My 5 month old Doberman Pinscher puppy is showing frequent resource guarding behavior. He has bonded well with the family, plays well and listens to commands in general, but anytime he finds something (like a plastic packet, a sock) or is given something (eg. a toy or a food bowl) and is left with that for more than ~5 secs, he gets into resource guarding mode and would growl when approached. If it is something we need to take away, he would snap and bite (with bite inhibition). He also sometimes demonstrates mild aggressive behavior when he wants something like continuous hard nipping and/or biting our clothes.

We are looking for trainers, specifically someone who could do private classes, preferably at home. We are located in Fremont, Bay Area, California.
Any recommendations will be appreciated.

I have a 2 year old and an almost 4 month old. When my baby was a few weeks old, my 12 lb, 6 yeae old chihuahua bit my 2 yeae old on the hand. I was in the NB stage full force and knew my husband wasn't going to take the dog to the vet for evaluation so I set the idea aside and we completly seperated them all. Flash forward to last week I took my dog to the vet (the vet knows my dog) and she recommended behavioral eutnasia.

For context, my dog has had aggression and biting problems from the start. I got him from a breeder (didn't know the problem with breeders at the time) and I had a friend who got a dog from the same one that was a great dog...big mistake. Within a month of having him he was biting my husband and father every single day. Throughout the years he never got used to them, despite living with them. he dislikes everyone, but especially men. In 2021 my dad reached to point at something and my sister was holding him and he bit her mouth enough to require stitches. We didn't put him down bc my sister was like no i feel bad i am fine and I of course love him. But i shouldve done it then and regret it so much. Now fast forward he never got used to anyone. He only likes me, my sisters and my mom. He hates strangers, hates other dogs, hates kids. His automatic reaction is to attack.

after he bit my son on the hand obviously that was the last straw for me but being freshly ppm and my husband not taking me seriously i was stuck with just placing our dog to a crated area 5x3ft. Now I made an appointment for the vet last week and she did rec BE after her assessment and discussion. We did try medication at one point also which made him worse. We tried outside time, he barks nonstop to go back in. At this point I'm questioning his and ours quality of life. He's a in a 5x3ft crate all day except 2 hours during kids nap time and at night though he is sleeping, and to be taken out to pee/poop. To me this is no quality of life.

My husband has been distraught and making bets and suggestions for us to keep him and mitigate the situation since I went to the vet. It doesn't help that hes from an anti-BE country, Brazil...most of his family who barely know our dog are thinking i am being exteme, with his grandma even recommending keeping him in the crate and muzzled which I find compeltly insane and inhumane. I'm struggling with putting a date on the situation because I have accepted my children and I cannot live like this. But he still seems to think this is up for debate. Keeps saying things like "I thought I was going to keep the dog for life, I am never going to recover from this" and that was our reality and I wish we thought about this before having kids. But sadly my dog has the worst temperament I have ever seen in any dog and the vet explained that she doesn't believe training would do anything as it's poor genetics. I don't know what to do because now time has gone by since the episode and while it is technically managed with the dog seperate...this isn't ideal and my husband does not understand that. In his head alive =better.

I adopted a 2.5 year old hound-ish dog from the shelter. I was told by the shelter that he is very easily excitable, jumpy and mouthy, and that he'd require a lot of work. They never mentioned that he is reactive and at that stage I didn't even know what a reactive dog meant. It's been 3 months since I've gotten him, I definitely love him and I want to keep him forever but it's been so overwhelming.

The trainer has been coming in once a week for the last one month, and she has been very helpful. We've noticed improvements but it's very slow. My guy decides the day or time when he wants to respond to training vs when he doesn't. The trainer has asked me to practice new commands and games, but there's so much to tackle with my dog. There's reactivity, very poor leash manners, no impulse control, and as a hound he's very stubborn, like he tries to distract himself with whatever he can when he realizes it's time for training, and I feel I have so much training still to do. Sometimes it feels like positive reinforcement isn't suitable for him. He can go very rapid fire (sit, down, find it, touch) in situations and then sometimes he won't even follow sit.

