Hi. I know there are many posts on " Dominance" but wanted to get opinions.
Lately my 3 yr old male GSD has started to give a low growl at certain times when my 3 yr old son comes close to him. Now this only happens when I am around and the dog is near me.
My son is VERY well trained and well behaved around the dog. He is also closely supervised around the dog at all times.
I tend to believe this is dominant behaviour but my question is suggested correction for this. Right now I grab his collar and give it a strong yank with a "NINE" in a strong tone with direct eye contact. The growl continues. Usually I then put him in his crate to control his "freedom" a bit. Today after the correction I firmly, gruffly said "get down stairs". He went and fully hackled , growled as he walked away. I would love any thoughts on either to "escalate" the correction or what? Could this be nerves ? I can give more info if it would help.

Read the article I wrote on Preventing Dog Bites in Children - you need to make some changes in how you live with this dog before your child gets dog bit.

http://leerburg.com/articles.htm

Quote:
Right now I grab his collar and give it a strong yank with a "NINE" in a strong tone with direct eye contact. The growl continues. Usually I then put him in his crate to control his "freedom" a bit. Today after the correction I firmly, gruffly said "get down stairs".

*****
what kind of collar?

I presume not a prong since you grabbed it. This is not a smart way to administer a correction for aggression.

If your dog is dominant this is not a strong correction and seems unlikely to change his behaviour.

I had good luck stopping growling in a dominant cattle dog that "spilled over" from growling at another dog to growling at my toddler. I used a prong, a drag collar, and two well timed corrections that my acd has not forgotten, as well as much more obedience. The corrections made an acd yelp. he is not sensitive to pain.

But I still only allow outside, minutely supervised interaction with my son that the acd clearly enjoys. The game is usually "fetch" in which my son throws a toy while my dog is in downstay, and after the throw I release the dog to get the toy. All of us have gentle fun. No direct contact between dog and baby.

Your dog seems more possessive or protective of you, which seems to be a larger more serious problem.

Ed's articles were very helpful for me in "re-orienting" my thoughts on how to live with my dog. It has been good for family and the dog. Unnecessary stress and risk removed. Babies sleep and that is a good time to enjoy this dog of yours.

My advice: take Ed's advice.

rgds andrew may

rgds andrew may

I have read Ed's article a few times before. And I agree that the correction needs to be with a prong.
The reason I did not have one on him was that this is very new behaviour and has only occurred a few (3) times.
I will keep the prong on him , I will be giving him a level 15 correction , and he will not forget it.
I am not new to GSD's but have always had females. This guy has been slow to mature but I thought that any major dominant behaviour would have been visible around 18-24 months. Guess not.
I feel confident that I will rectify this but I greatly appreciate the points of view and advice.