Bad behaviour from my bitch

Hi, been a while since I posted here, but just wanted to discuss my rescue bitch Hatties behaviour. I am kind of resigned to it now, as despite lots of hard work, there is no change. We had her DNA tested and she came back as part staff, part mastiff, part american bulldog. Here are some pictures:








Basically, she is very dog aggressive, unless she knows the dog and has been gently introduced over a period of time, then, she's fine, although very dominant. Outside however, on the lead, if she even sees another dog in the distance she is instantly ready for action, tail up, hackles up, growling.  When walking her, she seems constantly "On patrol" looking around, alert, hackles up, unlike my male older staff who just bumbles around sniffing and cocking his leg on everything. When she pees, she also paws the ground and scratches, she even does this without peeing sometimes, she will growl and rumble when she does it often, looking around as she does so , as if to say " I am here, what are you going do?"! If a dog barks at her from a house we pass, she remembers straight away and whenever we pass again, she will go into action mode, growling, barking and lunging towards the house.

I never let her off the lead unless I am way out in the country and can see all around, her recall is good, but if she spots another dog, its virtually impossible to get her to respond in any way to me, even though she is completely devoted & submissive to me. She is just completely fixated on the other dog until she cant see it. If the dog comes within range, she will attack it. At home with us, she is just the soppiest sweetest dog though. She also has very high prey drive and cats really set her off as well.

She is quite dominant, completely in charge of my older male dog. I have had one on one dog training and sometimes use a short rope choke leash the trainer gave me, which does control her, but she still wants to get at the other dog.

I basically manage her behaviour now, my wife cant walk her, she is too strong, but it is embarrassing and makes walking a bit of a pain.

What do think her behaviour indicates- ? and do you think she is beyond help? When she came to me 2 years ago, from the fosterers, there were 3 other staffy cross bitches in the house,  she lived with them for 5 weeks with no trouble, and the fosterer had had no issues like she displays now when walking her. Like I say, when she knows a dog, it's all OK, its just the outside behaviour. She is completely non aggressive towards humans, even threatening ones ! I guess we just don't know what she was encouraged to do before she was found or what situations she lived under.

Cheers, Mark

Perhaps a behaviourist may be best . Alternatively positive encouragement when she sees another dog , if u see something that triggers her behaviour try keeping your voice calm level and even . They can sense when your tense. If her behaviours good try giving her a strong smelling treat.

Aaah, if only it were that easy... I guess you have to be there, but she does not react to me at all once she is "in the zone.."

its as if she has got worse with time , not better, despite me trying pretty much everything ...if I about turn from the other dog, she faces backwards, I have to drag her along until she cant see it, I can calm her a bit by forcing her to sit then basically wrapping her in my arms and legs, facing away from the dog, but she squirms and tries to turn her head and whines and mewls. I have even tried hitting her to get her attention or shouting at her, but makes no difference at all how you interface with her, nicely or nastily, she wont listen! I could wave a cooked chicken under her nose and she would still not look...!!

Are you still in contact with the person who had her while she was fostered ? They may be able to shed some light onto her issues with regards to walking her ?

Please do not hit or shout at your dog, this will get you absolutely no where fast. This dog is obviously in some distress while out on walks and your agressive behaviour towards her will not help at all only make matters worse for you both.

If Hattie came to you through a recognised rescue centre then please contact them for some further advice on training methods for her. They may even advize you take her back in for an assessment which would be beneficial.

Is Hattie ever walked with another dog on the lead side by side ? How did she react to this if so ?

I would use the look at me training method Mark. If you can get her to focus on you and reward with a high value treat when she does you will be able to distract her when a potential situation occurs.

It's not a quick fix as with any training it will take time but might be worth trying if you haven't already.

Kathy wrote:Are you still in contact with the person who had her while she was fostered ? They may be able to shed some light onto her issues with regards to walking her ?

Please do not hit or shout at your dog, this will get you absolutely no where fast. This dog is obviously in some distress while out on walks and your agressive behaviour towards her will not help at all only make matters worse for you both.

