Worst Mother's Day Evar.

[qwyneth]

So Mother's Day started out well. My hair was behaving well, and it was cold enough that I could wear a blazer my mom got me last week. stickybear whined a bit about having to wear nice clothes, but when we explained it was to honor MeMa (his maternal grandmother) he acquiesced. We got him packed off with his mom, and then got everything together and ready

Comments

[sweetanyanka]

I know that they have a really good program at our shelter for borderline aggressive dogs. Our trainer does some private work so he might be willing to work with Matilda. She hasn't hurt anyone yet so you should be safe in terms of being able to keep her

[qwyneth]

How do you tell them that you're always in control? We've kept ourselves between her and the other dog, nudged her with our legs, forced her into a calming position, walked her on a tight leash....not sure what else to do.

I'd love to get the trainer's information. The more advice, the better. And I really want to stress that she's never been aggressive towards people. Sigh. Worry. :(

[anonymous]

Hey there - that's a little fear aggression and protecting her Alpha attitude thrown in. One of you has to get her into a calm sit /stay or down. And the other one gets to "make friends" with the dog being targeted. It helps to make friends with the owners of the the "other" dog...so that you can explain what you need to do and why

[ext_54170]

that was me - apparently my seesion finally times out or the server kicked me off...

[qwyneth]

Thank you! We am definitely willing to try this. We usually can take her on walks together in the evening, and that's when we seem to meet the most dogs. And, ironically, we do not usually get much of a chance to meet the other dog when we try to introduce them, as we're focused on calming her and keeping control of her. I'm definitely willing to try this.

She also always goes nuts with dogs (or cats, or sneakers...) on the other side of glass doors, so we work plenty at walking her past at the other side of us. We have been having...mixed results with this. Sometimes we succeed, but sometimes she flings herself around dramatically and it's nearly impossible to ignore it and keep going. We'll work on this though.

Thank you, thank you, thank you! I was going to email you directly if you hadn't commented, since you were so helpful over Christmas. :)

welp

[cmat]

So I don't know jack about dogs, remember. That said, 2 comments:

1) It seems like you have wiggle room if she's not in danger of attacking people. A problem may be serious without equating to losing your dog. Deep breaths!

2) From a logistical perspective, it sounds like, while you work on it, your current big problem has a lot to do with her getting outside without a leash. I know it's an unfun drag, but maybe you can train her to stay away from the door (not in the hall, etc) unless she's already leashed, and in times when she's trying to get near the door like that, shut her in another room or crate her until she gets the message: No Door. Would that work?

Also, *hug*hug*hug* and love and sympathy. It will be okay!

Re: welp

[qwyneth]

1) It seems like you have wiggle room if she's not in danger of attacking people. A problem may be serious without equating to losing your dog. Deep breaths!

My dad pointed this out to me as well. (My mom and grandmother, on the other hand, were Not Helpful, immediately assuming she'd start attacking children.) As time has passed and the other owner didn't come by, I also realized that if she didn't cause real damage to the other dog (or vice versa) it wasn't an actual, honest to god dog fight. It was plenty scary though, and it is something serious that we badly need to address.

2) From a logistical perspective, it sounds like, while you work on it, your current big problem has a lot to do with her getting outside without a leash.We've been working on teaching her that she may not walk out the door without our express permission, actually. She's not perfect at it (obviously), but she's been getting better. We're agreed that if she ever starts getting at the door like that again, it's immediately into the crate (even though we

Re: welp

[qwyneth]

Sigh, since I've stopped paying for my account I've lost the ability to edit my comments. Stupid lj. Of all of the differences between a paid and regular account, that's the one I miss the most.

[boundfate]

I'm going to go another route with this - feel free to ignore

[qwyneth]

Thank you! I was hoping you would respond to this. :) And at this point we're not going to ignore anything. We want to fix this. I don't want anything like this happening again, and I think she'd be happier if she could actually make friends with the other dogs.

As for the recall--ugh. That has been hands down the hardest thing to teach her. She is normally very attentive towards us and does what we ask, but when she gets focused on something, all bets are off. I don't even know if our calls registered to her yesterday. BUT--this is primarily our fault. I do recognize the importance of the recall, and we should have worked with her on it harder. Do you have any particular tips on teaching it? Maybe a different method will work better with her.

Positive reinforcement: again, we've used this for other things but hadn't thought of using it for this. D'oh. I'll make some more training treats tonight.

Is "Fight" the Donaldson book you were talking about

[boundfate]

Yup, fight is the book

For posterity

[qwyneth]

This was posted by driia.com and then accidentally deleted by qwyneth because qwyneth is a fool.

Hey - I also said something similar in a message I sent to your JL email...don't know if you got it or usual read LJ mail or not.

BUt Boundfate had *very* valid points - if she thinks it's her job to defend or guard. Then it's not aggression - but job confusion.... she needs to learn a different way to do her job or learn a different job altogether. Pack hierarchy is very simple - but complex to figure out - since you don't speak dog and she doesn't speak people.

[qwyneth]

Oh hell, I didn't mean to delete that comment. I'm sorry, driia. I was trying to figure out how to find your livejournal message, which doesn't seem to come to me anymore. (It's supposed to forward to my gmail, but it's not in my inbox nor my spam folder. But nor is it in my livejournal inbox! Stoopid....

Anyway, I am emailing you through the email listed on your website. :)

[biceyou]

I'm so sorry babe!

Seriously, though, while it is a problem, I really don't think you need to be worried that you'll lose her. I have never heard of someone having to give up a dog, or put her down, because she almost-sort-of got in a fight with another dog, and hurt herself but not the other dog. The other dog's owner has probably forgotten about it completely. Plus, if you are freaked out and nervous, it isn't going to help anything, least of all Matilda... so don't worry! It is going to be OK.