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He growls at me and other members of my family when eating and when chewing on bone. Few times he even snaped and bit my wife and 11 year old son. What I/we do in this case, grab him by the neck, lift him and give him a shake untill he cries.

Lifting him and shaking him till he yelps in pain that borders on what I would consider abuse. This will lead to fear aggression. YOU NEED TO STOP THIS FORM OF DISAPPLINING! PRAISE him when you feed him by hand and he doesn't growl or snap, make sure your family also feeds him. Give a sharp loud NO when he does growl and snap if you continue to grab lift and shake your puppy he will attack out of fear. If you take any advice at all listen and follow what Jeannette said on this problem and contacting the breeder-this is not normal behavior IMO either.

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the pup is in his crate for 80% of time (other 20% are for eating, eliminating himself outside and playing outside) things still may happen. I try to keep a 100% of my attention when my kids are even close to the pup. But I don't whant to take any chances.

You are not socializing the puppy properly. It does not know how to behave and act with your family, it has to be socialized and taugh. Keeping him locked away, and not being allowed to interact will create a "junk yard dog" affect with him.
IMO you need to focus more on the food/toy aggression, and proper socialization then the B.O. right now. Get him around other dogs, and people too, proper socialization will not affect his ability to guard.

Think about getting some of the Leerburg training videos especially the puppy ones-this is the most important time of his training, and these problems can still be corrected and eliminated.

Michael,

I love all breeds of dogs, and am a trained Professional dog groomer( which I no longer practice on a public level). I have had experience handling many dogs for many years and so...I resent that you would feel that the advice you have gotten is based on bias towards the Boerboel breed.

No puppy of ANY breed that exhibits such behaviour at such a young age should continue to be raised in a household with small children. Period. It is very possible that you can have a Boerboel that is the ideal family pet, but obviously this one has a temperment issue that will preclude it from being the dog you desire it to be.

PLease, contact the breeder, discuss the behaviour, and strongly consider switching your pup with one that is not displaying aggression. As has been pointed out to you, within any breed, there can be a temperment flaw, or perhaps call it a personality conflict...either way, DO NOT risk your CHILD'S safety. You CANNOT undo a serious bite, ever. Why why why why take a chance???????

Good luck to you in whatever decision you make <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Total number of SchH titles for the boerboel worldwide:
one ( 1 ) BH


Hey, they're a rare breed, that's not a big surprise.
In my previous post above, Alan supplied a link to a slide show for a boerboel doing SchH training. It wasn't great, but the dog could be a "club" dog with a lot of work, and as long as they did the tracking training correctly, it could likely be titled.
But observe the dog on the slide show in action, and compare him to a Rott or GSD of a similar age - no comparison.

Michael, the reason that people aren't posting much in the way of training advice for your situation is because that a dog biting and growling at such a young age is a temperament issue, not a training issue. If that type of behavior is happening at such an early age, what's it going to be like in the future when the dog matures? Likely much worse is the answer that most knowledgeable trainers would give.

Michael,
In your description of the breed you said this-

We only start training them from 9 months up, because they are very clumsy and play full when young, they would rather push you over and lick you than bite at this age,

It seems like if what you would normally expect from this breed is playful clumsiness, then your pup is atypical of the breed. Whether the agression you see is normal for the breed, as others have suggested, isn't really an issue. All that really matters is that YOUR pup is behaving aggressively particularly with your wife and child. Even if you believe you can handle the situation- why would you want to? The reason I ask this is because dealing with an aggressive dog for 8-15 years is a pain in the ass. Are you ever going to want to go on vacation, stay at a hotel, visit friends out of town, or have guests in your home? I can tell you from experience that owning a dog who is aggressive makes planning all of these things a major production. If you decide that keeping this pup as part of the family makes sense to you I would suggest feeding him in his kennel to avoid a confrontation.If you continue to punish him after the biting and growling he may associate it with the children being around his food, in which case things may escalate quickly.

I don't care what breed of dog it is. A three month old with the level of food aggression that you describe is a dog that needs to be in a home without children, period.


There is no scenario that would be an exception, there is no level of training that I would trust.