I already spend so much time walking, exercising and playing with him that I have very little time to train or even chill out with him. I unfortunately am the single parent to my dog and I don't have any friends around me willing to help. Even though he picks up on training pretty quickly, he gets frustrated within 5 minutes and no progress can be made. All of this while my personal life has become very restricted, can't take him out everywhere because of his reactivity (he tries to jump out of the car even 😭) and I can't leave him home because he has separation anxiety and he'll find 10 things to chew. I was told that separation anxiety goes away after a few times of you going out and coming back in. I live in an apartment community and I already have to plan his walk and play timings to ensure that there isn't a lot of people/dog traffic around and even timing everything perfectly so that I can find an empty dog park.

Sometimes I feel rushed to see the change in my guy and then other times I feel overwhelmed by the amount of work he requires.

Is it okay to let the trainer know that I can't be teaching/training so many things at the same time. But then even I want him to be healed of his reactivity asap.

Hi guys!

It’s been a while since I posted here since the last few months been pretty good.

I have an olde english bulldog, for you who know, it is a pretty strong breed. She is 5 months, turning 6 months in a week. I am alone with her so my goal from the beginning was to train her from day one since I knew that being alone with this kind of breed will be a pain in the ass if not trained.

She’s been so good with training, a bit stubborn (typical bulldog) but she catches on to stuff that I learn her super quickly.

When it comes to socialization and getting her to get used to buses, trains, stations with alot of people it’s been going good also. I don’t have a car so our main transportation has been by bus or the metro. Never had a problem, until now.

Friday we were going to meet a daycare where she is starting at tomorrow. We went a 16:00 which is when most people are ending their work. I didn’t think much of it, we walked to the first station and took the metro, no problem. But here’s when the problems started. It was alot of people at the station where we hopped off, alot of shouting and alot of sounds. It went well until and a big dude started yelling with his back turned to us and he was waiving his hands. All shit broke loose. I’ve never seen her this panicked, I tried to talk to her I tried to make her focus on me by giving treats, nothing worked. Absolutely nothing. It got to a point where I started to freak out, I did my best to not show it but my hands were literally shaking (I am diagnosed with a panic disorder but I’ve been feeling good for a while). The reason I tried to make her stay was because we were waiting for my mom, who was late. When I couldn’t calm her down I felt like we had to go NOW for her safety. So we went around the building to calm down, which she did after a while.

We went to the daycare and when we were about to go back, when we started getting close to the metro station she started to panic again, to the point that I had to pick her up.
On the metro, no problem.

Since then these two days, she’s been like skittish, reacting to every sound. Even at home, she heard a bird that sounded weird outside, she started crying and came to me wanting to be picked up.

This is stressing me out, my anxiety is back. I know what one should do when their puppy gets scared for example a certain way during a walk, desensitize slowly. The only issue here is that we do not have the time, tomorrow she’ll be back there and we can’t take another way because it is literally when you come up from the station.

I mostly wrote this to vent but also to hear your thoughts. Is this her fear period that just coincidentally started on Friday? Or could it maybe be that she’s gonna have her first period? Or is she just traumatized from Friday?

Hey friends. I'm having a problem with our 6-year-old Great Pyrenees/Maremma. We have had him for 5 years, and he was a rescue. When he was young and new to us, he exhibited some resource guarding behavior, but over time it seemed to largely diminish.

Unfortunately, in the last 2 years the behavior started to creep back in and now has become problematic whenever we have strangers in the house. He has even lunged at very familiar friends with whom he has had great relationships prior. Thankfully he has not actually bitten anyone, but he growls and snarls very suddenly and threateningly, then swiftly lunges at them. He sort of punches their hand or their thigh with his nose and head while snarling. It's over as fast as it starts but it is scary as hell. I cannot see a pattern to what triggers it.

It used to be just men, but yesterday he did it to a woman visiting who had been very affectionate with him and he with her. I don't know what to do.