If Hattie came to you through a recognised rescue centre then please contact them for some further advice on training methods for her. They may even advize you take her back in for an assessment which would be beneficial.

Is Hattie ever walked with another dog on the lead side by side ? How did she react to this if so ?

Hi, please don't think that ( hitting / shouting) this is how she gets treated, that's not the case, I just tried it once or twice, fairly early on when I was seeing what made her react. I really don't think she is distressed out on a walk, if she does not see another dog, she has a great time - fired up, yes, but she is not in distress. She came to me through Staffie rescue, and I have owned bull breeds and Staffies for over 30 years, so am not without experience in both training and the nuances of the breed and how to handle them.

I can walk her along next to another dog, but the other must be very non reactive and docile. And this is how I introduce her to the dogs she does know and spends time with. It takes a while but she will calm down slowly.

Hey I've just come through this with my boy, he suddenly turned very dog aggressive for no reason at all.

I will go into what I did but first can I just say never ever do this:

I can calm her a bit by forcing her to sit then basically wrapping her in my arms and legs, facing away from the dog,

Two reasons, one because what you are doing in the dog world is dominating her and it's not good it will just make her even more stressed out, secondly one day she may be too far in the zone and redirect her stress onto you, by doing this you are in biting distance, very dangerous and it's unnecessary

Anyway that said, I did go through this and I know how frustrating it can be and i'm not the only one who can sympathise there are a lot of people in the same boat on here who have managed it or are going through it, you're not alone!

I couldn't take Axl out on my own because he is too strong for me to hold when he has a mental fit of anger and I was horrified every time he did it, I found it so embarrassing. Anyway I took him to a dog trainer and this worked for us so you could try it!

Work out what motivates her more, food or toy. Once you know what she prefers either get a treat that she never gets at any other time, so it has to be very tasty and you must not give it to her at any other time other than out on a walk. Or use a toy that she doesn't get at any other time if that's what she prefers.

We used a tennis ball. Axl didn't have access to it at any other time other than when we were walking. As soon as I spot a dog in the distance I have the ball ready. When Axl spots the dog I bounce the ball and say "look", he'd look back at me and I'd praise him. when he looks at the dog again I'd bounce the ball and say "look", he does, I praise. Every time he'd look at the passing dog I'd bounce the ball and he would look around at the ball/me. Once we passed the dog I would give the ball to him to carry for a little, not too long as it has to be a special treat to keep him interested. He has to want it more than wanting to attack the other dog.

As I said, that's what worked for us but it may be worth you going to see a dog trainer as well. Going back to our dog trainer was the best thing we did when we had problems!

P.s I was told by our dog trainer that Axl wasn't fear aggressive he was just getting "bored" on our walks and was doing it for fun which was why the bouncing ball thing worked. Just an afterthought

Hi, I mentioned it, as it does seem to calm her a bit when I do it. However, what I mostly do now if we are very near the other dog and i cant avoid a confrontation, is put her on a short leash and grip her between my legs at her waist, facing away, as if we are on a narrow path and another dog has to pass, it's the only way to stop her lunging at the other dog. I did have good results with a trainer, ( He said he 100% was sure she was a good dog, not dangerous - he used his dog as a test dog, he said if his dog was cool with the dogs he trained, then he could rely on it as an indicator that the problem dog could be trained) he supplied me with the choke leash, it was amazing how you can control her with it, even just holding it lightly in the hand, and but like I say, she is still 100% focused on the other dog. As you say , more training etc may help, I was curious what you thought may have caused the behaviour, especially when looked at in conjunction with her other behavioural traits I mentioned, the dominance etc

No offence but your trainer sounds like a complete tool, how he can say his dog is an indicator of whether the dog can be trained or not is laughable, another dog can't determine whether a dog is trainable or not, every dog is trainable it's just a matter of how much work you put in and consistency.

If I were you i'd go to a different trainer and work through your problems with them.

It's impossible to tell you why your dog is doing the things she is doing. A behaviourist may be able to help you though but make sure you find a good one and one you're comfortable with.

Choke chains do not solve the problem they only mask it. Basically you are choking your dog into submission, which I don't mean to sound harsh by the way You need to get to the root of the problem rather than use short term fixes.

