[jazzking1971]

Allow me to chime in with a very recent and similar scenario. My wife was out walking with our 13mo male. There was a man in a white truck trolling along side her asking her stupid question like "How was your x-mas?" "is that a nice dog etc..." "Can I pet your dog?" She says "NO leave me alone" My rott stayed in his heel position but kept his eye on the man.

This idiot pulls up to the next corner and gets out of the car. "I just want to pet your dog." He took another step toward my wife and then my dog broke Heel and went to the end of the leash. He didn't bark, he didn't growl, he just gave that ice cold stare that only rotties can give. My wife yelled "My husband trains dogs and this one is trained to bite people so leave me the **** alone!" This guy takes one more step forward and my dog pulls my wife forward two steps. He still didn't make a noise but never stopped staring at him. The man called my wife some nasty female name and left.

Do I think my 13mo is ready for PP? NO. We're in a schutzhund club and haven't done anything beyond prey biting on a wedge. And when presented with the sleeve, on both occasions he went for the elbow. He's not ready for schH protection let alone any kind of civil work. Doing what my boy didn't isn't an indicator of anything other than he's got a good level of confidence. I wouldn't trust him to bite in a situation like that but nobody else on the street needs to know that.

In this case, we were lucky to have a puppy with seemingly sound nerves and a great helper in Jimbo at the club to help raise his confidence to where it is now.