I have recently adopted a 7 month old doby. She is spayed, gentile and the most submissive passive dog I have ever met in my life. She knows a few commands; sit, stay, down, shake, bed time, things like that and does each command without hesitation.

I adopted her from the local animal control, they said she was a stray, and didnt seem to care much about the other dogs in the kennels, and other than her sex, they didnt know anything about her. I have fallen head over heels for her, and she is more like a cat than a dog. she sleeps all day, and I mean ALL day, and to get her to play, walk, or go out and potty, you have to instigate the first move. Her laziness doesnt really bother me all that much, as i am more of a cat person and quite like the fact that she has more cat characteristics than dog, but my husband on the other hand wanted a dog that you can wrestle with and play with, basically one who does the opposite of Molly.

A week after adopting Molly I went back to the shelter and got an 8 week old choc lab/boxer mix for him. We named him bear, he is huge. at 8 weeks he is 15 lbs. He is very submissive as well especially with Molly, and in their first 15 minutes of meeting, she violently attacked him.

I have placed them in different situations at different places and she still tries to hurt him. I started to think that maybe she has a fear aggression problem. I have tried to inroduce her to other dogs since we brought the puppy home, and she behaves the same way, if the dog is as big or bigger than her she hides behind me and freaks out, aggressively barking with the fur on her back at full attention.

I understand this problem is going to take time to deal with, but other than the current methods I am using, I wonder if anyone else has any advice on the situation? They are both kept in crates at night to sleep, and they are right next to each other, and when they're out, they're both on leashes. Their food is given in the crates and they are both walked together, and if one gets any attention, so does the other.

She is being trained with a pinch collar, and it seems to work for a few hours, but she still keeps going after the puppy. Anyone with the same situations please let me know how you solved the problem and how long it took.
Thanks.
Kandace, Molly, and Bear

I would classify this as dog aggression not so much what I would consider a "fear biter". She probably has had a bad experience with another dog at some point in her life and doesn't like being up close to dogs. My dog is fine around dogs until they get really close, females he's ok with, but with males he will get aggressive if they get within 6" of him. You may need to keep your dogs seperated for the rest of their lives if you can't get your dobie to accept the other dog. I would follow Ed's guidelines for "introducing a 2nd dog into the home", it's somewhere in the Leerburg articles, so just browse thru em until you find it.

You have a 7 MONTH OLD that's so aggressive that you have trouble controlling it?

With dogs that need to be VERY confident (such as Personal Protection Dog) I'm not really sure how one would handle the situation mostly because all my past experience with dogs has been with house pets. But as a pet owner, I don't think I would have much of a problem with this... make is CRYSTAL CLEAR to the dog that she is not in control and you, as the leader of her pack, ABSOLUTELY WILL NOT TOLERATE such behavior from her. Also, you need to make it clear to her that you won't allow that kind of behavior directed towards her from another dog. Once she is confident that you are in control, she won't feel the need to show aggression to defend herself.

It's one thing for one of my dogs to show a little aggression or posturing towards a strange dog that comes wandering into my yard. It's an entirely different thing for any of them to show aggression towards an animal that I have taken into my home.

The most important thing all dog owners need to know is how to make it clear to the dogs in their home that people are the leaders of the pack and anything with four legs is a lower ranking member. Ed's article Ground Work for establishing yourself as a pack leader about the subject goes into great detail about this and in my opinion, is the best starting point for solving 95% of dog problems out there.

To answer your question, if this problem is solvable, which it almost certainly is considering you have a young female that is still very impressionable, it shouldn't take very long at all in my opinion. I've solved problems like this before in a week or so. However, just because you've fixed the problem doesn't mean you should relax too much. You need to stay on the lookout for problems.

And I kind of agree with Mike that this looks like dog aggression combined with a low self-confidence. Praise her like crazy for good behavior to help improve her confidence but don't hesitate to correct her for any signs of aggression. Watch her like a hawk and don't wait for her to lunge or show her teeth. If her hackles go up, she stands over the other dog in a dominant posture, she shows her teeth, barks, anything... ANY sign of aggression should be corrected and obviously, the stronger the sign of aggression, the stronger the correction.

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ANY sign of aggression should be corrected and obviously, the stronger the sign of aggression, the stronger the correction.

There's times where the only way to get thru to my 20 month old GSD that I'm not tollerating his aggression to another male dog is by level 10 prong correction n hold his feet off the ground, anything short of that he'll ignore, and even that isn't enough to stop him from doing it again. I've considered a dominant dog collar to try and stop this, but I don't know if it warrants it - if he develops any issues with my upcoming female pup he's gonna need to get his ass kicked (figuratively). I will be ordering Ed's new dominant dog DVD soon, he's not dominant to people but he sure doesn't like being dominated by other males.

I agree with Ryan's post, but I also think you need to read the article on introducing a 2nd dog into the home. You can't just dump a 2nd dog in the house n say "ok girl, thats your new buddy, he's gonna be here from now on" <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> She hasn't been in the home very long by the sounds of it and her life is suddenly changing rapidly with a new territory, new pack leaders, new everything, then suddenly when she might be settling in, this boy comes in and says "hey I live here too now".

