Hi all,

This question is about my 6 month old boxer again. She is very different in temperment than any dog I have ever had. I want to give her the best start on life possible. However, I am having a little bit of trouble understanding her trait combinations.

She is easily frightened, especially of loud noises.
She acts slightly nervous in new situations.
She sounds the alarm (barks) when she hears someone on our property with hair raised... looking very confident.
She gets very excited when some people come to our house, wanting them to pet her.
With others, she barks like crazy and backs away if they try to come near her.
Ocassionally she piddles when people pet her (strangers)out of excitement, I think. I am having trouble determining if it's excitement or fear/submission. It has been with people she barks at and those she's excited about. Her pidding is rather inconsistent though. It happens rarely.
She won't let me pet her head.
She is slightly food agressive. (I'm working on that)
She tries her dominance out on our JRT (who wins most the time).
She gets extreemly frightened with correction - harsh voice. (wide eyed and scared looking face and body languagge).
I use gentle correction and she looks at me in a way that says "wanna play?" this is confusing to me. It's one extreme or the other.
She doesn't enjoy much petting or affection, but will sit on me or lean on me regularly.
She is slightly aloof and detached. However if I haven't seen her in a while she curls up like a c and wiggles like crazy (it's so cute)... like she is soooo happy to see me.

I am using crate and leash training by the way.

I am not harsh with her and try very hard to be completely consistent and fair. I really want to understand her. I am not sure where some of her behaviors are rooted.

I don't want to break her spirit, but on the other hand I don't want to end up with a dominant, fear biter. I need advice on approaching corrections/training that suits her temperment.

Thanks for taking the time to read my lengthly post.
Wendy

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She is easily frightened, especially of loud noises.
She acts slightly nervous in new situations.

This is not uncommon, either in pups or adult dogs.

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She sounds the alarm (barks) when she hears someone on our property with hair raised... looking very confident.

Can you describe her "confident" body language?

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She gets very excited when some people come to our house, wanting them to pet her.
With others, she barks like crazy and backs away if they try to come near her.

The people she loves.. any similarities? Are they more calm, quiet types that don't automatically go to her? And with the people she doesn't like, any similarities you can think of? Is it only that she doesn't like them seemingly because they come at her first?

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Ocassionally she piddles when people pet her (strangers)out of excitement, I think. I am having trouble determining if it's excitement or fear/submission. It has been with people she barks at and those she's excited about. Her pidding is rather inconsistent though. It happens rarely.

Urination from excitement is more rare than submissive urination. A dog that really is just losing control of it's bladder won't squat or show any signs of peeing aside from urine dribbling or streaming out. A dog that is submissively urinating pretty much always squats, including the males. They may seem happy at the time - submission is not always fearful and indeed many times is not.

It sounds like she needs a lot of structure. It is not impossible to help her get over her fear of loud noises and new things but you need to bond and provide structure first.

How do you correct her and with what? Flat collar, choke chain, prong collar, halti, etc? How do you time the correction? Can you give an example of a situation where she became fearful from a correction and when another for when she ignored you?

For now I would limit her access to your other dog, the JRT. I can say with reasonable certainty that she is doggy. This means she bonded/bonds closer to other dogs than with you/humans in general. You say in your other post that the breeder kept the pups outside- were they all with each other and no handling from people/limited handling? Her behavior towards you is mixed, she is fearful sometimes and happy sometimes. This is not uncommon with a doggy puppy, they are often confused about human body language and show inconsistent reactions.

When she becomes fearful towards people, what is the body language of the person she is showing fear towards? Are they standing, sitting, laying, looming/leaning over her/bent over, etc

Regarding food aggression, how are you going about working on her with it, out of curiosity?

And the not being allowed to pet her on the head, does she act fearful or is she merely trying to avoid your hands, like a game?

Wendy,
After a quick search on some of your other posts, I can't find how you socialized your dog, or even if you were able to. I could have missed it.
Submisive piddling in young dogs when meeting new people and/or stuations is kinda the norm.
Have you tried corrections in a normal tone of voice? With no harshness. Given the verbal corrections BEFORE the leash and oral corrections?
Mostly though,how was she socialized?

If my dog isn't learning, I'm doing something wrong.
Randy

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Can you describe her "confident" body language?

Yes, she stands tall. Her body is firm, her head is raised and her tail is very pointed and one of her rear legs is slightly behind her other.

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The people she loves.. any similarities? Are they more calm, quiet types that don't automatically go to her? And with the people she doesn't like, any similarities you can think of? Is it only that she doesn't like them seemingly because they come at her first?

