 Barked: Thu Aug 16, '12 12:03pm PST |
 | |  | | I am struggling with the same thing with my dachshund. His name is Milo. Sometimes I refer to him as "Mr. Milo." lol. Milo's aggression is all based on fear. He was an extremely shy puppy, and not long after turning one, he started showing signs of aggression.
I hired a trainer/dog whisperer to help with dog aggression. We have worked on getting Milo past his fear of other dogs and people. Since the training, things have improved, but we are still working on it. I'll share what steps I go through to help with the aggression. Hopefully that will help others as well.
When we go on walks, I use a micro pinch collar rather than a regular collar. Dogs respond to your control when the collar is around their neck (no body harnesses!) When I see signs of aggression building (tail goes up, ears perk up, chest out, and alert/focused on target), I give a jerk on the collar quickly before he escalates into full blown aggressive barking mode. This stops him before he gets out of control.
Also, you can give his body a lite tap with your foot when he starts up. This takes his attention off his focus of being aggressive for a second. Sometimes that helps.
In addition, Milo is aggressive towards children because he is never around them. So when I go home for Christmas, around my young nephews, I need to address his aggression. My trainer told me the only way to get him past his fear of children (and the aggression that goes with it), is to put him in the situation safely so he can get over it.
To do this, we put a muzzle on him and let him run around the kids. We let the kids know he may bark, but he cannot hurt them. They found it funny. Especially the way the dog looked with the muzzle. It was funny.
After a bit, Milo settled down with the kids. No problem with aggression. He was snuggling with them and let them pet him no problem. We will keep the muzzle on though as a precaution even though he seems ok with them now.
Another great point to note, is do not let the dog sleep with you in your bed at night. Or in your room. He becomes more protective of you that way when you are around others. Because I am female and my dog is male, the trainer said he looks at me as "his female."
You have to keep putting your dog in the situation that makes him aggressive (say walking past another dog on a walk), and correct him BEFORE he gets into full blow aggressive mode. The repetition of correction him over and over, will teach him that, that behavior is not ok.
In my experience, it is not super easy to fix this problem. However, doing the above steps has helped a whole lot, and has made my life easier.
I hope this post helps!
Best,
Joy
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