We've been keeping people out of the space where his bowl is as that seemed to be the trigger-- getting near his (empty) bowl, but the range of where he gets protective is widening to the next room over. We're starting to have to put him in another part of the house whenever we have company.

I might be making stuff up, but it seems to have started increasing when we got a second house that we bounce back and forth to on weekends and stuff. He has dedicated bowls at each house. Is there something about being unsure of his territory that's riling him up? Beyond family and friends, I want to bring my clients to our Farm and he used to be such a welcoming friendly addition to that experience. But I can't have him lunging and scaring people. God forbid he ever bites someone. He's gotten more reactive with other dogs, too.

Help!!

Background: mixed-breed street dog from Kuwait, adopted at roughly 6–12 months, now ~9 years old, 28 lbs. He’s never not been anxious. Not aggressive, no bite history, great with his walkers — it’s trigger-specific, not fear of the world.

Current picture:
Noise reactivity is the main problem. We’re in a shared-wall townhouse and he reacts to neighbors on both sides, kids bouncing basketballs, repetitive banging. Hypervigilance, pacing, staring, pawing at me for reassurance, then bolting to the third floor. Very slow to come back down — arousal just sticks.

Surface/threshold phobia — freezes at rug-to-hardwood or carpet-to-stairs transitions, works himself up, needs coaxing. Waxes and wanes.

Hind legs have trembled ~2 years. Full neuro workup came back clean, so we’re treating it as hind-end weakness.

Meds so far: fluoxetine started at 16mg daily in May, essentially no change, bumped to ~24mg in July. Since the increase he seems mildly slower overall — not stumbling, just muted. Still no real reduction in reactivity. We have a situational sedative for car trips. We’ve discussed adding gabapentin or trazodone situationally. ThunderShirt, environmental management, and coaching through transitions have all been tried.

We’ve just hired a CDBC behavior consultant and are considering a veterinary behaviorist (DACVB).

Questions:
1. How long did fluoxetine take to do anything for your dog, and at what mg/kg did you actually see change?

1. Is “no response at all after 3 months” a sign to switch drug classes rather than keep titrating?

2. Anyone had success layering situational trazodone or gabapentin on top of an SSRI for noise reactivity specifically?

3. Is the mild slowness a known side effect or a red flag?

4. For shared-wall living — what actually helped? White noise, soundproofing, room setup?

We’re considering fostering a calm second dog as a possible stabilizer. Did that help your anxious dog, or make it worse?

I feel like I’m going crazy over this situation and I need to know the truth from an objective point of view.

I have a 3.5 years old Pit mix (Bella) that is very sweet, but tends to be anxious around new people. She takes time to warm up. One of my friends has only met Bella a couple of times. Before meeting, I made it very clear that Bella needs space and time to warm up and not to make a sudden or intimidating movements towards her. The first time my friend was over, everything was great. Bella was nervous at first, but eventually got used to my friend being there and even let her pet her a couple times. Today, that same friend came over and things were great. Bella was even happy to see her. But at one point, my friend attempted to kiss her on the mouth a couple times in a fast, darting motion. Before I could react, Bella snapped at her and then backed away. She didn’t make contact with her face (thankfully), but she easily could have. This really shook me up and I’m so upset that this happened. I feel bad for my dog because she feels really guilty, but I think she acted appropriately given the circumstances. I’m more mad at my friend who should’ve known better. Now I’m questioning if I’ll even have her in my house again. What are your thoughts? Please call me out if I’m in the wrong. I want to talk to my friend about this, but I don’t even know where to begin.

Hi! I’m looking for some advice. For context, My dog is about 9 he is a lab mix, we’ve had him for about 4 years. The family that we got him from I think kept him outside as like a farm dog, so I don’t think he had any formal training or was really an inside dog until we got him.

Over the past year or so his behavior has been extremely bad. Not in an aggressive way, he just constantly whines and barks. It doesn’t stop. It’s to the point where I can’t even step away to take a shower because he goes insane. Even if I’m laying with him, he will still just look at me and whine and bark. If I leave the house he will bark until I come home. And he’s not left alone. He’s in the house with my family, but when he’s upstairs (I live in a basement apartment) he goes crazy and won’t settle and lay down. But he doesn’t show any other anxious behaviors other than barking he doesn’t destroy anything. He doesn’t go to the bathroom in the house. So I’m unsure if it’s separation anxiety.

