Hello and welcome to this Talking Dogs. I'm Graham Hall, though you perhaps know me better as the dog father.

I've been working with dogs for more than 10 years and for the last few of those I've been helping exasperated dog owners on TV's dogs behaving very badly. I'm determined to make sure

as many humans and dogs as possible live happy lives together, which is why I'm bringing

even more advice and the odd funny story to you on this podcast. Now, today we're tackling people visiting the house because many

dog-owning households do indeed have a problem with their dogs tackling visitors. In a bit I'll

talk you through what to do when your dog gets overexcited by new people arriving but first I

want to have a think about dogs that are scared of visitors.

Like Sarah's dog, Teddy.

Hi, my name is Sarah Hodgson and I have a one-year-old rescue papillon boy called Teddy.

Teddy is extremely scared of visitors that come to my house and he barks non-stop,

especially my grandson who's four years old and has some behaviour issues. Ronnie can be good

and take instruction, but when he moves, Teddy goes nuts and we'll hide under the sofa and bark and bark.

I've tried giving him chues, dog puzzles.

I've tried walking him with my grandson.

I just don't know what to do anymore.

So the first thing to say is that there's already an episode of this podcast that focuses on fearful dogs. So do go back there and have a listen to that one for more anxiety

specific advice. Now Sarah, I can really hear the anxiety in your voice. You sound nervous,

even recalling it and talking to me about it. So just be really careful that you don't let that

anxiety rub off on Teddy because dogs really

pick up on both the sound that we make and the look on your face because I'll bet when you

are sending me that audio note, your face look pretty pained as well. Teddy will see and hear

that and he'll think, right, well, if you're anxious, I'm anxious and you seem to be anxious

...