Dog has started showing aggression - give me hope

We adopted the doggie in my avatar almost 2 years ago from a shelter when she was about 9 months old. She had been a stray in Detroit before that.

For the first year, she was wonderful. We have trained her with basic commands and she is just the lovebug of all lovebugs with people she knows. She loved everyone she came in contact with and we made sure to socialize her really well right away.

Unfortunately, about 6 months ago she began to show signs of aggression. There is one male who comes over once a month that she just does not like. When he’s sitting down, she’s completely fine and is a lovebug. When he stands up though, she loses her mind and barks. We know that dogs are like people and sometimes they just have someone they don’t like so we worked around it.

However, recently, she’s started doing it with all new males who come into the house.

I contacted a local trainer with good reviews who is supposed to specialize in aggression issues. We have a consultation on Monday where he’ll come and evaluate her.

I’m just scared. She’s only 2-3 years old so she’s going to be with us for a good long time- including when we bring children into our lives.

Just to be clear- she has never bitten or nipped at anyone. She doesn’t even growl. She just barks and follow them very closely… but I don’t want it to escalate.

Has anyone gone through this and had a doggie respond well to the training?

Barking is very different from biting. She is guarding the house, not attacking. While it is fine to get a trainer, there is no reason to assume she will become a biter.

@TheGreyKing that’s very comforting. Thank you!

Our beagle is fine but will bark at some men coming in the house. There doesn’t seem to be any reason why some people are fine and others aren’t. He has never bitten anyone. I know you have health problems. Have they increased in the last 6 months? Is it possible that he is protecting because of that?

Have you had her walking on a leash away from the house and had her exhibit the same behavior? Trying to figure out if she’s guarding her people, the house, or it’s something else entirely.

The dog trainer is the way to go. You should learn a lot about what’s going on in her mind from them. That’s the starting point.

If you don’t find success with the trainer or don’t like him for some reason, strongly recommend you go this route
http://www.ovrs.com/departments_and_services/behavioral_medicine.php. Looks like they’re in Oakland.
You want Dr. DePorter. She’s a board certified veterinary behaviorist, board cert are known as Diplomats. There are around 70 of them in the US. It may be expensive… we have one here that I considered using and it was $600 for the workup, develop plan, and access to vet for followups for a certain amount of time. I’m in a high COLA so you may be looking at less. Oh - let me add I don’t know her so obviously ask around. I went looking for this particular specialty, hoping that one of the 70 of them was located in your area.

My guess is your trainer will be able to give you some good info and a plan that can work. But it will take time, patience, and consistency. It’s worth it if it results in a happy home for everyone.

GOOD LUCK - keep us posted.

@MichiganGeorgia that is something that I’ve thought about. I don’t think I’ve gotten worse but I have been home more because the winter makes my joints hurt quite a bit.

I also have home care now where a nurse comes at least one a week to do my treatments. She is very hyper around the nurse (who loves dogs) so I am also hoping the training will help calm her. The nurse has to mix my meds once she gets here so having a hyper dog is problematic. (We do exercise her a LOT every day. She loves frisbee lol)

Posting this to sympathize. I don’t have an answer, but I have a huge dog who growls at everyone. Has never bitten but I’m not sure that he wouldn’t. I inherited him from my son who moved out 6 years ago to an apartment where he couldn’t have a pet then took a traveling job, blah, blah, blah. I live alone and have no one else to help care for him. I have to schedule my vacation around my daughter’s school schedule (she’s a teacher) so she can come stay with him. He’s 7 years old and he adores me. I feel he growls to protect me, but it really is annoying.

It sounds like what you’re seeing is fear aggression, and while I can’t tell you if your dog will be safe around children I can offer hope, as we had a dog who became fear aggressive.

Our dog was a sweet, friendly golden retriever whose issues began with our next door neighbor’s scary dog, The neighbor’s dog (abused as a pup) was aggressive and attacked and bit our other dog. Our golden became fearful of that dog, barking aggressively when it was taken out for a walk. Eventually the aggression became generalized to the other family’s second dog, then any dog walking by, and eventually people walking by. When she started scaring families with kids in strollers we realized we needed to put a serious program in place.

I worked with her over the course of a couple of months. Primarily what I did was to habituate her to people walking by our house. The aggressive barking only happened at the edge of our driveway/yard so I knew she was being territorial and keeping the bad guys away. I would sit outside with her talking soothingly to her as someone approached, correcting her when she started to growl and praising her when the people got by without incident. Eventually I was able to introduce her to people at the end of the driveway. That seemed to convince her that people, and eventually dogs walking by our house weren’t scary.

We spent a good part of yesterday in the park with her surrounded by toddler poking at her mouth and pulling on her ears. She wagged her tail, licked their faces and rolled on her back to have her belly rubbed. I knew she was absolutely safe.

Dogs have long memories when it comes to things that scare them. It’s possible your friend reminds her of someone who treated her badly when she was on the street. Would your friend be willing to work with you to help retrain her? As unintuitive as it may seem it may not help to keep them apart as your dog may be getting the message that he’s not a good safe person to be with and that you’re protecting her from potential harm. If you can help her to make friends with him, perhaps starting with him offering her biscuits while sitting on the ground and working gradually to standing, you may be able to to break the connection in her head between tall standing men and danger.

@JustGraduate thank you!

Oh yes, to add- we did take her to the vet about 3 months ago for her regular check-up and shots. We mentioned this to the vet to make sure there wasn’t something physically wrong with her. He checked her out and everything was A-OK. He recommended a trainer but at the time we weren’t all that concerned so didn’t follow-up.

