I am fairly new at training. I know, this is great place for info, so my question is this, "Once a dog has killed small prey,,,ie, Kitten,,,,,,can dog be trained off or will this always be an issue. Would also like training suggestions and methods on this if possible.
Thanks

You can teach an old dog new tricks, but you may have an uphill battle to counter a previously self-rewarding behavior.

Greyhounds are known to be high-prey dogs, so when Sailor came home I tethered him to myself, and kept a bag of treats with me. Whenever he looked at the cat I called his name. A look in my direction got a treat, ignoring me got a correction. He's now a studious cat-ignorer.

I've had less sucess with my Dane puppy. She has a very high play drive, and thinks the cat is more interesting than Mom.

Management is very important with self-rewarding, instinctual behaviors. The dog must not be allowed any unsupervised time with kittens. Precaution should always be taken when housing large predators with smaller animals. It's only natural for something to go wrong. Only maternal insticts keep a dog from not having predatory insticts towards smaller animals.

hmm....interesting question. in my opinion, once a dog has attacked, it will learn from that attack and apply it forward.

that said, i don't actually know the answer to your question, i'd be interested what some of the experienced folk on here have to say. i stuck in some questions below that may/may not be relevant....

could you train this away using adversives? positive methods?

for denise:
how old is the dog? what is it's background? has this happened only the once?

Jennifer, it happened in the middle of the night, I had no idea there were kittens in a shed on my property,,,,,,then the next day around lunch time, he sniffed his way to find the other one that was hiding out....I had no idea there were two,,,then to topp it all off, a new rescue, norwich terrier female, found one. OMG it was awful....and the norwich is the LOWEST in pack. she eats absolutely last...she is omega/alpha now I am sure.
noah, the newfie/gsd mix,,is about 9 months old....
I did take today for walk and told him leave it when we saw cat, gave hard correction, and then he acted like he didnt even want to look at them. But not sure on this one.
His backround was adopted as puppy, turned back into rescue after 8 months of NO TRAINING and he is with me, being fostered and obedience trained

So, the pack went hunting? It's not a problem with this particular dog, but a group of dogs that were lose in the yard doing what comes natural?

High prey dogs kill small animals when left outside unsupervised. How do you feel about rabbits? Squirels? Either you train an aversion to every kind of critter they might encounter out there, you confine/muzzle them when unsupervised, or you consider wild animals game and acknowlege that you own a large predator.

In my experience the answer is no it's not possible any more than it's possible for me to teach my lab at this point not to open the refrigerator when I'm not home. She knows foods in there, she knows how to open it. A self reward is a self reward, and if you get on your dogs about it in my experience they'll just wait til you're not looking and do it anyways because they know the reward is there. The key is to know what your dog is doing and set them up with enough control that you can bring them back in the distractions presence. Use a kennel, use a crate, and be present either by leash or e collar when your dog isn't in one of those two wonderful devices if it's that important for you to not have your dogs eat kittens and other small animals.

A long time ago in Minnesota my grandfather described to me the problem he had with his dogs chasing deer while fox hunting which was his favorite pasttimes in the 40's. He'd run five foxhounds and a terrier from horseback. Two of his dogs had brought down a deer after escaping the yard and did what dogs do when they kill an animal. He tried everything he could think of to keep these dogs from chasing deer while on a hunt including tethering which these dogs became wise to and impossible to do all the time on a hunt in brushy land, and they'd actually break from the pack to chase deer. In the end the cure for these "ruined" dogs came in calibers.

I'm not saying the solution to this should involve a bullet or PTS but just an acknowledgement that your dog will behave like a dog unless you are there to tell him to do something else and he has either the leadership respect or you have the control to back it up.

Best of luck,

Melissa

Well, thanks for the replies. They were not in a pack, when each dog did this, was by itself....For hunting dogs, yep, thats what they sometimes do Melissa, I have heard of that being from West Texas,,,,if a dog even mouthed a bird wrong, well it was oops calibers at the front gate.
Well Noah, will have to go to a home with no cats then.
I consider dogs, to be above small game in the chain , so killing small prey is not offensive to me, but might be to the next adopter of Noah.
THANKS AGAIN for the replies

Denise,

Not necessarily. I have 2 dogs that I am sure would kill a cat if they found one in my yard. The one has already killed at least one rabbit and raccoon. (He's a hunting dog). When they see a cat they get all excited the way they do when they see a squirrel. However, they have both lived in the house with my cat (who passed away last year) and I have trusted them both unsupervised with my cat while I was at work. There was never any problem.

Cats in houses as part of a pack are different to some dogs than cats outside in the yard who will run.

That said, there are some dogs, who are too prey driven to have in the house with cats. You would need to properly cat test this dog to know for sure if it is a chronic high-prey cat killer or just a dog with controllable prey drive.

Awesome Angela,,,,thanks,,,,I will do that,,,you are right, part of pack inside, not, outside