# My cockapoo is too trusting in other dogs.



## Yel (Nov 27, 2020)

Hi all, again, I don’t know why I spent ages researching this online when I just should of just started a conversation. Milo my gorgeous cockapoo is a year and 8 months now. I made sure he was socialised with all dogs shapes and sizes from a young age. He has always been the happy go lucky friendly one but he is also the submissive dog when meeting other dogs which I use to think was good and shows signs of respect. However over Christmas Milo was approached by two small dogs, so i took Milo off the lead thinking they wanted to play but the other dog ended up having his teeth around Milo’s neck and pinned him down and Milo just froze. Upon breaking them a part the dog went in and bit Milo on the nose again. I was heart broken as when the dog bit Milo’s nose he yelped in pain and I honestly felt like i let my boy down. Since then I only let him off the lead if there are not a lot of dogs around or if I know they are friendly dogs he has played with in the past. My worry is that Milo is too submissive, and everytime he meets a new dog and goes down on his belly I panic thinking what if the dog attacks Milo’s vital organs. I am gutted that someone else’s poorly trained dog has caused Milo to be the one on the lead. I have also noticed that Milo will now demonstrate fear around other dogs which he never use to before. His go to response is submit or lick dogs faces which I honestly loved about him in the past but scares the hell out of me that he will be the one who gets hurt. Do I encourage Milo to remain on the floor when meeting new dogs or do I try and get him out of this?


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## 2ndhandgal (Aug 29, 2011)

Awwwww poor Milo I hope you can both begin to recover your confidence. Was any damage done to him by the other dogs?

When we are out we watch out for other dogs and if they are on lead I call my pair back and put them back on. If I recognise them as dogs I am not keen on we turn and go another way and if the other dog is offlead and the owner looks confident I will leave mine off to say hello. After a quick hello I call mine away and generally we continue on our way. The vast majority of encounters are entirely peaceful and no problem. Occasionally there are words between the dogs but that is unusual - my girls are irritated by pushy dogs who do not say no for an answer and are very happy to say hello to respectful dogs like yours sounds. 

As we often walk in the same place at the same time we often meet the same dogs and some of them have become friends.

As an aside my personal hatred is dogs who come racing over from a huge distance often youngsters where the owners have little control over them and just leave them to hassle other dogs. It sounds like the two who raced over to you originally would be of that type and would definitely be on my turn and go the other way list. 

Molly is tiny compared to the majority of cockapoos but very rarely has issues and mixes with dogs of all shapes and sizes


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## Yel (Nov 27, 2020)

Awww what a lovely photo, Milo is black so we are very lucky when we do a get photo lol and he is on the smaller scale too as his dad was a toy poodle.

When he was a puppy he use to dart across to certain dogs but thankfully after plenty of treats and training he now thinks before he runs over to other dogs. We also noticed he calmed down a lot since his op and we can now easily tell him to come away from other dogs which is great it just makes me sad that every time we go out now I feel like my guard is up expecting something to happen you know?

Don’t get me wrong in the very rare instant Milo will get cocky and bark at another dog to play which I shut down immediately. I wouldn’t want any dogs behaving that way to Milo so it makes me mad when people aren’t conscientious in return....

I really love his temperament and don’t want to have to pull him away from dogs if they are bigger than him, so I haven’t been, but I really do panic when he gets on his belly because he will do it with any size dog if they show aggression and I feel like I can no longer trust that he won’t get attacked

Luckily no damage was done when he got bit but he wanted to play with another dog on the same day it happened and when the other dog couldn’t catch Milo (He is very fast) he nipped his tail out of frustration so it wasn’t a good day for him that day ☹.

It’s such a shame because I have seen Milo play with golden retriever’s triple his size, so it’s not always the bigger dogs are rougher, he was a gentle giant. I love seeing big dogs adapt when they are playing with small dogs. And it’s my favourite thing to see Milo play with his usual friends.

He didn’t see any dogs on our walk today but at least he was off the lead for the whole walk. 🙂


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