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Is Milo an ACD mix? Help with behavior Qs

   
Lexie and- Milo

Lexie & Milo - rescue succeses!		 
 
Barked: Sun Jul 19, '09 10:28am PST 
After learning a bit more about the breed, I'm thinking that Milo may be an ACD mix.

He is about 33 lbs, dark red/brown and white; reddish spots same color as his coat on his white socks and the white parts of his face, bib and belly; white-tipped tail, lower to the ground than a standard ACD.

He has definite herding instincts. At the dog park he keeps an eye out for new dogs and crouches low in the "I'm going to herd you" position then springs into action. I think he has short dog syndrome. He is good with most other dogs except puppies and some alphas; gets very mouthy with puppies and nips hard.

He wants to herd and chase runners, people on bikes, kids on skateboards, and cats, and barks like crazy at all of them. He seems to know when said people are afraid of him or don't like him and acts worse.

He is leash-aggressive with many dogs and fence-aggressive. Lexie (my Basenji/AS mix girl) never used to bark incessantly until Milo taught her how to do it; now she fence and leash barks too.

Milo is very stubborn and didn't do well with regular obedience training. He is laser-focused on prey/anything that moves and treats don't distract him. Also if another dog is alpha and aggressive he will immediately pick up on that and escalate. If other dog is calm, he is much better.

Lately some behaviors have gotten worse -- leash aggression, have had to pull him away from puppies and some other dogs in park due to chase/rough housing getting out of hand and escalating nippiness. Inside he has gotten more turfy with my F dog and with friend's dogs that come over and has moved from being possessive of toys and food to resource guarding some of them. M

I'd welcome any thoughts, advice etc. and any helpful links re. these behavior issues or training suggestions. Btw, he is about 2.5 now; got him from a city rescue group a year ago.

TIA!

Deb

Edited by author Sun Jul 19, '09 11:32am PST

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