Agression/Reactivity

[ArtTalKat]

My BC is just turned 9 months old and we have started having some big issues with him with aggression/reactivity with people and dogs. I'm sorry, this is going to be long as I'm feeling very frustrated at the moment.

 

He's always had a problem with being shy/scared of some men. We've been working on being calm and just walking by men and he's done really good. He was able to walk right next to a unfamiliar man, sniff the guys leg, then move on. We've never had any problems with dogs before! He has no problems with guys at the dog park or when he is free to run away. It's mostly on leash, when he's free to move around he just avoids them or sneaks a quick sniff and then goes away.

 

However, he's suddenly gone back to barking/growling/backing away from every strange man, and now a few woman as well (never had a problem with women before). I'm pretty sure he was frightened of men to begin with because as a young puppy (very sensitive fear stage) the guy we lived with yelled at him and "spanked" him for peeing on the rug. I was not happy to say the least. They believe in a more......outdated training style. I never let it happen again, they were never alone again, but unfortunately because I wasn't watching close enough he was left with a very timid personality with men. The fear started with my that incident (for obvious reasons) and just spread to all men. We let him sniff some guys when he's feeling comfortable, and with others just work on walking by with lots of treats trying to be as nonchalent as possible, rewarding calm behavior. So I'm baffled as why he's reverted to worse than before suddenly??? I don't know what else to do. Nothing has happened that is out of the norm as far a guys go. We don't force him to say hi to anyone he's uncomfortable with, he hasn't been yelled at or seen a guy yelling that I know of. Any suggestions at all for this would be welcome!!

 

Our plan is just to keep going like we've been doing and hope it goes away, but IDK. It just seems worse than before. We are also going to take him to my school in the mornings and let him sit in the middle of a field to just watch people go by and sit and play tug hoping to calm him down.

 

The other problem now is dogs. He goes to the dog park (hasn't been since our incidents), he plays with our other dog fine, he plays with my sisters collie and her lab mix as well as my parents chihuahua mix and st bernard mix all fine. He's never had an incident with another dog before. The worst that's happened is a dog that wanted to play rough with him wouldn't pick up on his cues when he didn't want to play rough and he gave him a warning snap and we immediately got him away as the other dog wasn't listening. But it was a very appropriate warning IMHO. He never went overboard, and when we went to the other side of the park he forgave the dog instantly as long as it didn't try to jump all over him.

 

However, he was attacked by someone letting their small terrier mix come over suddenly and it attacked Talon. Talon was excited at first as a small dog was suddenly next to us, I was caught off guard as I didn't see them until it was too late. The dog grabbed Talons legs as he ran away screaming. There are two small wounds on his back legs. But they are healing. Today was his foundations agility class, he knows the other dogs and he is fine with them usually. They are all crated unless it is their turn to run. He was fine with the dogs, but one, my instructors dog a cocker spaniel was brought in today. It was barking quiet a bit on and off in it's wire crate, but I didn't think of it until it was too late. Talon ran off course and went to the people, then to the dog crate with the cocker and they sniffed which was fine. When I went to pull him away as he was ignoring me, he bared his teeth started barking like crazy and just went nuts. I immediately put him in his crate for a cool down. The instructor's dog barked everyonce in a while and for the first time in the 4 weeks we've gone to this class Talon started barking in his crate. This is very unusual for him. It wasn't a nice bark either, it also had a growl in there. He'd do it every time the cocker barked. My instructor told me to throw a treat in his crate everytime the dog barked, as she thinks maybe that's what was unnerving him. So I did and he seemed ok then, didn't try to run to the cockers crate for the following two runs to the end of the class.

 

But now I'm worried that my previously fine dog is suddenly aggressive to other dogs. I obviously don't want to go to the dog park with him, as I now don't know how he would react and I don't know anyone with calm/friendly dogs around here. My sisters and family dogs live 5 hours away. I can go to the school as there are often dogs there, but there are often dogs off-leash as well. So I'm not sure that's a good idea. I just don't know how to overcome this! My trainer does NOT work with aggression issues, though she's given me a few suggestions in the past to overcome anxiety/shyness (being calm, rewarding calm behavior for looking or walking by without reacting etc), so I just don't know what to do at this point.

 

I'm mostly just feeling super frustrated and dissapointed. He was doing so well, and now he is so much worse. So any suggestions, advice, "maybe do something different" etc would be just fantastic!!

