Can you please help me? I'm very desperate. My German Shepherd ?mix?, Dimitri is becoming a problem. He is a barker, and a fear biter. I am aware that GSD are natural watchdogs. I rescued Dimitri from our local shelter, he was about 3 months old, I have had him for 8 months. He didn't appear to be people aggressive when I got him from the shelter. My neighbors started to complain about his barking, so I purchased a No-Bark collar. I ended up putting it on its highest setting before too long. It would cause him to yip sometimes, and other times not at all. I became curious and put the collar around my arm, and thumped it while making a loud noise. OUCH! Even on the lowest setting it hurt, and I wasn't about to try it on the highest. I had noticed that he would bark and run towards strangers acting aggressive, when I let him out, or he would bark, and growl when people walked pass the car. My friend one day reached in through the car window to pet him, and he started growling, letting out loud yips, and snapping. He managed to bite her finger, he didn't break the skin. He is fine around my family, and my friends 17 month year old child. When I took him to get fit for a muzzle so that I could take him out and introduce him to people, the woman noticed that he would bark then retreat. She said something about a low self-esteem. She said that I should try playing tug-of-war and letting him when, and she also recommended that I buy a prong collar. Do you believe that will actually help? After the No-Bark collar I house trained him and let him stay in. He knows sit, come, touch, down, and hug, and he is very good about taking baths. However he gets distracted very easily so I have to work on it. What do you recommend about the biting, and how can I get him used to other people.I did not rescue him from the Humane Society, for him just to end up in another. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Mary,

Sounds like you are dealing with a difficult problem. The best advice I can offer you for socializing your dog is finding a group of sympathetic people who are not afraid of dogs and know how to deal with aggression, which is not that easy. Your dog perceives every stranger he meet as a threat and is trying to chase them off. More often than not a stranger will recoil in fear at the display of aggression, which only reinforces the dog's behavior. Or they may stare at a dog, which may put him in more defense. It would be great if you could find a local Schutzhund club where people would be kind enough to let you come and socialize your dog.

Other than that, I would put a muzzle on the dog and find a large crowd of people to walk him through. The sheer number of people may prevent him from zeroing in on anyone in particular, he will become sort of "overloaded" and hopefully, eventually will learn to ignore people. It would help if prior to that you teach him to focus his attention on you, with a ball on a string, or a tug, for example. If you need to correct him with a pinch collar, don't overdo it, use it more as a distraction to bring his attention back to you than punishment. Don't try to do too much too quickly, it's a very slow process, and you may never succeed completely. In which case you'll just have to learn to live with it or, in the worst-case scenario, put the dog down--often that's the price we have to pay for being kind-hearted <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> .

This dog is a result of terrible genetics which is at the root of his horrible nerves and fear. Socializing in public is fine but like Renee said, muzzle this dog when you take him out in public. He has already bitten someone and he will bite again in a similar situation. The only thing to do is to obedience train the dog with a prong collar. Read Ed's article on shy dogs and fear biters. In addition to obedience training, this dog needs to know that it is absolutely unnacceptable to show aggression towards anyone. This will require severe prong collar corrections. If you can't do this, put the dog down. He will bite again, its only a matter of time. Only next time, it could be the face of that 17 month old child you spoke of.

One other thing, letting the dog win at tug of war will not accomplish anything. If the answer was that simple then we could save a lot of dogs from being destroyed. Be a firm leader with the dog. The goal is to get this dog focused on you as his "pack leader". The dog will take comfort in letting you be in charge. This dog does not have the genetics to be self confident so he must rely on you to show what confidence and leadership is.

Some big mistakes have been made handling this dog. I don't think a dog as young as 3 months old should have been left in the yard unsupervised. First, that allows him to claim the yard as his territory (poor leadersip on the human's part), and second, it encourages alarm barking, which is completely natural behavior. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Next, because of his alarm barking, a no bark collar was used, which was later found to be painful. If the dog alarm barks at a stranger, then gets a painful correction, would he not begin to associate the stranger with the pain (barking and then retreating is indicative to me that he's expecting a correction)???? Would that not reinforce his distrust? It's my understanding that no-bark devices are not meant to discourage alarm barking, but rather, to discourage excessive or inappropriate barking.

To me, it seems like this dog's fear was unintentionally reinforced by Mary's attempts to keep him quiet (and keep the neighbors at bay). In other words, it is only partly genetic, and a great deal learned. Now, perhaps Dimitri isn't the most stable of dogs, but I have a pretty strong hunch that had he been handled differently, there would certainly have been a very different outcome.

Secondly, to reach your arm into the car with a dog that is known to be distrustful is not very bright. Dimitri was basically set up. What else was he going to do? His hand (or paw, as it were) was forced.

I strongly disagree that Dimitri needs severe prong collar corrections. You should only give fair corrections, and since it's my belief that Dimitri has been taught this behavior, a correction would not be fair.

I do agree that Mary needs to show strong leadership, and give Dimitri the security that he lacks through her own example. But I don't think that punishing him for what she has taught him would be fair. I think it should be a more gradual, psychological process involving socialization and tons of rewards for being "nice". Maybe later on prong corrections could be added, once it has been made clear to him how he is expected to behave. But I think it would be a huge mistake to jump on that bandwagon immediately. I think things will go down the tubes if she handles it that way.

Chuck, nice to see you back, but sorry, I have to side with J, who filled the blanks very nicely. Thank you, J.

First of all Dimitri is not left outside at my home, he is only out, if I am there with him. Even if I just run inside to answer the phone, he just barks and runs the fence. I go to my mother's house to help out, and it is about a 100 mile drive. Because of alergys Dimitri was not allowed to stay in. The bark collar was bought when I was at my mothers for about a week. the next door neighbor is a light sleeper, the bark collar hardly ever worked, and I ended up going home early.
Second my friend Trina, the one that was bitten, has been around Dimitri a lot, and the only time he has showed aggression towards her was that day in the car.
He has shown aggression towards neighbors who are outside when I take him out to go potty, and when "strange people" atleast to him have come into my homeSecondFirst

A dog who has a barking problem at 3 months of age would have to be considered a dog with lousy nerves. I don't totally agree with the idea of making this pup a "victim". Yes, a victim of poor genetics and I do agree that putting a no bark collar on a 3 month old pup and putting it on the highest setting certainly dosen't make matters any better. However, I don't think we can totally blame Mary and Dimitri though for a dog that is far from sound. We can psyco-analize this a million ways but the bottom line is the dog will bite again if it isn't taught that agression will not be tolerated. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Sorry, but Dimtri was more around 6 months. The neighbor hadn't complained till then, he had just moved in a few days ago.

Even still, 6 months is still young for this kind of "alarm" barking. If this dog was sound, a week at your mothers would not screw him up to the point of fear agression(unless of course the pup was attacked by someone or another dog). I do understand JParker's point that the bark collar may have confused the dog into thinking that whoever he was barking at was attacking him. But lets not forget what came first. it was the barking at strangers at a very young age which indicates an insecure dog with weak nerves. The only thing I will say on the dogs behalf is that we can only go by what you are telling us. How bad was the dog barking? Was the neighbor being unreasonable? I guess to be totally fair, these are things that aren't really known by us. You did say that the dog seemed fine when you first got him.

Ok Renee, my soft side is starting to emerge!lol <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />