I have an adult GSD (almost 4 yrs), and have trained him in personal protection work. He is doing fine. My questions is: should a protection trained dog be confident against other dogs (specially with agressive dogs). It seems my dogs shy away when he sees others dogs that are displaying agressive behavior. With others dogs he seems to get along fine.

Another hard question to answer, without more information like was he the dominate puppy, was he ever dominated by an older dog when he was a puppy, and has he always submitted. Is he the dominate dog in your household.

But a dog could do protection work and not be a dog fighter or dominate with other dogs. I'd would think aggreesive dogs would cause him to stir though, especially if they got close to you.

My GSD is not as dog aggressive as my Rottie/Pit this could be a breed thing. But the GSD will not let another strange dog get close to me. Without flaring up and posturing, barking and growling. If the dog goes away he relaxes, but the Rottie if I let her, will roll the dog.

A dog's confidence/dominance with other dogs is unrelated to his relationships with people or his bitework training.

Thank You for your responses.
When I purchase this dogs, he was the last one from his litter, so he was put with another litter (one month older than him), so I may assume he was submitted by the other puppies.
When I bought it home, he was living with an older dog, but not for a long time, and then lived with a younger female GSD. Right now he is my only dog living in our house.
I do not want the dog to be animal agressive o dominate other dogs, but like your say, I want him to not let other strange dogs come close to me, more if the show sign of agresiveness. Maybe the question will be, what can I do to help change this behavior, how can I give him the confidence. With known dogs, he acts friendly.

You really don't want to promote dog aggression, but I see what you mean by still having some threat of protection from aggressive dogs that may approach.

How does he react to dogs coming close to him? And does it change any if the dog seems to be barking at you?

My GSD will position himself in front of me barking if they are a distance away say (10 feet), if they are closer he'll growl and show teeth. This usually gets them to moving away. Without any command he usually sees the incident before I do.

Going by your statement of his past up bringing he probably was submitted by the older puppies and dogs. So he has to start to feel that he the protector off the field.

I'd do this by bonding closer to him. If you are practicing Ob 2 days a week increase it to 4 or better yet increase the times you brush him out or groom him. And play fecth with him.

A stronger bond will make him want to protect you more, becareful with this because he may start wanting to protect you against rough housing friends or spouses and dogs.

If you are already doing this, he just may not be able to beat his past up bring. And you have to try to control the aggressive dogs.

Originally posted by Lee Baragona - Sch3FH2:
A dog's confidence/dominance with other dogs is unrelated to his relationships with people or his bitework training. Yep.

Thank You, will try to do your recommentations. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />