We have had our rescue dog Pip for about 7 months now.  He is a sort of Jack Russell/Fox terrier cross.  We have really struggled to "edcuate" this little fell as he is quite hyper and hard work!.  However he has a nice nature, is good with people and children,  never snaps or growls etc.  He is good off his lead,  doesn't fight etc (unlike our last Jack Russell!!).  He is aged about 18 months or so and we also have another dog, Lucy,a Westie who is 6 and a real lady. Pip and Lucy get on well.

Pip is now on his 3rd training course and he much more sociable than he was.  However we do have terrible problems when he is on his lead.  If walking along the road he spots a dog over the road or even in the distance he start this dreadful yapping.  The yapping is dreadful - an assault on the eardrums and he works himself up so that he is almost gagging!  Even when the dogs has passed from sight he still yaps for ages.  We often sit in pub gardens and again,  all is well unless he spies another dog and then he starts this noise.  We have had complaints from others sitting in the pub garden so it is quite embarrassing!

In mosts other respects he is  more civilised nowadays - working relationship with our 2 (also rescued) cats, housetrained, less chewing than before etc.  Generally more settled and less anxious.  We don't have a clue of his background of course.

But this business of yapping on the lead is getting me down and I don't know how to cope with it.  I feel like not bothering with roadwork because we always seem to see some dog in the distance.  It doesn't seem to be improving.  I guess it must be a terratorial thing.

Has anyone any suggestions - or should I see a behaviourist?

Leonora

A behaviourist is probably a good idea, however I will tell you how I got my little Tibetan out of doing this.

She would bark when she saw other dogs out walking, bark at people and generaly bark!  My other two dogs are relatively quiet for Beardies.  I had to re train her from scratch.  I started in the garden with rewards for not barking.  Everytime she barked at passers by, dogs, children I called her to me sat her and as long as I had her full attention gave her a high value treat (little pieces of sausage worked for her) and use appropirate praise words - in her case 'no barking good girl' (in a very up beat voice) it is important to treat the second you get the behaviour you want.  She soon got the hang of this so out onto the walk with a pocket full of sausage pieces.

Every time she barked at passers by, dogs etc I sat her and in that split second where she stopped barking praised her 'no barking good girl' - I had her attention now so gave the sausage piece, let the other dog walk past still keeping her in the sit and praising, once the distraction is past realeased her with 'walk on'.  Works in Pubs as well.

With her it was a case of setting boundaries and letting her know exactly what I wanted.  I don't allways treat now as she will come in for praise and a cuddle but I reinfonce the training every now and again by starting from scratch.  I am not a dog trainer just letting you know how I did it. 

This might help.  It worked for us with one dog.  If you can get him to carry a ball or toy he likes for a while when he is on the lead.  My dog would not drop the toy - it was a frisbee - to bark and that fixed it in about a couple or three weeks.  When we eventually took the toy away he had forgotten that he barked on the lead and it stopped completely.  Everyone was then keen to take him out for a walk. Now and again he would go to do it but responded well to being checked and it was over.  You do have to watch for the possessiveness over the toy creeping in but that is worth a try.

Hi Leonora - I do sympathise with you, my younger dog also does this, the only difference being that once he's had his 'say' and we've passed the other dog he does stop barking.  Despite trying various tactics I haven't managed to cure him so basically it's a case of avoidance of other dogs (it's surprising how good you can get at this :) )
The only other times he's very vocal is when he chases the birds in our back garden. In an effort to cure him I started sending him back into the kitchen every time he barked.  It's kind of working - he has a bark, looks at me then just trots indoors for his self imposed 'time-out' :)

Pip seldom barks in the garden or much in the house funnily enough.  He is only set off if he sees a dog or cat pass by in front of the window!  The Westie is much more vocal when out in the garden as she chases birds (and one dreadful day last year she caught and killed three baby blackbirds within a few seconds. ) Thank God they haven't nested in our garden this year.

When we first took Pip to training classes he was dreadfully yappy (obviously they are all on leads there) but now several months later he is perfectly okay - but I guess he has become familiar with the particular dogs in his group.

I think the answers are as suggested, rewards and avoidance!!!

Leonora

think rglass and echo made two brilliant posts there.
echo, dunno what makes you think you arent a dog trainer
just to add tho, it doesnt seem like he is being territorial to more.
morelike he is just excited at sight of other dogs - probably gagging to get over and play?
(albeit not in such a socially acceptable way)

One of my collies used to do this and I stopped it by squirting water in his face whenever he barked and giving him a food or toy reward the second he stopped. It only took a couple of days to stop but I suppose it depends on the dog. Whichever method you choose, make sure you stick with it for a good couple of months rather than changing backwards and forwards between them or he'll just get confused. Good luck.