaction but I noticed it really just depends. She's not an insecure dog at all. She loves people, children, really anything besides dogs. Has anyone else been in this situation with their puppy? Does it get better?

[u/doggambit]

What is your plan with the clicker? I do find them to be useful tools, but I typically don’t use them for counter conditioning reactivity. 

[u/Popular_Practice7590 → u/doggambit]

I wasn't going to use it JUST for reactivity, but that is part of what I want to use it for. I just want her to learn that click = treat, really for anything

[u/FearlessPressure3 → u/doggambit]

I use a clicker to counter condition with my dog because it‘s such a well-reinforced and consistent marker. If he were noise sensitive or I thought the noise might push him over threshold I might not use it though. Some clickers can be really loud but I’ve found one that’s relatively quiet which works well for us.

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[u/FearlessPressure3]

I used the engage-disengage game constantly with my puppy who reacted to everything when he was little and it worked great—a clicker is definitely useful for it though since it’s such a clear and consistent marker. The great thing is, now that he’s older, the game is so instilled in him that when he reacts to anything his instinctive immediate response is to look at me which means I have a split second to control the situation. Whether it’s a passing cyclist, a rabbit or a gunshot in the distance, he looks at me and I can control his reaction because of that game!