My 2.5yr old male has pretty good temperament, overall. I can walk him through crowded street, he gets along fine with other dogs, he is good with kids. Well, almost.... This is all true until anyone comes near my house. Then hes nuts! If neighbors walk down the street (a good 40' between the street and my front door, with a hill and some trees), he jumps up and barks at the window. If hes in the yard, he paces the fence, hair up, barking like crazy, jumping against the fence. Even if they pay no attention to him and show no interest. Mail men, pizza delivery, friends coming over... its always an issues. He's damaged a few crates pretty bad while I was out paying the pizza guy or whatever.

I'm not sure where I went wrong, so I'll just explain a bit about how I got to this point. Being new to dog training, I started training him with a mix of sort of conflicting advice, mostly due to information overload from sources with conflicting goals: typical house dog advise vs working dog advice vs competition advice. I studied a lot about developing pack structure early on, and I think I did pretty well with that, despite some detractions (girlfriend who spoils him). I really wasn't sure what my goals were early on, but I was headed down the personal protection path. The group that I trained with early on was heavy French Ring, and I think I might have done a poor job separating the advice they gave him to keep his drive and confidence high and my other training towards showing restraint and obedience.

On the plus side:
He doesn't seem to have a sense of ownership to anything and gives up whatever hes playing with if I tell him 'mine'. The problem I am worried about is obviously a territorial issue, but I always viewed that as being related to ownership issues, which I took precautions early on to avoid. I was most likely wrong For the commands he knows, he follows my orders almost by habit now. He's been crate trained since he was a pup, and still lives that way with no exceptions. He looks to me for food, for exercies, for attention, pretty much for everything. Hes not allowed on furniture, even though he tries to sneak it when no one is looking, but gets off instantly on command. He had a rock biting fetish that may have been signs of an ownership issues (see a post in behavior section from last month), but I've made a lot of progress on that front. Bottom line: I'm pretty sure he views me as his pack leader.

And on the down side:
Sometimes when he has a lot of energy, but I'm too busy to play, he'll crouch down by me and bark, nudge me with his nose, etc, then run to the door when I look at him. If I ignore him, he seems a bit frustrated and mad and just keeps barking. I'm not sure if thats challenging me at all, or if I just caved one too many times and gave him attention as a result of that behavior.

He does mind me pretty well, even though he'll do things he knows will get him punished, then avoids me after hes done it. So I'm pretty sure he views me as the leader. He doesn't seem to look to me for protection, though. He really never has a reason to, as hes not threatened. While I didn't get too far into the protection work when he was younger, he was defiantly working biting a decoy's sleeve while I had him on a line. He seemed to view it more as play, than protection though. Might this stem back to some leadership issue I need to work on?

I'm not sure how to solve this. He's a pretty hard dog. I try giving him a correction when he does it, but either he evades me while going bonkers if I'm not right there, or he doesn't have his prong on half the time. I started putting him on a lead in the yard when I'm not working with him, and its helped a bit, but he doesn't hesitate to do it every time... just stops early when I restrain him (or stops when the neighbor passes out of view). I will try to make a habit of having him on his prong, but even when he does have his prong on, even with a pretty hard correction, it doesn't seem to really phase him when hes in his 'GET AWAY FROM MY HOUSE!' mode. Today a kid walked up to my fence while we were out asking for a donation for some school project, and I had to literally restrain him while giving repeated hard corrections... no good (for a good 5 minutes... the kid was persistent, despite me having my hands full). Is correction the right course of action, even though it doesn't seem to change his reaction?

I also own an e-collar, but I'm not sure about the proper usage. The DVD is on my list. Would this be a good scenario of when to use it?

Thanks!
Jason

sounds like he is taking leadership when protecting "his" house and should listen to you when you tell him to hush. I had this problem with one of my dogs so I backed up to NILIF to where the dog would look to me for permission for everything, this made a ton easier to let him know that he'd done his job by alerting me to the supposed danger and that I would take it from there (that being my privelege ;-P)

NOTE: for sport or protection work, looking to me for permeision for everything may conflict with the dogs work and inititive, Im not sure. just thought Id add that just in case thats where your headed...

