Ressource guarding... seemingly without ressource??
Okay, my darling akita can sometimes turn into a vicious moraine fish, who pops out of her "hole" and attacks without warning.
She has done it a lot with visible ressources like food, toys or her sleeping spot. But yesterday we went to visit some friends of mine. She has met them before, and likes them. They have a dog themselves and she's the sweetest thing, never does ANYTHING. Eowyn just growled when she greeted because she was a bit enthusiastic, but later on the evening she sat beside the sofa, there was nothing of interest (food, toy, me or sleeping spot) and the other dog walked by without even looking at Eo and she launched an attack!! We had to pull her off the other dog.
Now I'm assuming she felt there was a reason ofcourse but I can't figure it out. It makes me kinda uncomfortable that I cannot predict these attacks, My friends are not too pleased having their dogs attacked - naturally.
Maybe she froze for a quarter of a second before she launched but it was no way near long enough that the other dog would have time to react and it was so short that none of us saw it.
Any ideas/thoughts om this?
She has also attacked my shepherd quite bad, but that was because the shepherd walked by when Eo had a horsepoo.
She has done it a lot with visible ressources like food, toys or her sleeping spot. But yesterday we went to visit some friends of mine. She has met them before, and likes them. They have a dog themselves and she's the sweetest thing, never does ANYTHING. Eowyn just growled when she greeted because she was a bit enthusiastic, but later on the evening she sat beside the sofa, there was nothing of interest (food, toy, me or sleeping spot) and the other dog walked by without even looking at Eo and she launched an attack!! We had to pull her off the other dog.
Now I'm assuming she felt there was a reason ofcourse but I can't figure it out. It makes me kinda uncomfortable that I cannot predict these attacks, My friends are not too pleased having their dogs attacked - naturally.
Maybe she froze for a quarter of a second before she launched but it was no way near long enough that the other dog would have time to react and it was so short that none of us saw it.
Any ideas/thoughts om this?
She has also attacked my shepherd quite bad, but that was because the shepherd walked by when Eo had a horsepoo.
Comments
Couldn't she be guarding the couch? Especially if the attack happened later in the visit, after she was more comfortable with the environment and after both dogs were more comfortable with each other.
I have found that when dogs calm down and start to figure out the "rules" that social disagreements will start to happen. At introduction to the new situation/misgovernment, if they do not initially attack each other out of (over) excitement, then there is a short "honeymoon" before social order starts to formalize (and I don't mean alpha/dominance) and at that point you will start to see disagreements.
The more important question here is - how bad was the attack? Did she injure the other dog?
As for how to "fix" the issue, it will depend on your answer to the questions above but I would say you are giving her too much freedom/trust. She clearly doesn't deserve that much trust if you feel she is unpredictable. I'd leash her to you next visit, or put her in a crate - take away some freedom - set her up for success.
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Resource guarding is one thing, and personal space is another... in my limited experience.
Many of our foster dogs are clueless when it comes to our shibas' personal space. Our shibas constantly correct new dogs when they are overly invasive or just plain intrusive. Our shibas will not attack, but they will get the point across that they don't like certain advances into their (self designated) zone.
One foster we had - a border collie - was so goofy and happy all the time, that our shibas actually started to just let it go because Lexi the BC just wasn't fazed by the corrections. They never attacked her, they just started to avoid her when she was playing.
Resource guarding I find to be very specific, and very serious. This is where I've seen more attacks happen when warnings are not heeded. Every dog we've taken care of that has these guarding tendencies always seem to zero in on something specific. Their eyes get wide, they show teeth and growl. They hover over the thing. Very intense display of "don't touch this".
The foster we have right now guards his entire area from our other dogs, and he guards high valued bones from me. We're working on trading him for items. And we limit his space little by little so he knows our dogs are really not a threat to his situation. Overtime he is getting better, but its definitely tense and could always be dangerous.
Like Brad said, taking steps to set the dog up for success goes a long way in managing and ultimately reshaping the behaviors.
So I guess if it were me, even without knowing how bad the "attacks" were, I'd take this as a fairly serious sign that Eowyn has a tendency to resource guard, and that you need to work on it. I'm not so good on knowing how to work with this, honestly (I obviously DID NOT do it right!) but I would think that Brad's idea about giving her a little less freedom might help. How about working on getting a solid "go to your place" command, so she knows she's supposed to stay in one place even if she something intriguing, like another dog, going by? I wonder if more work on impulse control, and "leave it" might help too? Doggie zen?
I'll be interested to hear people's suggestions for training in these kind of situations, as I could use some ideas myself. Oskar is mild in his resource guarding, but he does do it, and we've already discovered everyone simply must be separate if there is food, but I'm also noticing he's hyper interested in his toys, and I worry that might begin to be guarding. Right now he's still willing to play with other dogs with toys, but I've seen him "collect" all his toys (actually ALL the toys!) in a pile and lay by them, and I worry that will develop into more pointed guarding.
eta: btw, the description of her as a moraine fish--I'm seeing a moray eel there!--really struck home as that was exactly how Toby was--seemed calm, then he leapt up snarling and snapping. We call him the cave troll.