The consultation on Monday is free, luckily, so we can determine whether we are comfortable with the trainer and whatever it is that he wants to do. I will definitely follow-up with the Oakland Dr if this one doesn’t pan out. Thank you again!

@musicmom1215 my sympathies are with you.

@Sue22 oh that reminded me- most of the men that she barks at are smokers or around smokers. No one in my house smokes (and no one in either mine or Mr R’s family does either) and I do wonder if something happened to her before we got her that she connects in her mind.

I have a feeling that it is fear aggression.

She has been around children before- small toddlers that she’s met on walks. She was WONDERFUL with them. Sweet as can be- not even her usual hyper self. But this was before the barking and whatnot began.

I think the trainer is a good idea. I had to use one with one of my dogs who was a parvo survivor because she became more aggressive . I also believe that your dogs increased aggression is due to your medical condition , especially with you being home and more people coming into the home. Good luck and I hope you find a solution.

Ok definitely making a note to discuss my illness with the trainer.

I did mention it in my original message to him but it was in the context of me being too weak to work with her extensively (Mr R does though).

Sounds to me like your dog is resource guarding and you are the “resource”. A good trainer should be able to help with techniques to use to help him stop this behavior. My pekechin came to us (from a kill shelter) with this issue (she guarded everything - house, food, furniture and me) and while she got better with specific training - she never got over it completely. I couid never let her near any child.

A good behaviorist should be able to help you figure out the problem. If it’s one specific person, however, I find myself wondering: Does he stare at the dog? I can make my dog (who is not particularly aggressive) bark just by giving him a hard stare. Does the person use any drugs? The scent of some drugs seems to set some dogs off. Carry a cane? A friend of mine has recently started to use a cane, and some dogs of her acquaintance are very worried by it. What about a hat? One of my dogs really disapproves of floppy hats. A previous dog, now long gone, was horrified by parents who carried children in a backpack; she was convinced that the two-headed monster was coming to get her, and would bark furiously at them.

Your dog could be fear aggressive, reactive, resource guarding… or just easily startled. If you can ask the friend who sets the dog off to be there when you meet with the behaviorist, or videotape the behavior, it will help the behaviorist to figure out what is going on.

I compete in dog agility, and consequently know an inordinate number of “dog people”–I have learned that dog “issues” can be complex and highly individual. Dogs do not generalize well!

Do not expect the solution to be easy and quick. It takes time to teach dogs a new behavior.

Edited to add: I just noticed that you mentioned that smokers seem to be a particular issue. Dogs are extremely sensitive to scent; the scent of tobacco could well be triggering a behavior. If so, it may be fairly straightforward to teach the dog to associate the scent of tobacco with good things.

I taught my dog (who I adopted when she was almost 8) to sit down on command (in return for a small biscuit). She can’t or won’t bark when seated, so this is useful for at least short periods. She has been known to anticipate when she should sit, sit, get a treat, then stand back up and start barking. Smart girl! Outside, she barks when she sees or hears other dogs and occasionally when she sees or hears things with wheels (noisy motor vehicles, some bicycles, strollers, roller bladers). Inside, she barks when people come to the door. If I know someone is coming (e.g., the plumber) and spot the vehicle before she hears it, I’ll put her on the leash and take her outside to meet the person. Usually she doesn’t bark then. I’m not inclined to train her not to bark at strangers who come to the door. Even though I don’t think she’d bite a person, I don’t mind if people who come to the door unannounced are a little scared.

Some of her barking seems to be to protect me and herself; some of it seems purely communication (“Yo, other dog, I hear you. Do you hear me?”)

@dmd77 I didn’t think about associating tobacco with good things (probably because I myself have such a negative reaction to it!) I have a female friend who is a smoker- I should ask her to stop by and see if doggie reacts to her, too.

When we first adopted her, she had separation anxiety. We’ve fostered dogs with anxiety before so luckily we were able to train her (or she grew out of it) within about a month. She’s never been destructive- with the exception of stuffed animals. She will destroy toys with stuffing.

She also LOVES other dogs. She thinks everyone should be her best friend- whether they want to be or not. So she’s wonderful at a dog park… not so much with random dogs on the street because she wants to play. We will do sit-stays and keep her concentrated on us if a dog is walking by. We’ve started doing that in the house, too, since she barks at dogs that walk by. (Unfortunately because of the open nature of my house, it is impossible to keep her out of the room with the front window unless we keep her permanently confined to a bedroom.

My in laws keeps german shepherds in their experience big dogs don’t start guarding until roughly two years old.

My daughter’s dog claims people and doesn’t like any competition for attention. For example he can’t sit on me any more because he wont let my other kid near me.

It is hard when they come with so much emotional baggage that they need a porter.

“Even though I don’t think she’d bite a person, I don’t mind if people who come to the door unannounced are a little scared.”
My thought exactly. I live alone and don’t mind one bit if strangers at the door fear for their lives! lol

Consulting a good behaviorist sounds like the best idea. Make sure to tell him/her everything.

Teaching her an extended down-stay with a target such as a towel would be something that might help at least control the behavior.

It could be tough to figure out whether this change in her behavior is because of her age or the change in your physical status!

Is she inclined to be dominant? There is something to be said for the approach that makes the dog earn all privileges. Sit and wait before being allowed to eat. Sit and wait at the door before being allowed to go through. Etc. No free lunch. She is not in charge. She is not the guard. You control all access. Etc.

She’s kind of on the small side. She’s a pit/lab/something small (jack russell?) mix. ~40 lb.

I wouldn’t mind if she just barked at the door. It’s when she keeps barking even after they’ve come in and settled in that it makes me anxious lol.

@Consolation not dominant at all. In fact, she is SUPER submissive. Which is also why I wonder if it might be a fear thing.