Michelle Douglas

With the holidays rapidly approaching, keep in mind that your stress and changes in routine can have an impact on your dog's behavior.  They may "act out" if they sense our frustrations and the typical attempts to get our attention fail. This can be avoided by maintaining some of your daily routines, like mealtime and a long walk.  In addition to keeping things “normal” for Fido, also try to make sure he has a quiet retreat, like a bedroom or his crate, just in case he wants to get away from your niece who wants to play dress up or Uncle Fred’s cigars.

I recently had a client contact me to ask for some “refresher-training” suggestions for her aging dog.  Initially, she stated that her 11 year old dog, “Jenna” was experiencing some vision and hearing loss, and had bitten the behind of a worker who had come to the home.  I offered several alternative behaviors to teach and reinforce.  If Jenna can go to her “place,” or “touch” a visitors hand, she isn’t likely to butt-bite.  I also suggested that she teach the dog to gravitate to “heel” position so the owner can always be managing the interactions.

The client thanked me and said she would work on the suggestions, and then proceeded to mention that the bite happened when she was not home.  She explained that her dogs have a dog door, which gives them access to the yard, where they have an Invisible Fence containment system.

I didn’t think it was possible to introduce Nemo to a new dog.  However, the opportunity arose this weekend to see how far our training had come.  You see, Nemo is my “problem dog.”  He has had a habit of barking and jumping around in a frenzied flurry of anxiety when he meets new people or sees other dogs.  I have been slowly making progress, and he had been doing very well with visitors to my home.  So when my veterinarian called to ask for my help in placing a dog who had been dropped of by animal control (her time was up), I decided to evaluate Nemo, while checking out this “too-sweet” 6-year-old shar pei girl, who we’ve decided to call Emma. 

Well, it finally happened to me!  My dogs got skunked! It was, of course about 9:30pm, and I had just put the baby to bed. My husband was reading the 4-year-old his story and I let the dogs out into my fenced-in backyard.

This is in response to a comment asking for suggestions on how to deal with food aggression. The original question was regarding a dog who would snarl over his food bowl and snap at his owners if they approached. He was not walked and had never had any formal training.

For food-guarders, I generally put them on some version of a ‘Nothing in Life is Free’ program, with hand-feeding as the major component. Simply teaching the owners how to teach some basic cues and adding an exercise routine may make a world of difference! While each case is different, some general recommendations for food guarding include:

1) The owners need to teach (at least): eye contact, come, sit and lie down. I would also suggest targeting (touch hand with nose OR ‘paw’) and go-to-your-place.

(photo is Bailey - Lure-walking)

Leash Frustration or ‘Leash Aggression’ is a very aggressive-looking reaction to other dogs (or people) when on-leash. This comes from the feeling of frustration at not being able to freely investigate the other dog (or person). It doesn't necessarily mean that he wants to fight, but he does associate the frustrated feeling with the presence of other dogs (or people), so the aggressive behavior is directed at them. With intense frustration, there can be a loss of self control which can increase the likelihood of a bite, even if your dog is not normally aggressive.

I received another e-mail today. You know the ones with a string of adorable pictures of babies and dogs. People send me these thinking I will love the cute photos of cute kids and cute dogs. I don’t. These pictures terrify me. They usually show a stressed out or aroused dog with a child who is too close. The videos that circulate are even worse! Children and dogs should not ever be set up for a photo opportunity. This is dangerous. A stressed dog can inadvertently smother or trample a small child, or scratch or bite them to stop them from screaming (or even giggling). Dogs can hurt babies by trying to play, or just in an attempt to get away, especially if mom or dad is there telling the dog to stay! This creates a conflict for a dog: instinct urges, leave the scene, but mom says stay, so how do I get out of this?

The past few weeks we’ve been getting closer to the end of our dog, Farley’s life. He’s been having two unrelated chronic problems for almost two years. My husband and I knew this was coming, and we’ve wondered how to explain it to our three year old. Last year, Gibby went to heaven. She had cancer and Christian seemed to understand that she was sick and she went to a place where she wasn’t sick anymore. Farley has one issue, a recurring (daily) rectal prolapse, which just has become normal. Farley’s other issue is Canine Cognitive Dysfunction Syndrome, or doggie-Alzheimer’s. He has slowly been forgetting who he is and who we are. Through all of this he has stayed a calm, sweet and loving dog, just an increasingly confused one. Well, last week he began having “accidents,” forgetting to go to the door to go out. Then he began loosing his faculties, and defecating while he slept.

As we begin another New Year, I figure it is a good way to begin my new venture here on Dog Star Daily talking about new beginnings. Many folks are resolving to take better care of themselves, and some are settling in with a newly acquired puppy or dog. By now, if you gotten that Christmas puppy for the kids, you’re probably realizing that much of the responsibility for this new family member is falling to you, the parent.

Well, it is not too late to make a good start for the pup and for the kids. I would like to take this opportunity to remind parents that kids can learn responsibility and they can enjoy their doggy-chores too! It is all in the presentation.