Like I said with my boy it was completely out of the blue and was really bad but although the trainer said it wasn't fear I can never be sure. We've managed to bring him through it by seeing a trainer and working through the problem. He doesn't have a choke chain and I can now hold him on a loose lead when passing dogs without worrying.

I've also covered his eyes in the past as well which calmed him down immediately.

I think without taking her to a behaviourist you'll never know the whys

What he said was that some dogs are just psychos, much like some humans, and that they cant be trained out of it. His dog could sense that, he said. I have to say, he was VERY good, I took her up there and his dog was in the van in a cage. He let Hattie go up to the van and just watched how his dog reacted to her, she did not kick off at all & then he slowly introduced them. In 10 minutes they were walking together good as gold. the lead he suggested me use was a simple rope loop, and he fitted it tight up around her ears. When you use it, if she pulls, it will constrict, but they don't seem to really pull. This is in conjunction with keeping her at heel position. By the afternoon, we were walking in the park, other dogs coming up to her and she barely reacted. I was so impressed. However, she seems to have regressed, that was last year.

She does like to be Queen bee in the house and we do sometimes let her sleep in bed, etc, so she is maybe getting the wrong messages about her position. I just wonder if she has decided she is top dog and needs to guard and dominate ....?

Using will give the dog throat problems in later life have u thought to see if there are any dog obedience/behavioural classes in your local area what this man is telling you is rubbish as said above get a decent trainer.

markturner wrote:What he said was that some dogs are just psychos, much like some humans, and that they cant be trained out of it. [...] the lead he suggested me use was a simple rope loop, and he fitted it tight up around her ears. When you use it, if she pulls, it will constrict, but they don't seem to really pull. This is in conjunction with keeping her at heel position. By the afternoon, we were walking in the park, other dogs coming up to her and she barely reacted. I was so impressed. However, she seems to have regressed, that was last year.

She does like to be Queen bee in the house and we do sometimes let her sleep in bed, etc, so she is maybe getting the wrong messages about her position. I just wonder if she has decided she is top dog and needs to guard and dominate ....?

Sorry Mark, but

I was a professional remedial horse trainer (i.e. solved problem behaviours) and I would NEVER have been so rude as to call a client's animal a psycho. (A vet called a client's horse a dipstick - she changed vet. Turned out the horse was in pain, which is what we'd been saying all along.)

Animals react the way they do for a reason. That could be anything from early training, fear, current uncertainties, anything else at all that has impacted the dog. They do what they feel is the right thing for that situation, even though it may not make sense to us. We here obviously can't know why Hattie is reacting the way she does, and it may indeed be difficult/impossible to retrain her fully. I would have to believe, though, that a good, positive method trainer could at least work towards improvement.

I'm afraid the use of a choke lead like that sounds not only useless in long term training but even counter productive. As you've found, it can deter her through fear of pain, but once that threat's no longer there it's not taught her an alternative, good behaviour. Indeed, it may even have made things worse through her associating other dogs with that fear of pain.

As for dominance, I'm afraid I don't hold with that theory, for either dogs or horses. Yes, there are times when boundaries are pushed, and there are times when a dog will try to assert himself. That's different to dogs trying to dominate us. (This is interesting https://apdt.com/pet-owners/choosing-a-trainer/dominance/).

I agree with the others - find another trainer, one who uses positive training methods and who comes at the situation from the dog's perspective, so that Hattie can hopefully learn to build more positive associations and views of other dogs.

Good luck!

(ETA - the at the beginning was at the trainer, not you!)

Great posts from everybody do far - I think I replied to your first post a few months back and it would seem that things haven't changed since. IMO, you're not getting results because you're not training her. You may be managing the situation with aversive (choking the dog, etc) but you're not changing the mindset when she sees other dogs, or teaching an alternative behaviour.

My dog sounds identical to yours - or, she did when I took her in 3 years ago, except that aggression also transferred to humans. We tried a few trainers and finally got results. I use scientific methods to train my dog - not outdated theories. Your current trainer sounds hideous, I'm not surprised you haven't moved forward with her.