having Rank issue is likely to be the case but now more weird thing are happening as he now enters his 18th month and the teenager period.
As of the last couple of days he is starting to do crazy things that I have never seen a dog do.
A description of our play session goes like this.
I throw the kong for him , he goes after it like mad, pounces on it , grabes it, shakes it like mad, as if trying to kill the kong, struts (no better word for it) with the kong a couple times around the yard, drops the kong, then proceeds to pee on it as if marking it as his. Finally he brings it back to me, but shakes it violently as he reluctantly brings it to me. After this we can proceeded to playing as usual.
So what is up with this? Is this dog just plain crazy!
Other issues that are now surfacing
He is starting to take roughhousing around to seriously and gets carried away to the point of growling (rather a play growl than one of agression). He has become very violent in playing , even with the other dog in the house.
If I give him the command of gentle he will calm down,
Like I said before, if he were human, I would say he was someone that took everything too seriously and had no sense of humor.
As for dealing with his agression/dominance toward other dogs, I am dealing with it by putting him in a down/stay which seems to work. So the moment he starts dominating another dog such as at the vet, I put him immediately in a down/stay. all agression stops when I do this.
Any correction I give him is challenged by him as stated in prior post. Now that I have school and I am not spending as much time with him or at home, it seems that he starting to challenge and try to dominate members of the family (stealing food etc). I am assuming this new thing of peeing on the toy is all part of this. This breeder did say he would be a handfull. Now I see what she meant

Philippe,
I, too, have a dominant male that pees on his Kong. I always try to keep the garden hose handy. :rolleyes:

How do you respond when he challenges you?

well when he challenges me after a correction I follow it with another correction.

Incredible that another GSD pees on his kong.

Can you be more specific about the type of correction you are giving? Verbal reprimand, prong...? It sounds like maybe he just doesn't have much respect for you (or your corrections). I suspect that your family members aren't doing much to curb his behavior while you're away, too, and he thinks he's in charge of the entire household.

Mine was also an alpha of the litter, and, like yours, he tends to be very dog aggressive. I simply don't let him interact with strange dogs, so that's not much of a problem for me. In the last year or two, the playing between him and my other male has also gotten rather carried away (like you describe with yours)... so there is simply no roughhousing allowed and they are never outside together unsupervised. I have also found that giving him something else to take his aggression out on (he has a large Jolly Ball, not the kind with the handle, but the rigid plastic one) helps a lot and keeps him occupied for hours, attacking it. The ball is much the worse for wear, but better it than me or my other dog. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

I also constantly remind him that I am the one in charge - long down-stays, having to work for everything, obedience work EVERY day, using a deep voice for commands, all of these things make living with a dominant dog bearable. If he challenges me (as he does every six months or so, although it's getting pretty half-hearted now), then I up it a notch for a few weeks.

Also, without turning this into a kennel vs. house debate... if my dog had the nerve to steal food off my plate, he wouldn't even be allowed in the house. The more freedom and privileges dominant dogs are allowed, the worse they get. What about putting him in a down-stay in the corner when you're at the table... or, better yet, not even allow him in the room when you're eating, period.

P.S. mine will only let go of his Kong for two reasons: if I tell him to out, or if he wants to pee on it.

well minor things a verbal scollding is all that is needed. he is not always wearing his prong collar (only on outings or when doing obedience work) so at time he needs a a correction of more than verbal grabbing him at the gruff and giving him a shaking/scolding is the case. those two methods I ended up with a f... you expression from him. A strong correction with a pinch collar will in most cases end up with his trying to retalitate by trying to bite me, this in turns ends up with an even stronger correction from me at which time he then submits.
As a side note be carefull with the hard jolly balls. the GSD I currently have has chipped all 4 canines on one and my prior GSD wore down all his canines. I have taken it away since I discovered it was the culprit for chip his cannines. When he was little he had a smaller jolly ball. He was so violent with it that he broke 7 baby teeth playing with the boomer ball. So be carefull with boomer balls

I think OB is the key, it good to teach the long down stay as a punishment or to control the dog after the fact. But you really need a command that will stop or make him leave things alone (whatever it is) before or while he's doing it.

The entire house hold needs to know this command (really all his commands should be practice by the entire family). But the command I use to control eating food off the ground while hiking on or off leash is "Leave it". It does not have to be the same command, butit should mean the same.

It could be a porter house steak on the ground if I say "leave it" he or they will turn away, maybe look over their shoulder as they turn away. But the point is they leave the food or stuff along.
This is important because if it was poison like spilled anti-freeze, they would leave it alone.
If learned it could solve the dog taken food from family memebers.

