Socialization Myths: On-Leash Greetings
I was talking recently with a dog owner who mentioned that her dog often displays reactivity during on-leash greetings.
I asked her why she wanted her dog to greet other dogs on leash, and she replied, “I guess I always thought having her interact and come into contact with many dogs would help her to socialize.”
This is a common perspective, but just like humans, meeting as many people (or in this case, dogs) as possible is not necessarily healthy socialization.
Here are some of the main reason I advise against on-leash greetings with unknown dogs:
• Number one is that it socially doesn’t make sense. Think about it: if you stopped to greet a stranger on the street, asked them their name, age, where they grew up, and then never talked to them again, would there be any point to doing that? No. Same goes for dogs.
• Although a dog may appear “friendly”, you never know how they will interact with your dog; you could potentially be putting your dog in a dangerous situation.
• On-leash greetings can put pressure on dogs. If another dog is slightly pushy, or overly excited it can be stressful for your dog to feel like they must deal with that dog, since they are literally placed in the space to address that dog.
Here’s what I do instead:
• When I see a person approaching that indicates they want our dogs to meet, I smile and make eye contact with the person, so they know I’m not trying to be rude by not having our dogs meet.
• And, for my dog’s sake, I walk by the other person and their dog calmly, with confident body language, and a relaxed hand on the leash.
Finally, if you do choose to do on-leash greetings, here are some suggestions:
• If you’re planning to spend time with another person and their dog, I always recommend walking together before having the dogs sniff each other. This walk will allow the dogs to feel like part of the same “pack”, which decreases the pressure that may occur with an initial on-leash greeting.
• If you know another dog is genuinely safe for your dog to greet, keep a 3 second rule for sniffing before moving on. This is a polite amount of time for dogs to sniff without tension building up.