Aggression

[Kelly Oliver]

I'm so distraught right now about my almost 2 yr. old doodle's behavior at day care.  She has been going one day a week to a wonderful facility for a little over a year now.  About 6 mos. ago, she started "stalking" a younger doodle-meaning, she would follow him around and try to correct his puppy behavior.  She started getting time-outs and/or being put on the leash to chill out.  Over the last few months, she has been picking on any of the younger doodles that happen to be there.  Today was the worst-the handler said she got very aggressive with the younger doodle (grabbing the scruff of her neck with her teeth), the younger doodle got mad, and a couple of other dogs, sensing something was going on, came over to check things out and wanted to get involved.  Why is my sweet girl doing this?  Has anyone experienced this with their doodle?

[Kelly Oliver]

They almost called me to pick her up early.  :-(

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Kelly, is she spayed?

I remember that you posted about her being an "alpha" from a very young age, that even at 3 or 4 months old she displayed dominance towards other dogs in training classes and groups of other dogs. Had you addressed this then, and this is something new that just started up again, or has she pretty much been this way right through and it's just escalating? Have you continued her training right through since puppyhood? If not, this might be a good time to get a trainer involved. I would not do classes at this point, I'd get a trainer for a private consultation/assessment and go from there.

I had a dominant female poodle once, not aggressive but very pushy, and she required ongoing training and reinforcement until she was about 12 years old; then she finally mellowed out, lol. This kind of temperament doesn't allow you to cut them any slack.

Good luck, I'll be interested to hear what other advice you get.

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Kelly, I am so sorry you are going through all this with your dog. I stopped going to dog parks with our Fudge because if there was one submissive dog there, Fudge would locate that dog and start acting badly. Other times, she would be an angel, but it made me nervous enough I just stopped trying. She never had a problem at daycare, but would shake before I took her in and just sit there not interacting with any other dogs, so we stopped going. She loves our other dog and puts up with so much from him. Do you think your dog is actually enjoying daycare? It may be too much for her and this is her way of acting out. I am no dog expert, but not all dogs get along with all other dogs and in my case, as long as Fudge gets along with the dogs that she needs to (dog sitter's dogs, my daughter's dogs) this is fine with me. The only thing I would not allow is reactiveness on a leash when we are out walking and we work on that daily.

If you are not ready to give up on daycare, I would think a animal trainer/behaviorist could help you. Good luck! I know we hear all the time that doodles love everybody and all dogs, but that is not always true, and sometimes we just need to accept our dogs for the dogs they are and help them with training reach their full potential. Meanwhile, your doodle still loves you and you love her!!

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

Well, I think it's really good that the Daycare is not letting her get away with this behavior.  Is she around dogs in situations other than Daycare where you are present, and how does she respond with other dogs then?  It really does sound like dominance and bullying behavior to me.  I have a dog who is extremely dominant.  We use the "nothing in life is free" approach with him.....he has to earn everything, including affection.  He is also on a structured training program.  What types of training have you done?

[Sequoia & Dudley]

Kelly, I hear your frustration and disappointment. My Dudley Dood is the most difficult dog I've ever had, which has surprised me no end. He requires constant vigilance and reminders that he is not the leader of the pack. As someone else said about her dog, he needs to earn everything. The hardest thing for me is learning how I am giving him mixed messages and cleaning that up. I have recently bought one more training book which brought things home for me - Leader of the Pack by Nancy Baer and Steve Duno. They begin each chapter by describing wolf pack behavior in the wild. Pretty weird, right, I mean which of our doodles looks like a wolf for cryin out loud! But their point is that dogs are still hard wired like wolves and respond to hierarchical cues. They do not think democratically. Get a democratic thinking human and a hierarchical dog together and you can have chaos. The human is sharing, the dog is thinking who's in charge here? I can't tell, so I'll try to be in charge. Ooops, wrong answer. Two things in my life that helped immensely. 1. Humans eat before dogs. (alphas eat first). We always fed Dudley before we sat down to dinner. WRONG. Now he eats while we wash our dishes.  2. Dudley is never allowed to walk in front of me. He can walk behind me or to the side (all on lead, of course), but NEVER in front of me. These two simple changes have given him a clearer message that he is a pack follower, not leader.

None of this relates directly to your immediate concern, which is the day care situation. The staff there seems to be pretty clear that your doodle needs correction. One thing that strikes me, though. It seems a bit like mothering behavior. Does she only boss around little doodles or does she direct her attention to other young dogs as well? I had a bossy Keeshond once whom we had to keep from small children. She definitely wanted those young puppies to know when their behavior was inappropriate -- sort of like a strict nun in a Catholic school. We kept a tight check on her when our grandchildren were jumping, playing and leaping. She also tried to boss our Akita (7 months younger than the Kees) around. That was a HUGE mistake resulting in a visit to the veterinarian and stitches in the Keeshond's chest. We tried to work through it, but each dog had her own kind of dominance, and the Kees never learned to leave the Akita alone. We solved it by finding the Akita a wonderful new home. That was based on our best judgement for what was best for the dogs, not on which dog we would have preferred to keep. (We kept visiting rights to the Akita because we loved her so much.) 

Anyhow, hang in there, work with the day care people, talk with them about what they see and what they recommend. But meanwhile, you might want to reflect on your relationship with your doodle and see what you can do at home to make the chain of command very clear.

No one ever told me raising a doodle would be as hard as raising a kid.  Good luck and please keep us posted.

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

This is a very good point about bossing the younger dogs around. Our Fudge will correct Vern when she thinks his behavior is inappropriate. For example, for some reason she does not like him to swim in the lake and when he gets out of the water, she will let him know that she does not like it. I don't know if she is worried about him or what, but she also does not like it when he acts like a baby in some situations. She is never aggressive with him, but gets her point across. This could be what Kelly's dog is doing, too. Good point.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Do you have some veterinary information on the use of Tums in dogs? I would not give additional calcium (or any other mineral) to a dog who does not have a deficiency, and if the dog does need more calcium in the diet, there are better forms of calcium than the type in Tums, which iscalcium carbonate. Calcium carbonate is not as well utilized as calcium citrate supplements.

Some information about adding calcium supplements to a dog's diet:

http://www.fetchdog.com/learn-connect/dog-resource-library/health/s...