One thing that I've done in the past with aggression problems that has worked has been taking baby steps. For example, one male that I had would start posturing if he saw another leashed dog that was 50 yards away. At that point, obviously, he wasn't able to bite or anything so the real problem was if the other dog continued to come closer.

It starts with the hackles, stiffening of the body, tail standing straight out, leaning/pulling forward, growling, barking, bearing teeth, and eventually the dog will attempt to bite the other dog. If you setup a situation where the dog's only likely reaction is a mild one, you have a smaller problem to fix. So start with another male dog 10 (or 50) yards away. As soon as your male stiffens up or starts to focus on the other dog... he gets a verbal signal and a light correction. Find the level of correction necessary to get it through to him that his posturing is not acceptable. Eventually, he'll stop doing that when the other dog is 10 (or 50) yards away. Then start bringing the other dog a little closer. Watch for those subtle signs of aggression. Its much easier to correct a dog for posturing and focusing on a distant dog than it is to correct him for lunging at a dog that is within reach. Once he's comfortable with the dog being a little closer, bring the other dog even closer and repeat the process. With most dogs, they will figure it out. You may never have a dog that you would trust to run lose with other dogs, but unnecessary aggression towards other dogs that don't pose an immediate threat is usually fixable.

In my (limited) experience, I've never found a dog that couldn't at least be civilized while on leash within a few feet of other dogs.

I understand what you are saying, and I have shown myself as the pack leader, and Molly has totally shown that she knows it. My only concern with her and people is that she is too submissive with everyone she meets. Anyone she sees she greets with her head down, tail between her legs and ears back. I have an appointment to take her to a behavior specialist I worked with before, and expect great results, but thats not until Feb. 1st. Now she is being trained with the prong collar, and with the slightest pull back, she regresses and just avoids the puppy. I will be ok with her simply tolerating him, Im not asking her to take him in like he is her pup, I just want them to be able to be in the same room. Molly is too smart, too eager to please, for me to think that she wont learn what the rules are. And when she does what shes supposed to, she is rewarded with praise and treats, and when shes bad she is corrected. I appreciate your input greatly, and thanks for writing.

Ryan, in my situation by dog is OK up until the dog is interacting with my dog, my dog will tollerate sniffing for about 2 seconds n then suddenly goes from no physical signs to wanting to go crazy at the other dog, but he can heel next to another dog n be fine around the dog as long as he's "left alone" no sniffing etc, I only put him in this situation when he's around my helpers dog but never to any extreme, his dog is perfect on the "go away" command so anytime his dog comes over to sniff mine he just says "go away" n nothing happens n my dog accepts it n gets on with life, but there's times when my dog will just wanna rip his head off. Not really a big deal given that he's not really in situations like that regularly, but he needs to learn not to do it regardless n he's gotten awesome about ignoring other dogs at any distance now.

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I understand what you are saying, and I have shown myself as the pack leader, and Molly has totally shown that she knows it.

Well, then give it some time. If she truly sees you as a good leader, her aggression towards other dogs should get better with time and a little work. A dog acting aggressively towards another dog, against it's owner's wishes is a show of disrespect IMO. As pack leader, I handle confrontations with other dogs and my dogs all know that.

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My only concern with her and people is that she is too submissive with everyone she meets.

At her age, it could be a combination of things. Many dogs show submissive behavior at a young age and gradually become more confident or even dominant as they get older. It's natural for a "baby" to show signs of submission towards people that look like giants to her. If you are going to allow your dog to interact with strangers, then just keep the situations under control (no rambunctious children or rough housing that might intimidate/frighten her) and keep them positive with gentle affection and treats. I'm sure you'll be fine.

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Ryan, in my situation by dog is OK up until the dog is interacting with my dog, my dog will tolerate sniffing for about 2 seconds n then suddenly goes from no physical signs to wanting to go crazy at the other dog

Sounds like my Male GSD. With the exception that mine will nervously/anxiously allow another dog to sniff him... until the other dog does something that resembles an act of dominance. He is perfectly OK as long as the other dog doesn't put their head over his back/neck, doesn't growl, doesn't bark, doesn't attempt to mount him, etc. I've gotten him to the point that he will ignore most normal behavior. But he's got a hair trigger with acts of dominance directed towards him from other dogs so he's not allowed to interact with other dogs that aren't members of his pack.

update*** we took off the leashes and let the dogs freely interact. Molly has improved 100%. She is now showing the puppy that she is definately in a higher rank than him, but she is letting him walk around with out trying to go after him. Theyre doing alright with the sniffing thing, but when he gets on her nerves, she hits him with her head, and nibbles on him. But she hasnt been "aggressive" in a mean way towards him. She played with him for a few seconds with her rope, but since he couldnt pull back very well, she gave up. Things are headed for the right direction, and I hope they continue to progress. Thanks again for the input and advice.