@brada1878
I guess she could be guarding the couch, but I think that would be VERY fast for her to consider it her property?? We'd been there like 2 hours at the most. Maybe I am not as prepared for the spitz mind as I thought I was... this really worries me!
No one got hurt at all (thanks to thick plush coats) but Eo had a really firm bite and we had to yell and pull quite a bit to get her off. I'm not saying that was the best way to handle the situation, but I got really freaked out and I wanted Eowyn off the other dog RIGHT AWAY!
@tsukitsune
Nope, she didn't correct the other dog at any time prior to the attack. Eo is a 7 months old pup and the other dog i 5 years old. I guess I had hoped that there would not be much disagreements about who will bow to whom, when the agedifference is that significant, but clearly I have a very bold akita. Or a very frightened one. I'm leaning towards the last...
She did not seem stressed, but she was not in her comfort zone since she was a visitor in a place she's only been once before. She curiosly checked it all out and said hello to my friends and looked at the monitor in the terrarium. She didn't seem stressed no... No panting and tail up.
NO warning growls at all!! We didn't even see a freeze or anything!
@shibamistress
I'd love to try teaching her "place" or really ANYTHING at all, but I can't even get her to sit on command, she is still refusing any treats
If I google moray eel, I get the animal I am comparing her too, but moraine fish also gives the same result. Anyways it's the really mean looking eel/fish that lives in caves in reefs fx and shoot out and grab their prey with no warning at all
all too often guarding behavior is actually reinforced and strengthened by the owner when they react to it incorrectly. i am BOARDING a shiba now that has this at a very dangerous level
take away all her toys she has, stop feeding by bowl and start feeding everything by hand and starting teaching her operantly that all resources are yours and will be enthusiastically provided to her for behavior you LIKE to see
fwiw, this has nothing to do with fish or a spitz mind and you should never consider and accept this is a behavior you have to manage - it MUST be extinguished and can be - if not - it should absolutely be euthanized - but don't get too stressed about that yet :-)
well... I disagree. My current foster was ready to take my hand off when he first came to our house and after almost three months of working with him he's making progress in very small increments. Otherwise his temperament is eh, decent, but it seems extreme to even think that death is the ultimate solution for a resource guarder. It's natural, and it's understandable for a dog to guard limited resources.
@Brego - check this out: http://ahimsadogtraining.com/blog/resource-guarding/
it does work, I promise. It takes a long time but progress is possible, each step is important.
So how do I handle this? I close the door to my room and feed him in there. He has only ever been aggressive with food towards me a few times and it was entirely my fault on every occasion. He doesn't have a problem there, it's only with other dogs, and it's a perfectly normal behavior.
The link Tsukitsune posted is good, I used some of those techniques with Conker and they worked pretty well. I can take anything from him, even a chicken thigh he's got halfway down his throat, but I WILL NOT do that unless he is choking on said chicken thigh or for some reason it poses another danger to him. (Same goes with everything else.)
Read that page and see if it helps Eowyn.
Losech,,,,,and others :
READ my posts in their entirety b4 commenting on a few words you take OUT OF CONTEXT
- if i tried to put some hypothetical percentage of a dog that would have to be euthanized IF AND ONLY IF (which is HIGHLY FREAKING DOUBTFUL) the problem could not be fixed, it would probably be somewhere significantly less than 1%
- but NO dog on earth is worth more than a childs face . period
- of course here are those frustrated few that will just dump it at a kill shelter because they don't have the guts to deal with it themselves. THAT also happens and you should know it unless you have been living under a rock folks ! IMNSHO, the OWNERS killed that poor dog - not the shelter
and SADLY, there are some dogs that will fit this category . that's reality deal with it and accept it
or FIX it b4 it gets worse !!
some of you must really live sheltered lives
or take the isolationist approach :
and lock em in a room and isolate the poor bastard if you are too LAZY to learn how to deal with it and take the time to correct YOUR dog and protect others who may come near it when you are not paying attention
- CLEAR ENUFF ??????
and just so you know how strongly i feel about this issue, if your (whoever it may be) dog EVER, happens to do this to a child i hope the guilt follows you to the grave, because it is YOUR fault, which in 99.999% of all cases only takes a little knowledge and a lot of time and patience to cure
STOP isolating and rationalizing your problems and start learning how to make them go away
but probably the one i disagree with the most is this statement :
"Children should only work on the conditioning step under adult supervision"
i strongly disagree and feel that children should NEVER be allowed to participate in the training of a dog with resource guarding problems.
