Jimpy is basically the model springy, good as gold in all situations so far. However she has one drawback and that is that she cannot let a person walk past the window, or past her if we are sitting outside with her, without barking/growling at them. I know that this is routed in fear as she is a very timid pup, and if the people say hello to her, ignore the growling and give her a stroke she stops and wags her tail instead. She has had loads of socialising and has met lots of people - she is good with all of them but she doesn't ever want strangers to play with her - only us. We have also made this a little bit worse accidently as when our puppy minder was away on holiday we asked a neighbour to come in and see Jimpy. She knows the neighbour but has never met him in our house without us there. When the neighbour came in she got in her crate and growled at him, refusing to come out!

Anyway thatb is the background but my question is how should I respond to the growling? Telling her off doesn't work, but often if I give her a cuddle she will stop. However our puppy trainer said that you shouldn't use a reassuring tone in situations like this as it reinforces that there is something to be scared of. Should we just ignore her or play with her to distract her? It isn't really a massive deal as she never bites or even shows teeth, but I know that she is insecure and unhappy about strangers outside the house so it would be nice to sort it out! Sorry for essay! Looking forward to ideas!