You are correct. Guess I should have asked the question differently. In both cases where there was a loose dog, blocked them and sent them running.

Curious when you say to turn it into a positive training situation. What suggestions do you have? Also what is recommended by counter conditioning?

Hi David, I am interested in this thread as my GSD loves people and is OK with small dogs (she passed her CGC test because the meet and great test had a small dog) but she can be aggresive to big dogs (it depends on the dog and males she is usually OK with). She used to charge the TV whenever a dog came on, but now that is getting better because now when she gets excited, I tell her to lay down and stay and it seems to calm her down. I tried the correction route and it only made matters worse, so now I give her a command and praise her for doing it and that seems to work better. The trick is to do it every time and being consistent. Like you, I am slowly getting there and I hope as she gets older the more mellow she will be.

Sandy
P.S. You have a good looking GSD!

 Quote: Sandra Vernlund

... She used to charge the TV whenever a dog came on, but now that is getting better because now when she gets excited, I tell her to lay down and stay and it seems to calm her down. I tried the correction route and it only made matters worse, so now I give her a command and praise her for doing it and that seems to work better. ....

Sandra, this is excellent, IMO. Very much like training the dog what to do when people are at the door and the dog is jumping on them, out of control: Teaching the dog what to do when the situation comes up (sit, whatever) and rewarding/praising for what you do want is so much easier and more fun than correcting for what you don't want.

It offers opportunities for praise and a good experience for both of you.

JMO.

David,

Not that you needed to word your question differently, I was just making a comment in humor.

"Counter Conditioning" is the process of conditioning the dog to a new behavior where in there is one already. For example, if your dog sees another dog and goes ballistic, the dog's reaction to the other dog will become a conditioned response that just happens without the dog even having to think about it anymore, should it get the opportunity to practice this response enough. So counter conditioning is really just conditioning the dog to respond in an alternative way.

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

Teaching the dog what to do when the situation comes up (sit, whatever) and rewarding/praising for what you do want

Would be an example of counter conditioning. When doing this, you should take every precaution possible to prevent the dog from having opportunity to further practice the behavior you are trying to diminish.

What I mean by turning the scenario into a positive training situation would be taking advantage of one of these occurrences to counter condition your dog's behavior. So, if there is a dog approaching, not minding its owner, but at least on leash, you can use this situation to help achieve your training objective. Move off the sidewalk, pathway, whatever you are on, to a distance far enough from the other dog where your dog is able to observe but not react. Once there you condition the dog to offer behaviors that are non aggressive and slowly, over time close the distance. (This is the very brief description.)

The main reason that corrections are not effective when dealing with aggression is because the correction that was given was not a hard enough correction for the dog to care. If you are unable or unwilling to administer a severe enough correction to a dog; a correction that will interrupt aggressive behavior, then don't even bother, because as you have found out already, the aggression will escalate.

Everyone, thanks! Brad, no problem on that, it was humor in how I was responding (probably didn't come across that way).

Thanks for the response on "Counter Conditioning". This is exactly what I have been doing...moving to a distance that is "comfortable" and work on either distractions, OB, or observing with no reaction. Just didn't know the term. Have been slowly closing the gap on the distance. Have had good success with this except for the 2 dogs off leash...this is where she has been out of control.

Agree on the correction escalating the aggression. Guess the more I work and understand how she is reacting and what works and doesn't the better she will be.

Again, thanks!

I have an 18 month old GSD that loves to carry a stick in her mouth (which I will eventually get to throw for her as a treat when she is good.) She is slowly getting over being fear-aggressive towards other dogs. now, when we go walking (she on a prong and DD collar) she carries 1 of her 18" long sticks in her mouth , and I carry the other. When an out of control off leash dog comes at us I step in front of her waving the stick and yelling at the offending dog in a stern voice. so far that has worked just fine as a 'dog control' item -- that and a cell phone with animal control on speed-dial..