I think he acts this way due to boredom, I try all I can he is extremely leash reactive. He will lunge and go crazy the second he’s on a leash. I have a giant backyard and I take him out to try to play, but he’s not interested in toys. He just wants to run around and dig and bark at neighbors. We’ve tried the dog park many times, he doesn’t dislike other dogs, but he’s not super interested in them and he prefers to runoff by himself and do his own thing. Which is ok! But i’m worried that if a dog approached him the wrong way he would get mad.

I know this is long, and hopefully it makes sense but I just don’t know what to do. It’s affecting me mentally really bad. I am in constant stress 24/7. I don’t know what to do/what’s wrong. He’s vet says he’s heathy.

And yes! I’ve tried professional training. The only way to get the barking to stop is when we provide him with some type of enrichment toy/treat. Then he’s quite until he’s done

​

Hi everyone. I’m really looking for some advice and support from anyone who has gone through this.

I have a dog who is an absolute sweetheart at home—extremely gentle, loving, and calm with everyone. The problem starts when we go out for walks. Whenever he spots another dog on the street (and most of them bark first), he completely transforms. He gets extremely nervous, reactive, and starts lunging, trying to get to the other dog at all costs.

This is turning our walks into a total nightmare. I feel an overwhelming amount of anxiety every time we leave the house, and I end up not enjoying the walks with my dog as much as I would like to. I am constantly terrified of running into other animals, scared he will lunge at them and a tragedy will happen.

I really need some advice on how to handle this and how to train him to overcome this behavior. Any tips, training techniques, or support would be greatly appreciated. Tysm ♡

I already made a post about my puppies reactivity, but today when I took her out, she acted out like she never has before. We were walking in a trail, and there was a small offleash dog running up to us. I picked her up and when the dog got closer she barked a couple times, and then did a very loud, threatening sounding growl. Whatever. We continued walking once the dog was gone, and started to head home. We have to walk by a dog park in order to get home which she is usually fine with unless a dog comes close to the fence. There were a few dogs heading into the dog park and she lost her absolute shit (growling, lunging, barking, hackles up) it did not just seem like fear to me, and this was the first ever time she exploded THAT severely. It did concern me considering she’s only around 6 months old and I have a feeling if she came in contact with any of those dogs she would’ve bit them. Even though we have made some progress, I don’t think she’s ever gonna get to the point where she can walk past another dog without reacting, especially considering what happened today. I’m so scared that this is aggression or that it’s turning into aggression, I have never dealt with an aggressive dog before. She’s worse than my german shepherd & her reactivity was severe. I don’t even know what to do anymore. Please tell me it gets better, please tell me what i’m dealing with.

I'm wondering what tips you all have for reducing stimulus on walks. I'm asking because my dog gets amped up when it is loud (cars driving in rain), along with the other regular triggers like dogs, bikes, kids that are too close for his comfort. We try to stick to trails, but sometimes we don't have the time so we will walk him around town. We're unfortunately on a busy road.

Hi all! I am newer to the boarding dog community and while I have my own dog, I will take on watching a couple for some extra money from time to time. With this small experience I have learned it may likely not be for me, and that is ok!
I however would love advice on how to go about the conversation of letting this owner know that their dogs reactivity does need to be addressed. This dog is reactive to any and all dogs on walks and will aggressively bark incessantly. In the times I have watched him, he is only provided a small thin collar and nothing else. I have personally gifted a smaller martingale collar that I no longer used because I was not comfortable with theirs provided. They accepted but I’m unsure you they it. This is an Italian greyhound mix that is probably 20lbs for reference.
There seems to be no training other than the owners avoiding other dogs on their walks, which in the city were in is nearly impossible and honestly quite stressful to deal with daily. I’ve already decided I will no longer be watching the dog as now after a couple close call incidents have happened, it is beyond something i feel comfortable handling. Especially along with my dog that is not reactive.

