Oct 26, 2026 · 40 min · 11 segments
In this new season, Milly and Daniel return to discuss the experience of reactive dog ownership; something which Milly has first hand experience of with Amber. We introduce you to Ross and Roscoe and…
Daniel MillsHostCatherineGuestMillie JonesHostI think that's a similarity across Ross and Roscoe, isn't it? We have kind of those struggles with both dogs and with people, which I think is even more isolating, isn't it? Because there's not kind of one situation where you haven't got something to deal with sort of out and about.
So just thinking about your experiences sort of before these dogs, I suppose, or in the early days for you, especially, Debbie, with obviously what you've experienced, your feelings and knowledge has changed, I know, I think it's fair to say.
But what did you know about reactive dogs before you had one? So before you had Ross and Roscoe, Had you seen other people with reactive dogs? How did you feel about seeing dogs with those sorts of behaviours? And yeah, we'll start with Ria to Catherine first.
Well, I knew very little about them.
To be very honest, I tended to think that people claimed that their dogs were reactive in order to get priority parking places and running orders at trials because the dogs I saw didn't seem worried about other dogs or people.
But then when I saw a person who I respected very much as a nose work competitor, trainer and judge managing her very fearful dog at a trial, at different trials, and saw how nervous the dog was, how spooky she was, I began to realise there might be more to it
I think that's such an interesting perspective given sort of your background in competition as well.
Like always seeing that as a, oh, they're just trying to get some sort of priority system here.
But like you say, sort of starting to see three people you know and you trust sort of that there's possibly more to it than that.
So our family pet that we had when I was living at home, I'd be about 15 when we first had him, again he started off perfectly fine but then he gradually around the one year old mark started to have some reactive behaviour but having said that That was mostly towards dogs and strangers coming into the house but the dog side of it we could kind of understand because he'd been attacked several times by other dogs and at the time looking back there wasn't that much training as what there is potentially now and we didn't reach out but that was my kind of experience with him at the time and felt it was understandable.
We could walk him off leave.
We could do a lot of things that we can't do now with Roscoe.
But so he wasn't in comparison that bad, but I thought he was quite tricky.
Didn't think about it from any other perspective.
Um, and then of course we, um, And I also thought that when dogs were fearful, you would see them cower back away, kind of just want to cuddle them, even though you probably shouldn't.
But you kind of have that empathy with them because it's quite clear that they are frightened.
I didn't realise that a fearful dog can also exhibit it as barking and growling.
That was a learning curve, especially when we got Roscoe, because I think he's got a mixture of anxiety and we'll probably discuss later frustration issues and things.
And for me trying to, I just thought it was maybe, and I did some research on my own, more of a fearful dog.
reaction that he was demonstrating because when he was first home with us even to get him out of the garden we had to encourage him with some chicken he just didn't want to go outside he was shaking and so I thought all of his problems were anxiety based so doing the usual socializing everything else that you read about we thought you would be able to overcome that and yeah but when he met a dog he wanted to play he'd bounce on the lead and bark.
Looking back now I realise that was probably frustration but I didn't realise that at the time and didn't understand it and often probably thought when I did see some other dog barking that before we had Roscoe that maybe it was an element of fear or maybe a lack of training, obedience training probably was what you first come to mind if not being a professional dog person.
I now know that is not the case at all
yeah I think that's the thing we hear an awful lot is that you've got a reactive dog he just needs training he needs to be put in his place and obviously this is an audio so the audience can't see you nodding your head so you're gonna have to speak out so yes both of you in relation to that but yeah so Catherine that's also your experience I presume as well that people were sort of telling you just get your dog trained
I think that's a similarity across Ross and Roscoe, isn't it? We have kind of those struggles with both dogs and with people, which I think is even more isolating, isn't it? Because there's not kind of one situation where you haven't got something to deal with sort of out and about.
So just thinking about your experiences sort of before these dogs, I suppose, or in the early days for you, especially, Debbie, with obviously what you've experienced, your feelings and knowledge has changed, I know, I think it's fair to say.
But what did you know about reactive dogs before you had one? So before you had Ross and Roscoe, Had you seen other people with reactive dogs? How did you feel about seeing dogs with those sorts of behaviours? And yeah, we'll start with Ria to Catherine first.
Well, I knew very little about them.
To be very honest, I tended to think that people claimed that their dogs were reactive in order to get priority parking places and running orders at trials because the dogs I saw didn't seem worried about other dogs or people.
But then when I saw a person who I respected very much as a nose work competitor, trainer and judge managing her very fearful dog at a trial, at different trials, and saw how nervous the dog was, how spooky she was, I began to realise there might be more to it
I think that's such an interesting perspective given sort of your background in competition as well.
Like always seeing that as a, oh, they're just trying to get some sort of priority system here.
But like you say, sort of starting to see three people you know and you trust sort of that there's possibly more to it than that.
So our family pet that we had when I was living at home, I'd be about 15 when we first had him, again he started off perfectly fine but then he gradually around the one year old mark started to have some reactive behaviour but having said that That was mostly towards dogs and strangers coming into the house but the dog side of it we could kind of understand because he'd been attacked several times by other dogs and at the time looking back there wasn't that much training as what there is potentially now and we didn't reach out but that was my kind of experience with him at the time and felt it was understandable.
We could walk him off leave.
We could do a lot of things that we can't do now with Roscoe.
But so he wasn't in comparison that bad, but I thought he was quite tricky.
Didn't think about it from any other perspective.
Um, and then of course we, um, And I also thought that when dogs were fearful, you would see them cower back away, kind of just want to cuddle them, even though you probably shouldn't.
But you kind of have that empathy with them because it's quite clear that they are frightened.
I didn't realise that a fearful dog can also exhibit it as barking and growling.
That was a learning curve, especially when we got Roscoe, because I think he's got a mixture of anxiety and we'll probably discuss later frustration issues and things.
And for me trying to, I just thought it was maybe, and I did some research on my own, more of a fearful dog.
reaction that he was demonstrating because when he was first home with us even to get him out of the garden we had to encourage him with some chicken he just didn't want to go outside he was shaking and so I thought all of his problems were anxiety based so doing the usual socializing everything else that you read about we thought you would be able to overcome that and yeah but when he met a dog he wanted to play he'd bounce on the lead and bark.
Looking back now I realise that was probably frustration but I didn't realise that at the time and didn't understand it and often probably thought when I did see some other dog barking that before we had Roscoe that maybe it was an element of fear or maybe a lack of training, obedience training probably was what you first come to mind if not being a professional dog person.
I now know that is not the case at all
yeah I think that's the thing we hear an awful lot is that you've got a reactive dog he just needs training he needs to be put in his place and obviously this is an audio so the audience can't see you nodding your head so you're gonna have to speak out so yes both of you in relation to that but yeah so Catherine that's also your experience I presume as well that people were sort of telling you just get your dog trained
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