Please help...Puppy agresssion over bone

kimberlysuz

kimberlysuz

New Member
Yesterday my boyfriend was playing with my almost 3 month old Mini Aussie puppy. While Azura was chewing on her bone he took it away from her (for play) and she aggressively bit him on the hand. We've taken toys and bones away from her before without problems. I don't know if this is a problem I should be concerned with or just something to expect from a puppy. I've never had a puppy do that before and I need some advice on how to handle her bitting if she does it again.
 
Hi!

You should definitely start training your dog to accept you being around his toys, bones and food. This sounds to me like he might start being pocessive of his belongings and it will get worse if you don't do anything.

The easiest thing to do, is to start to exchange a treat for whatever the dog is playing with. For example, if the dog is playing with a toy, you can walk up to the dog, drop a treat in front of his nose (something that he wants more than the toy), and then to take the toy away from his sight. (By placing it behind you.) And then once he is done eating the treat you can give him back the toy and act like nothing happenned.

When you do this, the dog will learn a few things. First that good things happen when you come close to him and his toys/bones/food. And second that you don't actually take it away from him since you give it back.

You should start practicing this with toys, as he is more likely to accept you being around him. And then to do the same thing with bones.

Don't neglect doing this with his foodbowl too! Too many owners can't even get close to their dog's foodbowl once it's filled up. That is so sad since the dog can easily be trained to accept being around. Once the dog has started eating, you can walk to your dog and drop a few (yummier) treats in his bowl. Eventually you can sink your hand into the bowl, and then drop treats on top.

Eventually, you want to be able to walk up to your dog while he is eating his dinner, take his food bowl away and put gravy or something that he loves on top. And then to give it back to him.

Doing this will enable you to take away anything from your dog and he won't make a fuss out of it. If you train your dog now - you won't have this problem later on.

Well of course, if you always take things away from your dog without anything he won't want you around them. Kind of like being around a kid who comes up to you and steals whatever toy you're playing with. :D

Hope this helps,
Jean
 
If I may add to Jeans response. You should set the rules at an early age, you are at the top of the chain, puppy must learn that humans are the leaders. As the saying goes " Don't bite the hand that feeds you ..".
Basically, it's teaching the pup/dog respect , and forming the human-dog relationship bond with the most important thing in thier life...food.
We had the exact problem with each of our 3 dogs. With each one, we very gently tried to remove the bone from them, we got growls and teeth showing, the instant that happens, I would give a deep "NO" or " ahhhhh" , and stop and praise the dog (softly), as soon as it stops growling. This tells the dog, I don't like that behaviour ( growls, teeth), and stopping is the desired behavior. I repeated this methode several times for each new bone, and now it's set in thier head.
A bigger problems comes with multi-dog homes. This needs to be monitored, and corrected very quickly. When a dog growls at another dog over a bone, it can turn very ugly, as we had with 2 of our dogs. We fixed the problem, and the 2 have great respect for each other. That fight was 1 1/2 years ago, no problems since.

We also play the "wait" game at dinner time. Fill the dinner bowl, dog stands nearby, say wait, dog waits, usually around 30 secs, then say a release work like "break", the dog can then eat. It teaches self-control, respect to you , and very handy to have the "wait" for sports like agility and tricks.

Your pups behaviour is very normal and common, good luck with your training, I hope this helps.
 
but remeber to realise the WAIT command, i didnt the other day and poor storm was waiting for dinner for about 20minutes, he was good and waited but i felt soo stink for not realising earlier (i was dealing with koda after sticking storms food down and forgot my poor boy), but yeah koda started with her growling when you go near her food (its a stage all dogs go through i think) and we did what jean said to do and its working she does have her moments every now and again but shes only 13weeks old
 
there was a big wet patch :msncry: where he had been dribbling on the floor poor dog, but he probably would of gone in if i didnt lock koda up :dogph34r: when she had her dinner, i dont normally do that but she was tired and if i didnt put her to bed then she would of burnt herself out she had a big day that day:dogsleep:
 
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