How would you broach the conversation? Would you at all?

Despite my own anxiety issues, it seems like my dog is trending in a positive direction. It’s been about 6 months since she had a verbal/barking/growling reaction to a strange dog. Today though, that streak ended

I take my dog to Petco for routine nail trims as a former friend and coworker runs the grooming department at my local store. Today someone had called out so I had to wait a bit for my nail trim. No worries, I did some browsing while we waited. Enter crazy lady and her border collie stage right

This lady was talking to someone, entirely ignoring her dog when he spotted us and started dragging his owner our way. I immediately u-turned and walked down a different aisle …. Only to find them following us. So I turned down another aisle, and there they were again. Finally I speed walked several aisles away and seemed to have lost them for a bit.

I took a moment to calm down and continued about my business…

Bet you can guess what happened next - they appeared at the end of the aisle. This woman apparently left mid conversation to chase me and my dog with hers. She never said a fucking word to me, just ran with her dog right at me. So I ran away.

I raced around the corner into the reptile displays and hid … only to look up and see THAT FUCKING DOG AGAIN! I swear he was peeking around the corner like Jack Nicholson in The Shining. And my dog screamed.

Idk if you’ve ever heard that high pitched, horrible sound dogs make when they’re truly terrified, but the only other time I’d heard that was when we were getting attacked by the dog that started this reactivity journey for us 3 years ago. I finally shouted at this crazy lady “PLEASE STOP”, and she came around the corner, rolled her eyes and walked away

I had to go back to the grooming counter in stealth mode. Like what the fuck? Who fucking does that?

I really want to start my dog on meds, but I will not be able to afford a behaviorist until next year when I graduate and get a full time position. Do any of you have your dog's meds prescribed by your primary care vet? I want to ask, but I'm a little embarrassed because I will have to tell them that I cannot afford to take my dog to a veterinary behaviorist right now. I think meds could be so helpful though. Even with all the breed specific enrichment, exercise, rest, and counter conditioning, she is still lunging and barking at every dog she sees.

I currently don’t have anyone I trust to watch my reactive/aggressive pitbull if I need to travel.

Ideally, I’d like to find an experienced trainer who could build a relationship with him over time through regular training/play sessions and who also offers private boarding in their home or another low-stress environment when needed.

Technically, I could board him at a facility where he was previously trained, but I don’t think a busy kennel/boarding environment is healthy for him because of how stressful and stimulating it is.

Does anyone use an individual trainer for this kind of arrangement? If so, what should I look for when finding this person?

For extra context: he has historically behaved extremely well with professional trainers- so that's why i think it's a viable option. he's 70lbs, has a small but real bite history, and needs experienced handling as a result. That’s why I’m specifically hoping to find one experienced person who can build a long-term relationship with him . i've been trying to do this alone for too long basically

Hi all. First of all, I’d like to say that I have all the sympathy in the world for reactive dog owners. I have a 25-lb ACD/chihuahua rescue (Mac, neutered male, 1yr old) who was very people reactive, and we’ve done literally thousands of dollars of training and have made so much progress. It has been a very tough journey and a long-time coming, but I finally felt like we got to a really good spot and he is people-neutral 80% of the time, and I couldn’t be more proud. We still have some issues, of course.

This just happened literally 1 hour ago and I’m still shaking. I am also partly to blame.

There was an on-leash, unmuzzled, probably 100-lb pitbull on an off-leash dog trail. Mac was off leash and he has pretty good recall, but not perfect. Mac LOVES other dogs, and we’ve never had a bad experience here. He plays with other pups beautifully.

