Is she an aggressive dog?

Kismet wants to go meet everyone... She's a very friendly dog and loves to play with other dogs, so most of the time, I keep her on the lead. If we meet up with other friendly dogs and all are happy to run together, then I let her off to go play and her recall is very good, better than the other dogs in every occassion so far. However if the other owners are not close enough to ask, or if I'm not 100% sure, she stays on the lead. If there is no one else about and we have the field to ourselves, she goes off lead to play with Pharaoh, if she sees another dog while offlead she will usually go deaf to recall and run over, so I spend most of her offlead time 'meerkatting', scanning the field for dogs and recalling her before she sees them.

However...

Kismet has developed onlead aggression to offlead dogs... If the other dog is playful and bothersome but I wont let her off lead to play, she launches screaming growling attacks at them. Difficult if the other dog wont leave us alone and their owner is no where in sight. If I let her off lead in these occasions (as I have had to before when the other dog was big and pushy and I didn't want to handle the fight), she will bounce up and go play, but if I keep her on lead she will attack and has bitten another dog.

I am working on this by taking her to agility classes where her on lead and offlead time is controlled and by taking her to dog shows where she has to mingle with lots of other on lead dogs, but she remains unpredictable.. She is perfectly fine around other calm happy dogs, but as soon as one gets over friendly or playful, or anxious and aggressive.. she will attack it.

The second problem she has developed is even off lead, if the other dogs starts a fight, She goes full on attack. She doesn't start the fights, in all cases the other dog starts it, but she just goes red mist and launches. I have to drag her off, she hasn't so far hurt the other dog, all dominance display, teeth and noise, but it's terrifying to watch and the other dog doesn't know what's hit it! ... It's only happened once or twice off lead... Once over a piece of dropped food the other dog attacked her for and once when a staffy decided he wanted her ball, she would have been happy to share it and has before, but he tried to aggressively push her off it and take it and she wasn't having that!

I am careful who she is off lead with and who she mixes with, so these offlead incidents are extremely rare... But onlead she has developed a seething hatred of little snappy dogs... She has been attacked on more than one occasion by aggressive little offlead uncontrolled terriers and while I am holding her head, the little dog is ripping at her tummy and legs. In her defence the little dogs started it, but because of the size difference, she is the one grabbed and punished. Now she won't give them an inch.. If we meet a little dog out walking and she is on lead, she launches at them, whether they look aggressive or not...

Is she an aggressive dog?

Do I need to see a trainer?

The Agressive Dog class that was previously at Brentwood has opened up again near Grays - they might be able to advise you. They were the ones that helped me most with Daisy. They do socialising walks as well
link to their site- http://www.dtce.co.uk/

She isn't an aggressive dog but you are putting her in situations where she has to show aggression in order to defend herself.

It is your job to make sure that she doesn't get attacked by other dogs.

Of course she gets uptight when she is on the lead, she knows that she could get hurt and has no way to help herself while she is confined.

You need to make sure you do the protecting and keep her out of situations where she could get stressed.

rune

Ok... broadly I agree with this.

What can I do? Never walk her in social dog parks because she is on lead and others are off? That would seem unfair as she's fine 90% of the time, and only gets stressed if the other dog shows aggression or is unstable or anxious...

I don't want to keep her away from all other dogs... but do agree that I have to keep her safe and don't want her to feel anxious or like she has to protect herself.

What I have found helps is to not let off-lead dogs approach her when she's on a lead (block them/move away etc)....but if the other dog lets us approach them, that's fine. It isn't easy, but I've found it's definitely helped for Stumpy.

Walk tonight was mainly very good, an off lead very testosterone driven terrier boy ran over and started to harrass all three. Pharaoh told him off, I moved between him and Kismet, she mostly ignored him... she was on loose long lead at this time... He wouldn't leave us alone, but seemed happy enough, so I let Kismet meet and greet, she played a little with him as he was a good natured boy, was not too stressed and we moved on...

Then we met a nervous black Labrador. The labrador approached licking his lips head down. Kismet tensed. I moved between them ,shortened Kismet's lead and we passed by. Kis did have a growl at him as we walked directly past. Onto the next open field and there was Divo, one of Kismet's good friends and she went offlead for through the long grass zoomies..

A couple with a scruffy white terrier mix came on to the field and Kismet and Divo went up to greet the little dog. At first all was well... The little dog wagged his tail and was submissive, Kismet went to move away and come back to me for her ball, when suddenly the little dog threw himself to the ground screaming under Divo... Divo, backed off, Kismet ran in and grabbed the little dog, both paws and mouth holding it to the ground... The owners grabbed the little dog from under her and picked him up above their heads. Kismet sat down and looked at them quizically head cocked.. the little dog was still screaming...

I of course ran over and asked if he was hurt, was there anything i could do, so sorry, did they think Kismet had attacked him... "Oh he always does that with big dogs" they say.... Pardon? ... "He lets them sniff him for a bit, then he just hits the floor and screams"...

Poor Kismet.. How can she possibly learn how to behave around small dogs when some of them are clearly just crazy??? ...

In hindsight.. I am proud of her that she was gentle enough with him that she didn't hurt him when she pinned him and allowed the strange couple to take him from under her without a fuss... But still... I wish she had just backed off like Divo did... Why must she always feel like it is her responsibility to control all the dogs on the field?

IMO if she is behaving that around other dogs, why are you still letting her off lead? her behaviour is obviously unpridictable...'pinning' other dogs that are not troubling her or showing no signs of aggression. The small dog she 'pinned' may well have had a bad experience with a larger dog, thus it behaves in that way. I wouldn't say it was 'crazy'.

I would contact a behaviourist personally.

So the general consensus is... Yes... She's an aggressive dog.

I should stop allowing her off lead and seek a behaviourist.

I don't think it sounds like aggression so really I wouldn't panic about that!!! I'm sure a behaviorist will have it sorted out in no time and everything will be back to normal. It's worth seeing one just to get to the bottom of things quickly.

Regardless of why the little dog behaved like that I'm told it's not unusual for a dog to intervene when a dog is behaving abnormally. The fact that yours didn't do any more than pin the little dog would suggest to me that it's not an aggression problem. But it's not something you want so let an expert figure it out - it's covered by insurance you know!

We went through a funny spell with our girl (so I know how you feel). It worked out fine and she's good as gold now.

Don't worry about it - and you did nothing wrong letting your dog off-lead. You have to try or you don't know how they'll behave.

(Love the signature BTW - gave me a good chuckle )

How old is Kismet?