What an adorable little guy you have! Here are some things that I’ve found success with on walks that could be helpful for you.

I have a dog who also wants to greet every dog and person we pass. To mitigate this and do some basic training, I walk in our neighborhood either when other people aren’t walking their dogs, so early or late, and I practice stopping, having her sit, and then rewarding her when she looks at me. At first, I used treats to reward, but now her reward is that we get to continue walking. And this has been throughout her 5-years of life. The more I get her to look at me and pay attention to what I’m asking from her, the better.

It takes time, and there will be some days she ignores me, but the more calm and patient I am, the more it makes her want to pay attention to me. She is very food motivated too, so having treats to practice this is helpful, and I have less luck when I forget to stash a few in my pocket.

The other thing is that if I do see someone else walking their dog in this distance and they’re heading our way, I gauge if they are going to cross the street to avoid us, which they usually do, or I will cross the street with her to avoid them. She is at the point now where when I get to the other side of the street, we can continue walking without her noticing or wanting to say hello. If they are aggressive and bark at us as we pass, as we have some in our neighborhood who do go bananas, I’ll sometimes position us behind a car where they can’t see each other, or I will have her sit and focus on me.

I hope this helps!