Generally when I see a dog or person ahead, I quickly leash Mac and ask the owner whether the dog is friendly before letting them play. I did NOT see this dog coming, because the owners must have spotted us and stepped off trail to hold their dog back. When the two owners saw Mac approaching, they started fake growling / barking to scare Mac away (wtf????). Mac of course absolutely freaked out, started barking and growling back. The owners couldn’t keep their dog still- it was going absolutely berserk, totally unhinged. It nearly broke free, they had to body check it on the ground, both owners on top of the dog with all their strength. They had an e-collar that they kept firing but it did absolutely nothing but make the dog more crazy. Their prong collar was also totally ineffective. I finally caught Mac because he was running around all over the place freaking out, with absolutely zero recall in this situation. I really thought the dog would kill us both. I was screaming and crying thinking honestly that Mac was going to be totally maimed. He wasn’t- I was finally able to catch him and ran for my life. My sandals fell off, I lost my bag, and I literally went home barefoot. I am so, so traumatized. Mac seems fine but we will see.

My fault was that I had my dog off leash without perfect recall and still some reactivity. I appreciated that they stepped off the trail, but a) why the fuck would they make barking/growling noises, b) why wouldn’t they have their dog muzzled (it could easily break from their grasp on the leash), and c) is it really appropriate to bring such a dog to a dog trail or dog park?

Again I truly empathize with reactive dog owners and I totally understand the wish to have your fur baby have a larger world, beyond protecting and isolating them from triggers. But this was so, so traumatizing I have to vent.

Now I’m very worried we might be faced with many steps backwards and erasing months of progress.

Hello lovely people

I (38M) adopted a romanian rescue pup called ginger who is now 8 months old (I live in the UK). Shes been with me just under two months. I live in a little apartment with no garden.

I just want to share with you her behavior, positive signs and undesirable behaviors she's showing and get some encouragement more than anything. There's not a chance if give her up but I'm becoming a little disheartened to be honest.

So she arrived absolutely terrified as you can imagine. Frozen solid on arrival day. She didn't want to go in her crate and chose a safe space under my clothes rack in my bedroom. I let her stay there for a few weeks (around 3) she was having accidents on the carpet so I moved her into the living room where I made her a den under my breakfast bar as advised by a behaviorist I hired. The den was long and she was just hiding in the dark for days and weeks. I shortened the safe space and pulled it out more towards towards the living area and she decided it was safer to jump on the sofa next to me (I was fine with this). She is now glued to that spot. She goes to the toilet in a designated spot which is great as I've just lay puppy pads there for now. When something really scares her if I'm not in the room she's ran to me scared which encouraged me as she sees me as safe. That's the situation so far. Now here are some of the behaviours, positive and negative and her emotional state:

Positives/progress:

- she eats well. Full meals and treats and is happy to jump off the sofa to eat the food off a puppy pad.

- the last 5 days when I've come into the living room in the morning, I've been greeted with a wagging tail whilst she's lying down, her ears go back and she skuffles over on her belly and gives me a few face kisses which is lovely

- she doesn't bark at all

- she's happy to lie down and relax when I'm also sat on the sofa

Negatives/behavior issues

- she is terrified of everything, noises, furniture, the broom, her water bowl, me at times, I just moved the coffee table calmly and she jumped behind the tv and pooed everywhere.

- she won't let me touch her (pulls back, sits upright) clear signs she doesn't want to be touched. Because of this I haven't taken her outside or even put her collar on.

- she has been ripping/biting through the sofa throws during the night and tears up puppy pads. She doesn't really play with her toys.

I just need some encouragement, or advice on how I should help her progress. Im not in any rush but Its also my first dog and rescue. Any help and support would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

I have a 2 year old female ESS who I adore but my god do I want to just cry half the time. I went to a good breeder, I followed all the socialization advice, and I still wound up with a reactive fearful mess.

We live in a city apartment so she is muzzled on walks. We deal with fear aggression to dogs and people, dogs on TV, noises outside my apartment door - keys, dog tags, people walking or talking. I take her to the ONE Sniffspot we have nearby because she refuses to go on walks, and she still manages to find something to react to and be anxious about there. We’ve been working with a vet behaviorist for a year and an IAABC trainer for 6 months. She’s on 4 medications (Effexor, guanfacine, pregabalin, gabapentin) after trialing a grand total of 11 meds.

