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Over the past two days, Fern has suddenly altered her behavior dramatically and I'm not sure how to best communicate to her that it is not appropriate. In the past she has been wonderful with other dogs, and we go to a fenced park at the same time every day to meet up with one of her best friends who has a good temperament match. She mainly will just play with one of these "best friend" dogs and will generally ignore other dogs. She has been generally very good about reading other dogs, and only plays with dogs that have a similar play style to her. Yesterday, there were few dogs around, but a large, pushy, dominant female dog came in and jumped up on me and friend dog's owner. She's seen this dog many times, and has never reacted much. This time, she ran under our bench and started baring teeth & normal threat display. Pushy dog didn't back off, so she jumped her and they got snarly for 5 seconds or so before we separated them. I interpreted this as her being possessive/defensive of me, and I stood up and walked away from her whenever the pushy dog would come near. No more bad interaction occurred.

Today, I came at the same time so she could play with her best friend. But her response to every dog was different today. If dogs got near me she would bare teeth and air snap at them. I responded with "leave it" and if she didn't immediately knock it off I had her chill out and enforced some obedience commands before I let her go. But it wasn't only possessiveness of me. If she was playing with a playmate and another dog came by to "police" them by barking or something, she would run up to them and air snap. Basically anything she could possibly interpret as a challenge, however minor, she's reacting aggressively.

This change is really dramatic for her. She is 10 months, so I am wondering if this is a temporary change due to hormones. It's like she has some newfound confidence and wants to enforce all her desires. I did leave her with a sitter for a week recently, but the first day I was back she was fine with other dogs, and showed no unusual aggressive behavior. I'm really hoping it won't continue, and not sure the best way to discourage the behavior. If this is a temporary hormonal phase, is it best to take a break from all dog-dog socialization so she can't reinforce this behavior? Alternatively, I can think of a few options I could try to teach her that the behavior does not get rewards. Option A: leave the park as soon as she shows signs of challenging other dogs, only returning after chill out period. Option B: use a clicker to reward all non-challenging interactions (but I am wary of treating because I don't know if this will make her feel more possessive due to food). Option C: continue verbal leave it commands and brief time out if she does not comply. I could also try going to the park at calmer times with few dogs in case over excitement is making the situation worse.

If anybody has experienced something similar to this, I would appreciate suggestions on what I should be doing. Thank you in advance.

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I've never raised a puppy, but my dogs preferred to play with me, and would 'share' my attention with the other 2 dogs who I owned at the time.  Groups of dogs playing and dashing around just didn't work for them. I've read here that b. collies tend to prefer this more solitary focused style, particularly as they  mature.

That's just my experience, so wait for others to weigh in.

Ruth & Gibbs

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6 minutes ago, urge to herd said:

I've never raised a puppy, but my dogs preferred to play with me, and would 'share' my attention with the other 2 dogs who I owned at the time.  Groups of dogs playing and dashing around just didn't work for them. I've read here that b. collies tend to prefer this more solitary focused style, particularly as they  mature.

That's just my experience, so wait for others to weigh in.

Ruth & Gibbs

Thank you. I have heard this as well, but at her current point she is very enthusiastic about playing with other dogs. She is good at following my commands, and will leave play if I ask her, but she would generally prefer to play with other dogs than play with me. Even today she was still wanting to play with the other dogs more, just would come in and react if one of the "ignorable" dogs came near me or did something even slightly annoying to her. Her level of reaction just went from nothing to extreme in a day, making me strongly suspect hormonal changes. But I don't know how to navigate it. If she preferred to play with me rather than other dogs, I wouldn't mind, but she has found such huge enjoyment in playing every day that it is very confusing. She has seemed to enjoy meeting every new dog, and tended to react very appropriately until now. If she was reacting appropriately to convey a desire to not interact with dogs, I would understand that, but she just seems to be going straight to a knee jerk aggressive response, even to dogs she knows very well that are not acting dominant or pushy.

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At 10 mo she may be aproaching her first season, which does bring on many hormonal changes. My Tess is not that good with some other dogs, but during season she was much much more reactive, and then it took her a couple of months to go back to normal (one of the reasons I spayed her). Even if she isn't coming into season, she's growing up. With Tess, as a pup she liked most other dogs but as she grew she became more and more selective and gets "offended" very easily. I would limit her interaction with other dogs for now and see if it's her season coming. As she grows, it might be that she grows less tolerant of other dogs, and there's nothing much wrong with that. I know my Tess will never ever be dog park material, but she does have many friends with whom she plays well. I'm just carefull with whom she interacts.

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3 hours ago, teresaserrano said:

At 10 mo she may be aproaching her first season, which does bring on many hormonal changes. My Tess is not that good with some other dogs, but during season she was much much more reactive, and then it took her a couple of months to go back to normal (one of the reasons I spayed her). Even if she isn't coming into season, she's growing up. With Tess, as a pup she liked most other dogs but as she grew she became more and more selective and gets "offended" very easily. I would limit her interaction with other dogs for now and see if it's her season coming. As she grows, it might be that she grows less tolerant of other dogs, and there's nothing much wrong with that. I know my Tess will never ever be dog park material, but she does have many friends with whom she plays well. I'm just carefull with whom she interacts.

I am wondering if she may be coming into season, given how sudden it is. I was going to wait until ~18 months to spay her, but if she has an early heat it may make more sense to do it earlier. I don't mind if she isn't super fond of other dogs, I'm just not cool with her picking fights with any dog that approaches me due to possessiveness. I know she doesn't care for rude behavior and that's totally understandable as long as she's using appropriate behavior to indicate that, as she has always done before now. If I am going to spay her earlier than intended, does it make sense to do it sooner or to wait until she settles down again after a heat?

I'm also wondering if this bout of reactiveness is just due to me leaving her with a sitter for a week. The first night I got back, she seemed very out of sorts and was super submissive. I wouldn't be super surprised if it made her more possessive of me, though I'd hate if she made a permanent change.

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38 minutes ago, GentleLake said:

There are actually studies showing that desexing dogs can increase aggression rather than reducing it. Given the other contraindications to early spay/neuter, you may want to rethink your plan.

You can do a search here for past discussions about this.

I've read a lot of these discussions in the past, which led me to think 18 months would be a better time to do it. If I stick to this plan, is there a good chance she will chill out again after going through these hormonal mood swings? I'm only concerned with what will allow her to live a happy healthy life in the long run.

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29 minutes ago, RainDrops said:

If I stick to this plan, is there a good chance she will chill out again after going through these hormonal mood swings?

It's hard to say. For one thing, there's no proof that this behavior is the result of hormonal mood swings. The cause is only speculation at this point.

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If your Fern is coming into season, it would be best to at least wait until this estrous cycle passes before you spay her.  Spay surgeries are more difficult for a variety of reasons when a bitch is in heat, and most vets strongly prefer not to spay under those conditions without some compelling reason to do so.

So, if you wait until this cycle passes, then you might as well wait three or four months after that before you have her spayed.  If her crankiness diminishes once her season is over, that would suggest that it's related to the doggy version of PMS, and you can decide how many cycles you want to put up with before you spay her.  But if her crankiness persists, that would suggest that she's just become less fond of other dogs as she's matured (and yes that can be quite sudden), and spaying may not make much difference.  That's not to say that you shouldn't decide to spay her eventually, but you can make a more informed decision about how long you want to wait. 

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