- they should never be allowed to interact with any dog that has this problem to ANY degree until it has beed resolved (referred to in behavior circles as EXTINGUISHED).....and also verified resolved through a thorough proofing process.....if you do not understand EXACTLY what proofing is, write me
and fix it !!
exactly my feelings too :-) :-) :-) :-)
Now you'll have to forgive me on this, because I don't know nearly as much about training as the majority of people here, but should we still be talking euthanizing if it's only resource guarding with another dog? If it simply growls, or possibly nips at another dog that's trying to take food from it (never bites down and never actually made contact with fur), but never a human?
I have a similar problem, but never with humans, and not to the same degree as Eo, but so far all other dogs have for the most part backed down when she growls.
Buffy knows that all items are mine (a human's) first, and hers second, but with dogs she definitely is a growler if they try and grab her food, this is still clearly resource guarding, and it's being worked on, but honestly I think it'll probably never fully go away.
I'm not saying one should assume this to always be the case, as that would be rather dangerous, but the link above as well as the suggested training seems geared toward a dog that resource guards from a human. What about a dog who resource guards with only dogs?
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I would study canine communication, body language specifically and you will eventually begin to see when Eowyn will start showing signs toward the another dog that she wants it to retreat. The signals can happen in a very quick sequence, so I can understand that it's hard to see them and have enough time for you to make a quick decision. In my opinion, the problem is the fact that the other dog did not read Eowyn's distance increasing signals, and Eo had to escalate her aggression to get her point across.
I wouldn't correct Eowyn for her behavior (meaning punishing) because it doesn't sound necessarily that out of the ordinary. You should manage and avoid situations where this is more likely to occur, so maybe keep the dogs separated in the evening time so they both have a safe space to relax in. I've heard some dogs' seratonin or dopamine levels drop in the evening and it can cause them to become more irritable. I don't know if anyone else has noticed this in their dogs, but Kohji can be more irritable in the evening if I disturb him when he's sleeping somewhere.
It wouldn't be a bad idea to encourage the other dog to retreat from the room and reward it. You can also work on the "come" command with Eowyn, so that you can tell her to come to you and redirect her if you notice her anxiety level heightening because of another dog in the room. Maybe buy some DAP diffusers and plug them in around the house, a DAP collar on Eowyn couldn't hurt either. Those are just a few things I think could help, and there are many more ideas out there, I'm not sure what has worked for other people.
http://www.angleseypetclinic.co.uk/pdf/dogs/aggression.pdf
maybe it has worked for others, but redirection has never been an effective TREATMENT for resource guarding in my experience
kwyld : resource guarders are often handling aggressive too...one problem tends to reinforce the other
when i am out with the black shiba i am currently boarding, and he has crashed after some intense well deserved play sessions, and is now laying down beside me chilling and resting peacefully, he would immediately try and rip my hand off if i reached down and affectionately laid my hand on him as anyone might do with their dog in a similar situation .... probably regardless of how many DAP collars he was wearing :-)
(no i have not tried the chemical method but if you send me a few dozen i will and report the results on this list ... i have a backlog of dogs they can be used on if the owners agree
in most cases, this is not a problem that can be cured quickly and i doubt it can be done thru the use of chemical agents.....of course anesthesia would manage it for some period of time :-)
- this is such a common problem that if there was a reliable chem fix, the whole pet world would quickly know about it via the net and the manufacturer :-)
- it may be in the same category as using melatonin.....i have used that and have some anecdotal data of some effectiveness for some dogs
if anyone is successful with treating resource guarding with the application of DAP, please document it and publish it and send me an advance copy
that wasn't necessarily obvious in my previous post
I don't know of any really helpful links that help us understand guarding between dogs.
You can definitely use the tools on that link to work with your dog so s/he always trusts your judgement in a situation where they feel they need to guard something from someone or another dog.
Anyway, the tools on that website helped me. Some of my fosters guarded from me, and some from other dogs.
When I have dogs that guard from other dogs, I rely on management and time.
It works, everyone stays safe, and we slowly let the dogs learn that the food isn't going anywhere.
Management:
- I never *ever* leave toys, bones or food down when a new dogs are interacting, and I block off areas that dogs may want to guard (my male shiba tends to want to guard under counters in the kitchen)
- I always supervise their interactions whether or not there is resource guarding tendencies
- new dogs are never alone together, even when they are just visiting
Time:
- Over time, we start letting toys stay down when everyone can agree that toys are for sharing
- Over time, I start handing out treats when they are together
- Usually time is measured in months, it takes a long time, but its worth working towards
I'm not sure how often Eowyn wil be in that situation, but it helps to manage and work on convincing her to leave things, share things and trust you to manage the situation for her.
My "whoa" was more to the confrontational tone this thread has taken. We on the forum try to disagree with or instruct each other respectfully, objectively, and without making character judgments. I'm not speaking in any official capacity, I just feel it's more appropriate and effective if we take a more charitable tone when we disagree with each other. I believe I'm not alone in feeling this way.