 

 

 

[gcv-border]

Others will have more complete suggestions, but here are a couple of quickies since I gotta run:

 

Regarding fear of men getting worse: It sounds like he is in his second fear stage. Continue with positive reinforcement training - having men throw treats on the ground as he walks by, if he approaches them looking for a treat, they can give a treat from hand. Keep him at a distance at first and gradually bring him closer while reinforcing calm behavior. (Some of what you have already described.)

 

Regarding barking in the crate while in class: If he is calm while the cocker is barking, I would treat that as suggested - BUT why is the instructor's dog causing such a ruckus. It needs to be better trained. On the other hand, you can take it as an opportunity to train with distractions.

 

Jovi

[Pam Wolf]

What Jovi said. However tugging excites the dog, and works against calming him. Try redirecting with food and a sit/down and redirect him from men/dogs. Counterconditioning using food works great, but if he is too fearful he will not take food. I use food with my Kelpie who is extremely reactive with dogs. He may not eat the treats but I keep shoveling them in (very tiny treats) and it has helped a lot.

[Howling Farmer]

I have been going through something similar with Tucker, who is 15 months. Yes, it is sooo frustrating and disappointing, especially when they seem to be doing better, then have a regression. ARGHHHH.

 

Emily Larlham (kikopup on Youtube) has a new DVD out called "Reactivity A Program for Rehabilitation." Her program is super comprehensive and user friendly and I'm seeing a lot of improvement in Tucker, as well as in my training abilities and understanding of dog reactivity. Her dog became reactive after a situation similar to your dog's, and she talks about it on the DVD. You can get the DVD at Tawzerdog. Unfortunately, it's not on their rental program yet, so you have to buy it. I think it's about $40 and has been worth every penny for me. You can view most of the video clips on the DVD free on Youtube, but for me it was good to have them all organized in a program. I would highly recommend it. You also might check out Grisha Stewart's B.A.T. training. A lot of folks have also had luck using Control Unleashed techniques.

 

Best of luck and hang in there.

Leslie

[Howling Farmer]

Oh -- about tugging. I agree with Pam that tugging generally works against calming, but I think there can be some exceptions. Patricia McConnell talks about this with her dog Willie. With Tucker, tugging can actually lower his arousal in some situations. He gets so worked up and tugging gives that energy some place to go, besides barking and lunging. But he is dog that, although he loves, loves tug, it is not something that sends him over the top. I actually haven't been able to use tug to effectively practice impulse control in high arousal situations because tug doesn't ever get him anywhere near being over aroused (unlike when he sees another dog or a skateboard...)

 

Leslie

[Liz P]

Your dog is in the middle of a fear period and has had several incidents that give him reason to be afraid. You can work through this, but it must be done carefully. Start with reading this article. It's important you understand the concepts for socializing a fearful dog. Above all else, he needs to trust you to never put him in harms way and to protect him from the idiots of the world.

[ArtTalKat]

Thanks for the help! I'm glad everyone thinks it's a fear period, as we can, and have, worked through those before! I'm honestly feeling much better today.

 

Also, my boyfriend took him to the dog park today while I was at school. I had no idea he was going to do that, when I got home they were gone. I didn't know until he got back. >_< But, everything aparently went super well. My boyfriend said he seemed to do just as well as he's done before, he didn't have any problems with the other dogs at all. In fact, he met two dogs on leash (bad boyfriend) and he did fine, no reactivity at all. Even though that's not what we had planned to do, I'm glad it happened. As it lesson's my fear that he's going to be terrible with other dogs. I also think I *may* know what caused the aggression with my instructors dog. The barking seems to freak him out a lot. He get's very unnerved. So for now he never meets dogs on leash, unless we know the dog (I've talked to my boyfriend about this and he agree's) and we will slowly just work on ignoring dogs when they are barking and trying to get up his confidence there.

 

gcv_border, I agree. I was not happy about the dog being there during the class, it was very disruptive. The funniest thing was it was the worst behaved dog there, some of the others were whining a bit but not like that. Well, I guess unless you count Talon's freak out. I was not very happy about the instructor lately at all. Being on your phone for the first 10 minutes of class is NOT OK in my opinion. I won't be going back. We are going to focus on obedience and socialization for now anyways and leave agility for when he's older.

 

I think we are going to sign him up for a obedience class in september, hoping his fear period will be over, and get his CGC, then do competitive obedience. If it turns out it's not a fear period and he just has issue's period, then the obedience class will help us get him around more different types of people, which we are currently having difficulty with.

 

Currently, we found throwing treats on the ground in front of him instead of just handing them to him helps him redirect his attention very well. He was able to walk by 2 different guys without even a second glance. He's not 100% or even nearly, but I can see improvement little by little, I think this is a fear period.