It's a damn shame, I've lost a really nice working bitch for this very reason. It is one character flaw I won't live with. I had her fixed and sold her to a nice guy in Canada who lives alone.

I've never seen severe food aggression fixed to a level where I would trust the dog as a pet in the home with children. You can't control the situation all the time, especially with food and kids and dogs.


Realistically all you can do is overfeed the dog, hand-to-bowl feed the dog his every meal in small increments . . .first you, then the wife, then the kids etc. Ignore aggression, don't respond, don't recoil, place the dog in a down and (without emotion) correct the ever living hell out of him with a prong collar if he doesn't down away from the food. . .and immediately start over praising for correct behavior.

This might make food around the bowl almost safe, but what about food found elsewhere? What about cookies behind the kid's toy box, what about all the other deadly possibilities?


This is my opinion and it won't change.

I know that every body could throw in a story like this but here it is anyway - my brother in law bought a Weimaraner as a pup - which was food agressive, he decided to keep it - thinking he could train it - the dog remained food agressive. Instead of getting rid of the dog he thought he could manage the dog - until one day his youngest son sam who was 6 at the time picked up the dogs bone which was left on the floor - as you can probably guess he got a nice bite on the face - the scars of which he still holds today. The amazing thing was that he blamed his son for provoking the dog?! by taking his bone!!
Now my brother in law was ignorant to the real issue that was the dog. Since then the dog has biten again and is still a part of the family.
I suggest that like my brother in law - you are also ignorant, like you he didnt want to give up on the dog - and look what happened. dog bites on children are nasty - especailly when they could have been prevented.

I am sorry for the things that I am about to say and I know that it will probly get me kicked out of this site but it must be said. All the person was asking was a solution to a simple behavioral problem. All of you have not asked any other questions to the situation and not helped one little bit. All these examples of people not solving thier problems all did it wrong if they did not fix it. You are the type of people that would go for breed spicific legislation and would make it hard to own any breed that you think is in your eyes are bad. I own 3 gsds but I know that there is other breeds in the world. I have trained over 400 dogs in the last 3 years alone and understand that a dog is what you make it. Now I am not the best trainer in the world but I work in more areas than sch. To may hobbiests are giving advice. I like the ideas on some of them but they are the wrong aplication. Everybody is overanilzing without following up with more questions.I know he has not givin all the info that we need to help solve the problem. You can not solve the problem without all the information. A real train will ask more questions. This is a proble that should be easy to fix if the right steps are taken.

Sorry all for the harsh words but I needed to say something. I do enjoy lots of the info shared on this site but lots of it is damaging. I hope that you all understand what I am talking about. I also hope that this does on get me kicked off this site but understand if it does.

Thanks all
Dave G

No David, what you said certainly won't get you banned or anything. I do however, think that you don't know what you're talking about.

Food aggression in a three month old puppy is not "a simple behavioral problem.", as you have posted. It is most likely a serious behavior trait.

Saying to the other posters that "You are the type of people that would go for breed spicific legislation " was just stupid. No where but in your overactive imagination did anyone suggest a breed ban.

"I know he has not givin all the info that we need to help solve the problem."
Sorry, he gave me all the information I needed to hear when he told us that he has children and that the dog has already bitten his wife and child at such a young age. I would tell him the exact same thing if he was my client ( and I *do* train dogs for a living ) . Family members get protected first - the dog comes second. Any professional dog trainer would say the same thing.

"This is a proble that should be easy to fix if the right steps are taken."
Ummm, not in my experience - temperament issues don't resolve. You can control them to a degree, but the dog *will* revert to his inborn temperament during stressful periods - are you going to risk that owner's child on a "maybe"? I certainly wouldn't, and I can't think of a professional trainer that would.

"Sorry all for the harsh words but I needed to say something. I do enjoy lots of the info shared on this site but lots of it is damaging"
David, as far as "damaging advice", it certainly appears like you're the one that would be giving it. Maybe because you reside in another country with a more lax legal system that you feel that you could give advice that might possibly lead to the harming of a child. In the U.S., we'd never consider that.

Michael, you've gotten the opinions of several people. If you'd like to discuss the matter further, pick one or several of them out and send them a PM for further advice.
Good luck in your situation, I hope it works out for the best!