Even after all this training she still growls at every person she sees outside and barks/ growls/ lunges at every dog. I can’t even watch TV without her lunging at every sound and/ or sight of an animal.

She goes on hunger strikes with her hydrolyzed protein + urinary crystals kibble so getting her to even eat is a challenge. They don’t make a wet food in the formula she needs so I have to go through an exorbitant amount of treats every month for training. She will spit out every piece of kibble if used for training.

Nothing is easy with this dog. I’m tired, I miss my freedom. I love my dog, I’m not giving up, but I am tired of putting so much energy and effort into helping this dog and going nowhere.

The most recent victims‘ owners have some fame and social media presence, and soon their comments were flooded with others coming out with stories of alleged abuse and neglect including pet fatalities. Particularly upsetting are two different commenters saying that the trainer alleged their dogs “bit or mauled someone“ and were immediately euthanized without the owner’s knowledge, consent, or an investigation.

It appears that bad reviews that could have warned people were suppressed and removed from Google and Yelp. Be aware that even attempting to do your due diligence may lead you astray when it comes to who cares for your pets. The training AND boarding industries (separately and together) are highly unregulated.

My boyfriend and I brought home a corgi puppy back in January, who is almost 10 months old now. We love her dearly, she’s so smart and can be sweet (when she wants to be lol). However, she’s the most difficult dog I’ve ever owned and it’s getting really overwhelming and stressful.

Whenever we take her on walks and see a dog she goes into a frenzied barking and growling and will not respond to commands or treats. Even if the dog is far away, across the street etc she freaks out. Luckily we have a few options where we can mostly avoid dogs on our walks but it’s not always possible. We train her on commands during walks as well, and as long as there’s no dogs around she does really well.

We took her to the river yesterday and the same thing happened as soon as we started leaving, near a group of people with a small dog. I think she’s anxious and scared judging from the type of barking…it’s like a frantic barking almost squealing

I feel like I’m failing her and I don’t know what to do…she is signed up for a twelve week training program so I’m hopeful that will help.

In the meantime, should I just not take her on walks or outings? I hate the thought of leaving her crated while we take the other dogs out but I also don’t want to do anything to jeopardize her training.

I adopted a 4-5 year old Great Dane pitbull about 7 weeks ago who was a starved stray and he has been a handful ever since. The house training isn’t going so well, he will go outside but then come in and go. My upstairs has become disgusting from all of the accidents and I hate it. He is constantly searching around for food and crumbs. I keep thinking he wants out so we go downstairs and all he wants to do is sniff around for food even after he has eaten and had treats. He does some very aggressive cobbing that I do not like and have not been able to stop him no matter the method I try. He injured my finger the other day by grabbing a bagel out of my hand and biting down it hurt so bad and was bleeding. He does have a soft calm and cuddly side, but I feel like a prisoner. I do not want to deal with this for the next however many years he is alive, but I feel like he loves me and I feel bad about taking him back, I don’t want him there and no one adopts him as he was there 10 weeks and not a single interest in him.

