Socialisation.

There is a common thought that this means you need your puppy to meet all the people and all the dogs possible. But this is really not the case. If every time my puppy sees a human or a dog it gets to go and play with them, what happens when they can't say hello? Frustration can build up, we've never taught them how to handle this before and all too often that then leads to frustration based reactive behaviours like barking and lunging on leash.

So yes we do want exposure and experiences with people and dogs but we want them to be good OR neutral.

Here we took Mim to a clients dog friendly office where he got to see loads of people, but he only actually had interactions with a handful. The handful of people he did interact with were of different genders, sizes, heights, races, men with beards, people with glasses. Some people played with him, some people ignored him. This is the kind of exposure you want to provide a puppy for them to grow up into a well rounded stable adult dog. Not desperate to say hello to everyone, just neutral but equally ok to say hello or act appropriately in the right circumstances.

When we left the building via the lift (a great novel experience for him) a person came in and Mim is neutral, looks at them air scents towards them, but no jumping, no seeking attention. The person asked to say hello so this was a good opportunity to say yes. But just because a person asks doesn't mean you have to say yes. I often have the line "no sorry, we are training right now" or "no not right now, he's very tired/unwell/nervous" up my sleeve so I am ready and not taken by surprise and fumbling for words in the moment.