I have the same problem with my dogs - not so much in the house but in my yard which backs onto a public park. I have a 5-month-old puppy, who is ALWAYS on leash, who turn into a nutcase whenever someone walks by. Nothing, not even lifting him by his cheeks, can distract him. I sympathize with you and will be watching this thread for advice too.

Glad to hear I'm not the only one

Thanks for the advice, Mary. Does anyone have an references discussing how to reinforce the NILIF approach? Even just some basic advice? To me, that seemed more like a one-person dog practice, which mine is not. I'd prefer he would be, but its just not going to happen in my case Undoing bad habits that you allowed for a long time always seems harder than starting off on the right foot. I recently got a new pup, who I see picking up some of the same behaviors, and I'm just not sure how to handle it.

Thanks again!
Jason

is it possible to seperate them? I know what you mean about the new dog picking up the behavior;I had a car chaser who ruined two other dogs of mine...
what I did with my overzealous alarm barker is (this may sound cookie, by the way ;P) when he started to bark I would go over and look at what he's barking at so he would know that I'd checked it out, just so he was clear on that, then Id put him in a down, watching me and when he started to think about the noise/person (you can tell; theyre eyes arent looking at anything and you can tell the mind has moved back to the sound) I would say "hush" and maybe correct with a snap on the leash. Id make him stay laying down because it seemed to interrupt the defensive barking mechanism, until the thing had passed. He was worst in theh car and would trample me in his excitment so this worked equally as well in the car.

Mine does the same thing too. I once put a prong and a 30 foot lead so I could correct him, but he just stood there. Didn't move at all. Sometimes I think he's smarter than me.

The only thing that calms him down is if he has his bark collar on.
I know this doesn't do anything to his total behavior. I guess that aggression is still there, but he just knows that barking will get him a correction so he's a lot more calmer. I can see that he gets anxious and is just itching to go off and start barking though.

Edited by Collin Coo (01/31/2008 04:08 PM)
Edit reason: add more

Okay Jason,
So now you have two problems, rather than one. First off the pinch collar: When the dog is in drive the pinch can and often does escalate any agression. It's even been know to happen for the dog to come back at the owner blindly with corrections when the dog is in high drive. So be care what you ask for.
You've run out of time for one dog, but you now have two? Sounds like you're moving in the wrong direction to me. Any ways, at this point you can't allow the two dogs to hang together. The older dog needs your attention and work most. The youngest needs frequent but shorter sessions. Work the OB. in the backyard where you're having the problems, the busier the street the better. When he's alone and goes barking mad , go out to him, stand beside him or behind, lay your hand on him and say 'good boy, it's okay, leave it'. If you must then put a lead on him and take him inside. Repeat as necessary. But continue working the OB. in the back yard day in day out. He'll come out of it.
So what are the plans for the little one?

Randy

 Quote: Jason Lash

Does anyone have an references discussing how to reinforce the NILIF approach?

Forgive my ignorance (again.... yeah, I know.)

NILIF?

 Quote: Jeff Brosius

Forgive my ignorance (again.... yeah, I know.)

NILIF?

NILIF = Nothing In Life Is Free

The dog's gotta work for EVERYTHING!

~Natalya

I'm having a simular territorial problem with my 18 month old dutch shepherd. Whenever someone new comes to the house she get's aggressive. With obediance I can control her on a temporary basis, but only for a few minutes at a time. I usually need to crate her in another room. Is this the right thing to do? Or is this isolating her and causing the problem to be worse? In neutral places she is very friendly with people.

Any advice would be appreciated. I'm new to dominance issues. My last dog was submissive to a fault.

Note: My dutch is a pet and agility dog, she is not used for protection.