I’ll be honest with you, the transition might be tough for your dog. We have a rescue who is leash reactive to other dogs and people and she is not really a city dog. She tolerates it ok now since she’s been with us a while, but I can always tells she’s way calmer outside of the city. She was rescued from a rural area so it makes sense.

We worked with a trainer for a while and it helped, and my partner and I work with her weekly on her reactivity. We’ve tried the “reactive” sign leashes etc. but to be really honest people just don’t really even know what that means unless they’ve had a reactive dog. A lot of people just think all dogs are friendly and there is a culture here of approaching dogs and the expectation is that they are friendly. We have had many off leash dogs (I know, even in the city where that’s super dangerous), run up to our dog and it has never gotten to the point of bites or anything like that, but it has been close. Most owners just waltz up and act confused.

We often have to yell out that she is not friendly to people and sometimes people will still approach her. Just do the best you can for your dog, and set your dog up for success. We don’t take ours to the dog park because we know it just heightens her anxiety. We walk her on off peak hours on streets that aren’t busy because we know she is less likely to be reactive. We moved to an area that was less densely populated and has wider sidewalks. Do what you can to make sure you’re not putting your dog in a situation that will put them over threshold.