Puppy not paying attention when excited

Question

Our 6 month old Pitbull is incredibly friendly and well behaved (for the most part anyway).

We like to take him on walks, and responds well to basic commands. He stops at corners with us before crossing the street and while he still lags a bit or gets ahead to sniff stuff, I believe we're close to getting it right.

The problem is that when he gets excited (ie: when he sees other dogs) it seems like everything he's learned goes out the window.

Just yesterday, he tried to run to the other sidewalk when he spotted a couple of dogs behind a fence. He was totally oblivious to a car that was approaching and I don't want to delve on what could have happened if he hadn't been on a leash.

When this happens, he doesn't even respond to his name.

There's absolutely no indication of aggressiveness. Like I said, he's just incredibly friendly, as are all the dogs we've met in out neighborhood, so he often plays with dogs we meet when on our walks.

Is this normal for a 6-month-old?

Is there something we can do?

I'd like to make our commands more important than his impulses?

Answer 1

I've had this problem with my crossbreed Akita/German Shepard I found that making his walks longer and making him sit and wait until there is a balanced energy between my self and him has worked great. My only down fall is that he is trained to be a police dog. But I sleeked advice from a police dog handler and this has worked as he now waits from me to approach other dogs or walk away from them. Hope you can use this with your own dog