Like its been said on this board, most the problem that dogs have stem from their owners. I'm not cracking on you, because in truth we really want a strong confident, maybe rank dog. But we want to be able to control him, somewhat it will be give an take, but when you say so.
<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

yes I too have taught him the leave it command. He always disengaged in what he was after, be it dog, cat, or food. Now we have entered a phase in which he ignors the command, even basic obediance is becomming a problem. Basically he is rebelling at anything he is being told. This results in firm corrections, which at times will result in his attempting a bite back, then another even stronger correction. Afterward he will show submission to me for several hours, byt that i mean he will try to lick my lips (as I have seen dogs do to dominant males when they show submission). I hope that in time his rebellion will settle down. Yes lots of obedience work is the key.

Phillipe,
I can't see from your posts if you have had this dog from a puppy but I gather that this is a house dog rather than a kennel dog.
I may be off target here but 12 months ago we rescued a Male neutered 4 year old White GSD. When we picked him out we thought he was deaf as he would not look at us- however, we decided to take him on. He was not deaf and just decided not to look at us
He jumped into our vehicle and walked into our home like he owned the place. Within a day he would growl at us if we walked passed him. He was O.K. with our other 2 dogs. This is a long story as we had 5 weeks of hell with this dog. We took him to see an expert in GSD behaviour and it was a dominance problem. We changed tactics:
We ate first ( even if was only a biscuit)
Dog had to sit before being allowed out to the garden.
If dog growled walk away and no eye contact
If dog demanded petting just ignore only pet when we decided to.
He was a long coated dog so grooming was becoming a problem - apparently when he was taken into the shelter he was so matted he could hardly walk. I s'pose his previous owners were too frightened to go near him.

He was O.K. with strangers and friends coming into the house as they were passing through and no challenge to his dominance.
We took him to our local pub twice and the first time everyone could pet him - the second time he started taking over and was growling and lunged at a child that came over to him.
It got to the stage where we weren't allowed to pet our other dogs without him growling.

The behaviourist did warn us that the dog may understand what our new tactics were and decide to escalate his aggression. Sure enough that is what happened. He started taking over certain rooms in our house and not letting us in. The last night we had him here he challenged my husband - fortunately my husband is 6ft 3inch and strong and was able to win the fight - but we couldn't live like that.
The dog was destroyed the next day as the shelter could not have him back as he could not be rehomed. He was an accident waiting to happen- kids loved him and wanted to cuddle him as he looked like a big white teddy bear.
It broke our hearts as we did love him - seemed to me we couldn't reason with him.
I think a lot of it was bad breeding/bad genetics- he was bred for the white long coat- nothing else mattered. We have been told by several experts that we could have had this dog from a puppy and he would have still turned out the same.
Get all the help you can as problems with these dogs can escalate - be very very careful if you have children in the house.
Sorry if this is a bit doom and gloom but I do know what you are going through.

Gwen

Gwen
That was sad.

Phillpe
I think you need to start proofing the dog, give the command, if he ignores it correct him, then the command again. I think you have tried this after reading your thread.

I'd start over in your OB training, use treats or a toy he likes. Slowly bring him back up to a a better level of understanding what you want. Without the conflict of this internal battle between you make him want to please instead of want to defy.

If this does not work seek out a professional trainer, a lot people like strong willed dogs but not many can live with them.

The example that Gwen drew out was an example of a dog with a server case of bad nerves, from obvious previous handling and treatment, so its unlike yours you had your dog since he was a puppy so he is a product you. Gwen's was a dominance problem, no doubt, but it was prompted by mistrust and confused aggressive habits. A long haired White Shepard American is rare, I'm wondering if he was full breed. But being a White Am shepard was a problem in itself, I had one that I save from a shelter, it broke out of its make shift kennel and ran away. It never wanted to be petted and was as dumb as rock.
<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I think part of his behavior is a result of my not spending as much time with him as I have in the past. Probably adding to this is that he just turned 18 months old and is now realizing that he is no longer this 9 pound puppy but a 97 pound freight train. I have taken note that when I am home all day for several days things settle back down but when I am gone most of each day the problem increases. I have read everything on this site and others concerning dominant dogs, even before I got him (at 8 weeks) for I was told this would be a dog that would be very dominant and a challenge to handle.
I have followed all the rules that Ed has concerning dominant dogs (not sleeping on bed, etc.) since he was 8 weeks old. I can take away from him his food or anything else he has, touch him while eating or even take a cookie aways from him. So I think I am still in charge of things as far as that is concerned. He is not the first male GSD I have raised but he is certainly the most difficult one. Added to the mix is that he very stubborn, almost obsessive about things. I have watched him spend 30 minutes trying to retrieve a kong that I accidently threw on top of the storage shed (bounced and landed in its roof). Eventualy he managed to climb on top of the storage shed by climbing on top of stuff next to the shed and then jumping on top of the shed, then jumping back on the pile of things and brought the kong back to me for another toss. Most dogs that I have had including Labradors would have given up but not this GSD. We have gone through several phases in which he has challenged but now it is more difficult since he is not longer that little puppy. My concern is that each time this escalates I am having to increase the level of correction another notch, which he in turns increases his level of retaliation up a notch. I am hoping that in time things will settle down and hope that this will not become a daily routine (of being challenged for pack order). Hope that makes sense