I hijacked a thread yesterday about this. Sorry!
We have a four year old boxer Louie. He was a rescue so his history is foggy. But we do know that he was locked in a room and not feed. When we got him he was 40 or so LBS. Now he is 61#.
He has snapped at people at the vet and at petsmart. It always happens when people are reaching in toward his face. ie to pet him or take his collar off, or god forbid look at his ears. He is a very nervous dog at places like petsmart and the vets. It's very stressful for me as well.
He has a fear of loud places like near the city street where we live. If we go one way he's fine if we go another way by the stores and stuff he's all nerved out.
He has jumped fences that are not mine. Like we take him to a playground to run and he has been so good up till yesterday. He saw a person walking by and jump the fence to chase them off. I see when we walk that he watches people and does lunge at them from time to time. Not every person so I can't tell if it's a type or not. This seems to be getting worse I think because I'm scared to go by people.
The other fence that he jumped was my friends house after a dog. Now when we go there he is on a leash.
I feel like we can't do anything. Cant go to the dog park can't go where there are people...aaagh. I'm so sad.
I've been doing what I can to take the leader of the pack.
They don't eat now before the walk we walk first. We are not letting them tell us it's time to eat. They eat when they are calm. While we eat they stay in down or at lest sit.
He will sit and get down when I tell him, like during a walk or before I feed them.
Oh, we have two boxers, Sophie is our girl. She is dominate over him in the house. Her way of pushing us around is walking slow or not keeping up. Louie lets her do anything she wants to him.
Getting people into our house is an issue. Sophie is the barker and Louie follows. I have to meet people outside and walk them in because I'm afraid that Louie will bit them.
I wanted a dog I could take everyplace and that would love people. He loves me and is a sweet heart at home. But will I ever trust him?

Jennifer,

I think you need to alter your expectations for Louis. This can be a tough thing to get over, but you need to get over it. THis will NEVER be a dog that you can take anywhere and do anything with. HOWEVER, I do think that dogs like this can make GREAT improvemnts and fit into your life with some CLEAR expectations and boundries.

Use a muzzel at the vet. Never take this dog to Pet Smart or the dog park and stop letting people pet it asap. DO not let him run around in a playground off leash. You have to back WAY up.

You have goten the good acvice on reading everything you can on this site. DO not delay. The pack leadership stuff you are doing is a great start. THere will be corrections involoved in this dog's life, I will let others speak to that. With a fearful dog, this can be tricky and corrections MUST BE FAIR, to keep trust between handler and dog strong. THis can be difficult for an inexperienced handler (or an expereinced one!)

Please tell me this dog is either toy or food motivated? I would work at making this dog food motivated ASAP. A nervous dog needs to learn to TRUST you as a pack leader. Motivational learning will have a lot to do with that IMHO. They need to learn that YOU will keep the dog safe and make deceisions concerning the safety of the pack. Louis needs to learn that YOU will protect him, he does not need to get defensive and take matters into his own hands. Ultimatley, you want the dog to look at you when it is scared, deffering the protection of the pack to you. You build the dogs trust buy earning it. You earn it through training. THe training is a slow process that will involve great leaps forward and frustrating steps backwards.

Recognize that it will probably NEVER be okay to have strangers pet this dog, and he may always have to muzzeled at the vet. However there is probably LOTS of room for improvement.

Are you willing to accept that this dog will not be the one you always dreamed of? Are you willing to protect the public form your dog and your dog from the public? Are you willing to change the way you think about what a pet dog should be? Are you willing to make your fence higher, buy a crate, spend a lot of time training, maybe spend some money on a trainer reccomended by folks here?

Sorry more questions than answers. Be ready for varying opinoins from everyone from the dog folk on this board, to your friends and family. You are in the RESEARCH phase of working with this dog now. THere will be a lot of stuff to sort through....

Jennifer Coulter makes some good points there. Sometimes there are dogs who are just too late to be the "perfect dog" you can take everywhere. That's ok though, I'm sure Louis has some other amazing qualities, other "perfect dogs" don't. I know of many people who have dogs with "quirks" and live extremely happy with some minor adjustments. I hope you can be one of those people and give Louis the best life he can have. Also, read Ed's e-book on dog parks. I'm sure that is adding to his problem as well.

As a quick replay to the dog park. I've not taken him and have known for a while that I can't take him. I was just stating that fact.
Yes I'm willing to work on things. Or I would not be here on this site.
We do have a trainer coming to the house this week.

Sorry, I had not intended to be rude.

How much obedience does the dog have. Have you played the focus/attention game? Is there a threashold distance you can walk by strangers and you know the dog will not act out? Can you call for the dog's attention and reward it when you walk by people to avoid the dog focusing on the stranger?

Does the dog have a crate or room that it is used to that you can put the dog in when people come over? Could you train the dog to wear a muzzel?

Does the dog growl at you when you check its ears, take off the collar, go to pet it? Or is it just strangers? Have you workded at desensitizing the dog to these kinds of things (starting with you and your pack)?

If the dog is truely shy/fearfull with a questionable past, being very predictable can be very helpful in building trust. If the dog knows what is about to happen, they can be less fearfull (if the outcome will be positive or neutral). Have you thought of teaching a command like 'pets' that will let your dog know that it is about to be petted, so it knows what to expect? This is not a command for strangers to pet your dog though.

Hope the trainer goes well, where you able to get some references from folks that have had similar issues as you? It is a tough problem you have going. Sounds like you are committed though! Nice one.

There are others hear that have experience taking in older dogs with "issues". Hopefully they will add some advice. (might be very different form mine) You are looking for whatever works!

Cheers,

With me I can do just about anything with him. Check the ears, play with his face. Even do his anal glad deal..yuck!

With his attention I have a hard time when we are outside of the yard keeping his attention. Once he finds something he wants to keep his eyes on. Yes, I can walk a safe distance away from people but that gets a little tricky since we live in the city.

At home he listens to me very well. Get down off the bed, come here, lay down, Stay, Sit. I can roll him over and play with him on his back.
The only time he ever growled at me was around his food. So for a while I had him eat from my hands then eat while I was holding his bowl. Now I do that once in a while to keep him aware that I'm safe. When he did growl it was as I was walking by and touched him on his back while eating. I've not done that in a while. We do make him lay down before eating. This past week we started to realize that it was time to stop letting the dogs tell us when it was time to eat. So they have to be calm before we feed them. It's really powerful how they wait and will do just about anything to get feed.
Also, with walking I have him stay at my side. No pulling and I stop from time to time and have him sit. He gets really scared in certain areas so I've been trying to go to these places when he is more tired.
OK, I'm at work will get back later.
Thanks,
Jen
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