Good question. It is a mixture. However, she does tend to like women more. It seems as though she can tell if a person is really a "dog person."

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Urination from excitement is more rare than submissive urination. A dog that really is just losing control of it's bladder won't squat or show any signs of peeing aside from urine dribbling or streaming out. A dog that is submissively urinating pretty much always squats, including the males. They may seem happy at the time - submission is not always fearful and indeed many times is not.

She does not squat when piddling. She is standing. Her legs move apart just slightly.

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How do you correct her and with what? Flat collar, choke chain, prong collar, halti, etc? How do you time the correction? Can you give an example of a situation where she became fearful from a correction and when another for when she ignored you?

She usually only needs a somewhat calm verbal correction. With this she is not intimidated. I do not think that that she would receive choke chain, prong (not a chance) or the others types of correction very well (with one exception I will mention in a response below... food agression). She would get scared and "turn off." If she is doing something she is not supposed to do I say "Ah, ah." She stops what she is doing and looks at me. Then I priase her for stopping (unless it is a pack misbehavior).
The problem is correcting her for peeing in the wrong place. Ah, ah does not work. She looks at me clueless. If I raise my voice (yes, I have yelled "Ah, ah" to stop her), unhitch her leash and take her collar and lead her outside, she acts very afraid and resists.

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she is doggy. This means she bonded/bonds closer to other dogs than with you/humans in general.

Absolutely, I have mentioned this to my husband. I have tried limiting her interaction with the JRT because of this.

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You say in your other post that the breeder kept the pups outside- were they all with each other and no handling from people?

Yes, exactly.

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Her behavior towards you is mixed, she is fearful sometimes and happy sometimes. This is not uncommon with a doggy puppy, they are often confused about human body language and show inconsistent reactions.

OK, that is very helpful info.

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When she becomes fearful towards people, what is the body language of the person she is showing fear towards? Are they standing, sitting, laying, looming/leaning over her/bent over, etc

Bent over her, mostly.

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Regarding food aggression, how are you going about working on her with it, out of curiosity?

I use the DD collar technique. I CALMLY say no and lift her front feet off of the ground and hold her there for a short period of time. It has almost completely cured it.

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And the not being allowed to pet her on the head, does she act fearful or is she merely trying to avoid your hands, like a game?

Definitely not scared. Just avoids it with all persistence like she doesn't like it and won't tolerate it. No fear involved.

Thank you for your respons. Hopefully, I did the quote thing right so that my response won't be too confusing.

Soft, nervey, defensive, skittish and sensitive. That about sums it up.

soft... agree,
nervey... yes, I think so (hopefully temporary).
defensive... not so sure I agree. Perhaps you can explain yourself more.
skittish??? ""
sensitive... same as soft to me.

Now what? Do you have any suggestions along with your diagnosis?
Thanks

Wendy - you did great! It took me months to figure out the multiple quote thing.

When she pees, does she move her legs apart and then pee, or just happens to have her legs apart, and pees? She might not completely squat but any lowering at all of the hind end, even an inch, shows it's more intentional and not just losing bladder control.

With people leaning over her, that is very very common. Dogs that are raised without human contact and only interact with other dogs interpret human body language the way they would body language from another dog. Leaning over her is dominant body language, if she seems to become fearful she is trying to appease this dominant person, if she becomes aggressive or just barks and avoids them she is essentially disputing this persons attempt at being dominant.

Has she been through any Obedience training?

What is your body language when you go to grab her after going potty in the house? Are you angry at all? Do you loom over her when you grab her collar and hunch over when you hold onto her collar and wind up dragging her?

The housebreaking issues can be from unclean conditions as a pup - does she soil her crate at all? What do you use to clean up the messes with? Is it always one area, or randomly throughout the house?

I would keep a lead on her at all times and not just go to put one on her when she makes a mistake. Tethering her to you would also be good as she is always right there and you do not have to approach her to correct her. With the Ah-Ah not working for her going in the house, do you only use Ah-Ah as a correction and not the word no? You can also try clapping your hands to get her attention and then say a very firm Ah-Ah or No, and immediately taking her outside.

For the food aggression, the use of the DD collar is effective - are you using a DD collar, choke chain, flat collar? Are you only correcting her while she is at the food?

How does your normal every day feeding time go? (I.E. you just give her the food bowl, or you make her sit and then give her the food, or you put the food down, make her sit and then let her eat, etc.. is she super excited, nervous, or ?)

Maybe not hopeless though Mike.
She seems to recover okay.

Randy

in young pups.