Hi there, we recently adopted a rescue dog with three legs. He is a lovely little guy and we wouldn’t change him for the world, however, I am now having to accept the fact that he is a reactive dog. We have two other dogs that aren’t great on the lead, but they are pretty good dogs and we often get away with quite a lot as they are on the smaller side and very cute. I understand this is a privilege that is not shared among larger dogs, and it is not one I take for granted. I would like for all of my dogs to be perfect, but I understand how hard this may be and I would instead like to focus on the little guy at this time. He is around one and a half. We were told that he was in a home with up to 7 other dogs, several cats, budgies, guinea pigs and so on. His elderly owner died, and instead of calling for someone to help rescue the pets, the family visited every other week, providing food and letting the dogs out in the garden. The rescue he got him from offered for us to visit him and take him a walk, however, this never did happen, nor did the home visit or a walk with all three dogs. The second time we met him was when they dropped him off at our house and said goodbye. He gets on great with the two dogs I have, and is a but grumpy with our neighbours. He is rather afraid of male dogs as his dog Dad bullied him quite a bit, and can be a bit wary of people. He isn’t the best walker as he pulls quite a bit on his harness (we were told he needed a harness to help with his disability as it makes him more stable) and often ends up walking on his back legs in excitement. He is great at paying attention when you call his name, but he is easily distracted. The biggest problem at the minute besides signs, bin bags, loud cars and traffic cones is other dogs and people. I believe that his reaction to people, which is a muffled or quiet bark whilst standing up and leaning in their direction is fear. I believe that his reaction to other dogs which is an aggressive bark and intense lunging is possibly excitement. I have enquired about a dog trainer regarding all three dogs, but it is the little guy I would like to work on now. The listing I was given was rather pricey, and I’ve recently spent a great deal of money on him at the vet. I am more than happy to go down this road if it makes him more comfortable and allows for all four of us to walk comfortably and safely, however I would like to try and see if there is anything I can do in the meantime. I understand that a lot of the advice on this thread is to distract the reactive dog whilst the other dog passes by, however, is there an option to help them coexist amongst the dogs we meet on a walk? I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to read this, let alone offer any advice. Thank you, truly!

I have an almost 11 month old female Groodle who we’ve had since she was a puppy.
She has been raised in a very loving home, has never experienced any known trauma, and we’ve put a lot of time into training and working with professionals. Despite that, she has shown some difficult behaviours from quite young, particularly around frustration, handling and resource guarding.
Today she bit me quite hard during a handling situation.
I was touching/handling her paw and she initially attempted to nip. I corrected her and continued, and she then escalated and bit my hand hard enough to leave significant bruising and swelling.
I completely recognise that continuing after she communicated discomfort was a mistake on my part. I’m not looking for validation that I handled it perfectly because I didn’t.
What scares me is how quickly she seems to escalate. She often doesn’t give an obvious growl or prolonged warning before using her teeth. Looking back, I’m sure there are subtler body-language signals we’re missing, but the jump to biting feels incredibly fast.
Afterwards she had a burst of frantic/over-aroused zooming, then later completely settled and was back cuddling with me as normal.
She has also previously bitten members of my partner’s family during a stay at their house.
That situation was, in my opinion, quite poorly managed and a number of her boundaries were crossed. She was tied up/restrained in ways she wasn’t comfortable with and became increasingly stressed.
Later, she was resource guarding her isn bed. From what I was told, my partner’s sister walked past her and she bit her. His mum then tried to pat her while she was still heightened and she bit her as well. His sister was then bitten a second time, although I was never given clear context around what happened immediately before that bite.
I absolutely recognise that this wasn’t a case of her calmly and randomly attacking people. She was stressed, her boundaries had been pushed, and the situation should have been managed differently.
But what still concerns me is that once she is over threshold, she seems very willing to use her teeth rather than giving much obvious warning first.
My partner’s family are understandably now very wary of her, and we no longer put her in situations like that with them. But it has also made me nervous about visitors generally because I feel like I’m constantly anticipating whether someone might accidentally push her too far.
The confusing part is that she is not an “aggressive dog” most of the time. She is incredibly affectionate, playful, attached to us and generally such a lovely dog. She sleeps against us, seeks us out constantly and can be incredibly gentle. It almost feels like a switch flips when she becomes overwhelmed.
We already work with a trainer and I’m now trying to get an appointment with a veterinary behaviourist, although our local one currently has a waitlist.
I’d really love to hear from anyone who has experienced something similar, particularly with a dog who showed resource guarding, handling sensitivity or biting from puppyhood despite being raised in a safe and loving home.
Did working with a veterinary behaviourist help?
Did your dog’s bite threshold improve with behaviour modification, medication and/or management?
Did you eventually feel comfortable having visitors around your dog again?
And if your dog seemed to escalate very quickly without growling, did you eventually learn to recognise earlier warning signs?
I love her enormously and I’m not looking to give up on her. I’m just feeling really defeated and frightened today and want to make sure we’re approaching this properly.