My GSD can be dog aggressive. She has never bitten another dog, just kinda slobers on them. She's always been very dominant and even tried to hop on top of a huge Rottweiler, when she was just a four-month-old pup. Last night, I let her out the back door(we have a fenced in back yard), and she took off flying. It was dark but I could hear her growling and something else hissing. I got a flashlight and happened to see a large raccoon climbing the fence. I called my dog back and checked her over. She wasn't hurt. So I went to find the raccoon and saw it in the crook of a small tree. It was obviously dying. This has upset me and I'm wondering if my dog has become dangerous. Some of the people at my dog club have told me that she can't be trusted(She's one of only three GSD's that take classes there) At our last class, a dog growled and went for her first, but she was blamed for being the aggressor. We're in the advanced classes, so all of our work is off lead. There are quite a few of the other handlers that don't keep there "little foo foo dogs" under control and are either making their dogs jump up into the air or do spins while we are working and I'm so nervous that my dog might go after the other dogs and this of course causes my dog to become nervous too. I have gone back to keeping my dog on lead between exercises. She's not people aggessive. Am I being overly concerned, or should I keep her away from other dogs altogether?

Becky,
How old is your dog? What kind of training are these classes, OB or socializing? Or a bit of both? Compulsation or positive reinforcement? How long have these classes been going on? And lastly what is the daily routine for training, exercise, and the dogs place in the family?
Prey drive is prey drive......It doesn't make a dog dangerous.
Rank drive doesn't make a dog unmangable.
Take heart, they are both keys to your dogs inner workings you can use to shape the behavior you want.
You'll have many more questions to answer, but the people here will do their best to help you out. Believe me though, your dog is not dangerous; he can be, if allowed to get out of hand, but coming here is a good first step in preventing that.

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

Hi Becky,
You were lucky to be able to call your dog away from a coon fight, which to me shows you have control over your dog. Younger coons are not that dangerous to dogs and will usually scramble up the nearest tree but adult racoons have been known to kill dogs. In the water, adult racoons are downright lethal to dogs and can drown them quickly.

My GSD just had a short scuffle with one yesterday during a search. We were checking out a debris pile and she flushed one out. We were lucky it was a young one that took off for a tree when I called Shadow back. We checked Shadow over for any injuries and she was able to get back to work. Shadow was dog aggressive also but as she gets older and with training and socialization she has gotten much better. I am sure the people on this forum will help you with the specific steps you should take.

Do you also have woodchucks and badgers in your area? Badgers can be very nasty also.

My dogs will go after rodents, opposums feral cats and other preylike animals but this has nothing to do with being aggressive, IMO. Its dogs nature and a totally different Drive, like Randy said. I like it my dogs, as long as I can call them away when I choose.

My GSD is a five-year-old female. Since the incident with the Rottweiler, people haven't allowed her to socialize with their dogs.In their defense, she is an intense dog, and has charged other dogs when they became too close to us. The dog clubs I belong to are your basic obedience, agility, and confirmation clubs. We're traing for our CDX and UD. She's my first shepherd I have trained for competition, so I'm learning along with her. I have used a mixture of training methods and that can be part of the problem.

My dogs LOVE to chase raccoons, one is dog aggressive, the other not. I am quite confident it is prey drive. They killed a very young animal a few years ago, and are crazy to catch another.

Becky, there is a lot of misunderstanding about "socialization" for a dog. A better fitting word may be "exposure". You see, you need to EXPOSE your puppy/dog to as many things to shape and mold the behavior you want the pup/dog to display in those situations. Exposure and interaction are two different things as well. Just because you are exposing your dog to other situations does not mean that you must allow interaction to take place. In fact, sometimes interaction is a roadblock! These classes sound like a great place for distraction proofing, and I would treat them as such - and not allow any interaction at all. Not because of YOUR dog, but because it sounds (from what has been said) that the dogs in the class, while well trained in tricks and crowd pleasing antics, are actually not very well disciplined from a respect/leadership issue. Sometimes the cute tricks done on cue with the right amount of bribery make it SEEM like the dog is well rounded and balanced, but in reality they are not even CLOSE. From what you have described, it sounds like the dogs that are in question are not really the best dogs to allow for interaction with anyway. Trust your instincts to figure out proper interactions with dogs you KNOW are solid on OB work and save play time for with them only. Use the classes to mold the behavior you want under distraction, and no interaction. Just make sure that you are ready to prevent dogs that run up to YOUR dog from getting close. Again, not because of YOUR dog, but because you must protect your dog from unwanted and unappreciated obnoxious dogs. Once your dog is able to see that you will keep the unwanted attention away, he *should* start to allow you to deal with other dogs without trying to assist you. Training a solid sit-stay or down-stay is instrumental here.
As for the racoon, well that is something different. Prey drive and dog aggression are two different things. The recall from the prey item was awesome, and pretty close to what you hope for and train for in a perfect world situation. I'd take a little pride in the fact that the recall was spot on and the dog released it's prey item on command is great. It's unfortunate that it happened, but it is something that happens sometimes. Keep it in mind, but move on.

Killing a coon and being dangerous seem so TOTALLY unrelated.

My service dog has killed many bunnies, possums, birds, moles and always on the watch for the unaware cat or kitten.

This is what you call their natural instinct. My boxer is incredible with people. She tolerates dogs if she has her vest on. When she is off duty she is all dog. Nothing she likes better than the hunt. Oh I forgot she also has killed a canadian goose. SHE IS A DOG.

Just wanted to second (third? fourth?) what has already been posted about prey drive, aggression towards other dogs, and aggression towards people being quite separate and unrelated. Catching a raccoon does *not* mean your dog will become dangerous towards other dogs or people (she might want to go after another raccoon, though, now that she's discovered it's fun!) Our old Airedale mix has chased and sometimes caught critters any time he was allowed to for all of his 13 years - rabbits, muskrats, squirrels - but he has never shown the slightest hint of aggression towards other dogs or people.

Becky,
Alot of people here could care less if their dog ever (as in, never) interacts with another dog. And it sounds like you've come to terms with that concept. How long ago did the dog lunge toward another dog, and is she still doing it? If so, wouldn't that make a CDX title a bit of a stretch? If I remember rightly, isn't distraction/off lead work is part of the CDX criteria?
Here here, on the recall from the caught prey! Well done! I know mine wouldn't break it off in the middle of a fight. Maybe in another 2 or 3 years lol.
Where in the world did you come up with the idea she was a danger now? Have you bought into the old wives tale about first taste of blood? I don't want to put you off, but LOL.......Becky, it really is an old wives tale.

So Becky, is dog agression an on going problem?
It sounds like you're having a grand time with your dog otherwise.

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