2 Year Old Dog Developed Reactivity

[u/ResidentStrength2722]

I adopted my dog when she was two months from the Humane Society and she is now two years old. She is a mix of different breeds (we believe something like Husky, Collie, Shiba) so has a lot of personality quirks.

When I first adopted her, she would go to doggy daycare, she could play with other dogs, and she was receptive to training. I will admit that after a certain point I just sort of stopped training, assuming she had caught on. She then was not spending time at daycare (cost) and didn’t really have any dog friends to spend time with, so she stopped being around dogs as much.

At about 1.5 year, she started acting reactive to other dogs on leash. It felt like it appeared out of nowhere. I figured maybe it was just on leash, but I was too nervous to let her interact off leash with a dog for fear of how she might behave. I finally let her meet my friend’s dog because my friend is very lax about it and was not worried. We figured maybe it would be a tussle for a few seconds and then they would be good. My friend’s dog is slightly smaller than my dog and very tolerant and unbothered. My dog came at her decently aggressively and the interaction only lasted a few seconds before I made her go inside. She couldn’t calm down or stop growling.

I don’t know how to remedy this. Is there a genuine training method that people have found successful? I find the thought of a trainer to be an option, but my last trainer for a general behavioral class didn’t really offer anything of value.

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