|
Location: Merseyside, UK
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 891
|
|
What is this? What can we do? Dog Aggression
My Alfie (1 year old Border Collie) has a problem with other dogs. When he was a puppy, he was just frightened and avoided them, walked away or around them, just wanted to stay out of their way! We tried to socialise him with quieter dogs and took him to training classes, but I admit that perhaps we didn't do enough there to help him get over it. In our first class, a GSD attacked him, he was about 4/5 months old, and I'm not sure if that's what made it go down hill or whether it's just got progressively worse.
When he sees a dog, he'll go over slowly, and stands really stiff when he gets there and just touches noses with the other dog. He won't look the other dog in the eye at all, his eyes sometimes go to the side and look the other direction. He'll stand like a statue, and then he'll come back to me when I call. However, if the other dog follows him, he's okay at first but then he'll snap at them and a couple of times has started a fight. He's never harmed a dog at all, it's all noise really, but I'm worried he will. He's worse on lead and I'm reluctant to pull him away from a dog as often that sets him off. There was one time at obedience where we were doing recalls and two of us did it at the same time, and he ran to the other owner, got there the same time as the other dog and started a fight. I'm not sure if this had something to do with the food or if he was after the dog.
I'm just a bit unsure what to do when this situation arises. He literally freezes, and if a dog follows him I'm reluctant to grab him or pull him away as that tends to make him more agitated.
We have another dog, Jessie, who he's fine with! He's also played with the odd jrt, and likes a border terrier at our training. He seems to be better with little dogs, so when we go to training I'm going to click and praise like mad when he's with these dogs. I was just wondering if anyone could tell why he does this, is it fear, dominance, what? And if anyone had any tips, I'd be really greatful
If it means anything, he's very wimpy around humans, rolls over onto his back frequently
but very very friendly.