Please do anything to your puppy that has to do with pack theory. You are a human and she is a dog and she knows that. Dominace theory is very flawed and dog behaviour is far more complex than a simple hierarchy.

Keep up with positive training, not leaving your dog alone with your children, listen to what your dog is saying to you, avoid confrontation and before you know it your puppy will be a well balanced dog with no reasons to growl because she loves doing things you ask her to and being a valued member of your family and being treated kindly. Most people get dogs to enjoy being withthem. I'm not at war with my dogs, we are a team that is mututally beneficial and they are part of my family.

Think you might have posted this on the wrong thread, guessing you're after the puppy that growled:

******!!!!!


Ooops! But my advice to the presso owner is still the same. Do not consider doing anything like rolling your dog or blowing it with a hair dryer, it's dangerous, unneccesary and unkind. It won't make behaviours better but it may mask what's going on so you think the issues have improved. ....it might stop the dog but it won't cure the root cause.

Rescues do have to pts aggressive dogs, if one did do a lot of damage to someone they would have been sued, no rescue can afford that.

A wagging tail doesn't always mean a friendly dog, a dog's tail tells us a lot about how they are feeling along with the rest of their bodies. The position of their tail is relevant, if the wagging is soft and wavy, the dog is relaxed, if stiff the dog is on high alert and feeling threatened. A wagging tail can mean the dog is going to attack.

We are not a pack member, we hold all the resources, food, water, exercise etc. all high resources to dog who want to survive, so don't need to prove anything to our dogs.

The man who first studied wolves were the Alpha roll and pack leader came from is now saying he got it wrong, he was studying a gang of wolves who lived together in captivity, they do not behave like a wild pack, add to this dogs are not wolves this theory is wrong.

A pack of dogs/wolves is mum, dad and offspring, like human families mum and dad are parents to their children, they take care of them and teach them how to survive until they are old enough to fend for themselves. This is were we differ from dogs and wolves, they kick their's out but us humans never stop providing for our children.

I have 4 dogs, I used to have 6, I don't have a pack I have a group of dogs that I act like a parent and teacher to so that they can live in our society.

A word of warning about the Alpha roll, when you roll a dog and pin them down your face is in an ideal place to be bitten. I took on a dog that had put several people in A & E including bitten on their face when he was Alpha rolled, the dog was a JRT/Maltese, a small dog, a big dog can do a lot more damage.

Your dog is very lucky to have found you, you did work with her to try and turn her round and not be frightened of humans.

You were lucky that you have visitors who would still come to your home and face your dog, may are too frightened to face a dog like this. A friend took on a Collie like this and people have stopped coming to her house, she was feeling very isolated when I first got to know her.

To a dog something like this is an aggressive act and the dog can turn on the person who has used it on them, also it destroys the bond between the owner and the dog, the bond may be able to get back when this is no longer used but I know dogs that 2 years later the bonding wasn't back.

I agree, please don't buy into the pack theory or use negative devices and alpha roles on your dog, they will not help either of you.

It might have changed but last time I heard the age at which one is held to be accountable for their actions in law is 10. I know there was some debate as to wether it should be raised to 14? But not sure if that happened. Young children should be the responsibility of their parents and the parents should be the ones held accountable for the actions of their offspring. In the same way dog owners are held accountable for the actions of their pets in public places. There has been many a time I've been left thinking that if my dogs were allowed to behave in the same way someone's child is I'd be being prosecuted under the DDA, and that if they can't control the little ******s they should put them on a bloody lead too.
Humans are not the only ones to kill for pleasure.



Alex

My advice for what it's worth would be to consult a reputable behaviourist to help you with your dog.
Part of me thinks that you never should of put your dog in the situation where they felt biting was necessary but that wasn't how it went and it can't be undone. The other part of me thinks that now maybe your brother might just learn to do what he's bloody well told. If he can't follow your rules I wouldn't have him in your house.
Hope you can work through it.



Good luck
Alex

If I remember right, children under 16 years old are not responsible for their dogs their parents are. There was some talk that under 16s shouldn't walk a dog unless an adult was with them but not sure if that was put into the act. No under 16s can buy any animal but I am sure that a lot do.

Like a lot of laws in this country they are ignored, you only have to see how many drive talking into a mobile phone to see just how our laws work.

Hi Freckles, I'm not an expert (so you can ignore anything I say ) but have done alot of research on dog behaviour, warning signs etc. Dealing with a large nervous breed, you have your work cut out for you.

When your dog is obviously nervous, you reassuring her is doing more damage, I'm afraid. You're encouraging her to act that way, you need to snap her out of it. Waving her favourite toy/treat in front of her...if she concentrates on you and ignore the dog, the other dog will more than likely leave her alone. Over time, she will naturally relax around others. Obviously it's not as easy as that, and could take months. But you need to learn to read her, and snap her out of it before she gets too uptight.

In relation to the home aggression, I'm sorry but if my dog ever growled or looked nervous around a visitor in my home, I would put my dog outside. Telling people to ignore the behaviour is wrong, you need to deal with the behaviour.

Try getting Kixi to lie down and stay before a visitors enters your home. If she gets up, remove her from the room. Over time, she will learn that staying down and relaxed she gets to stay inside. You need to be firm and calm, she will trust you more. With trust, she will relax.

Best of luck.

Modern thinking is to reassure your do when he is nervous but how you reassure them is relevant, talking to them in a calm voice helps and sometimes a hand gently stroking them but it is important that you stay calm while doing this. No baby talk, it is amazing how many people do baby talk to their dogs, that only confuses them.


The problem with stressed dogs is they can't obey you, bit like us when we are very stressed and someone tries to communicate with us, we don't always hear them. I used to find when getting my children ready for school very stressful if one of them was on a go slow deliberately in the hope they miss the bus. We do have to take this into account when dealing with stressed dogs. Yes we have to be calm but if we insist on a dog obeying us when they are too stressed to do it, they get even more stressed which is not what we want.