Need advice

[Leann]

Can anyone give advice on occasional growling and snapping? I'd love to talk if anyone is willing. 

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Leann, Can you post some more information? How old is your dog? What situations cause him to growl or snap? I think you will be able to get better answers with more information. 

[Joani, Skadi & Elli]

Growling and snapping may be due to resource guarding.  There's good information online or your could have a trainer guide you.  Many dogs want to guard their belongings...training them to trade up for something better is the foundation of the training. 

[Stella]

Can you give us more information?  Who is the dog growling and snapping at - you, a child, another dog in the house?  What are the circumstances when this happens - around food or toys, if the dog is woken / startled etc?  How old is the dog?  Who else is in the household?

[Maryann,Roo and Tigger]

Another thought - is this a recent behavior?  Have you taken him to the vet?  Maybe he really hurts somewhere.

[Leann]

Bodhi is ten months old. My husband and I live alone with Bodhi and two little dogs. Its for the most part quiet except for family coming over once a month. He has always been protective of my hubby and really leery of men and new situations. He's the most intelligent dog I've ever seen and has to make his own mind up. He's not easily convinced that something is safe. Like riding in the car or a new Frisbee! He so sweet and happy. Rambunctious and energetic! Anyhow, last night we had a growl and snap at our house. But after talking to the hubby we came to some conclusions. We both assumed he'd outgrown the growliness. We let our guard down and allowed a very overstimulating and chaotic situation to happen. It has happened in the past with this same man family member. The whole family came to visit and walked in the front door loud, making over all of our barking, excited dogs. The gandbabies are yelling for my husband and myself! This scene moved into the living room with Bodhi absolutely hyped up, As he's bouncing up, jumping on and off the couch, my daughter and son in law were patting and greeting him, briskly like horsing around... and with a pull toy Bodhi had picked up. According to my hubby, Bodhi growled a deep growl and a second later snapped at the son in law. He caught Leos arm, didn't break the skin. I feel awful and will not allow it to happen again. Does anyone else have issues with their doodles? I've raised two big goofy labs and a german shepherd. I've never owned a big, sensitive dog. I love him and his super smart personality...with his quirks. Last night I was afraid we'd have to get rid of him but clearly see what went wrong. Thoughts?

[Joani, Skadi & Elli]

I'm sure most of us dog owners have had issues with our furkids.  I had resource guarding problems with my youngest doodle.  You can train them at any age.  Training takes time, patience and consistency.  I hired a trainer to come over to the house to handle several issues I was having with my girls.  Never stop training and re-enforcing.  I took in a six year old doodle about 3 years ago.  Her behavior was bizarre.  I had the trainer come to the house once again and after several training sessions, I stayed consistent with keeping her behavior from escalating.  We are Elli's 3rd home that we know...she's been with us 3 years now and not that she is perfect, but she has come a long way and we continue training every day.  The youngest, Skadi was a "resource guarder" even nipped at me once because I did not at the time understand what was going on in her mind.  So in order to get her through that behavior, took many many many days of "trading up' to get her to trust that I wasn't going to take any thing that she valued away without giving her something better in return.  She learned that it was no big deal for me to take a meaty bone away...this training took a good while.  Also, when the door bell rang or someone came to the door, the trainer taught us how to get the dogs to go to a "safe" spot until we allowed them to interact with "company".  When I come in the door, whether I've been gone 5 minutes or 5 hours, my dogs are always excited to see me...wagging their tales and trying to get my attention.  I ignore my dogs until they calm down and then I go to greet them.  Whenever my dogs presented an issue that I did not approve, I read articles online and took some online classes...Leerburg was one.  Stopping the "resource guarding" takes time, but this is really something that needs to be addressed.  

[Haley, Yeti, and Phin]

What kinds of things did you give her when you were “trading up?”

[Joani, Skadi & Elli]

When you have food in her bowl, approach her carefully and drop a piece of cheese, sausage, chicken, beef, something more delicious than what she has in her bowl.  Keep doing that several times a feeding.   Get closer with your hand as she gets used to you being by her food.  Same with anything she seems to growl over...a toy, a bed, a person.  Always trade up and slowly.  If she's chewing on a bone, drop the goodie near the bone...same concept as the food bowl.  Set her up, give her a "chew" that she loves and practice doing this several times a day.  She will hopefully soon learn that you do not mean to take her "possession'  away.  It takes a long time to correct this behavior, but it does work.  I can put my hand, face etc right in Skadi's bowl and she does not react.  I can take anything away from her and she does not bite me.  Please do not ignore this behavior...work on it several times a day.   i don't know that every doodle does this, but many breeds have this instinctual behavior.  When my son was 5 years old he was over at the neighbors and was bit in the face by a husky because my son was playing with the dogs food.  His dad was "supposed" to be watching him that day, but he was helping the neighbor clean up after an ice storm and wasn't paying close attention.  This can happen with dogs that display this behavior and the dogs haven't been trained out of it.  Scary.

[Haley, Yeti, and Phin]

Our guy has NEVER guarded his fold. His MO is typically chews/bones (at random times too) and items he shags that he knows he isn’t supposed to have. Sometimes with bones he completely happy giving them up to me and others he gives me a deep growl and eventually snaps when I grab It out of his mouth. He has never tried to bite me when he snaps, just a very aggressive loud bark. When he gets things he knows he isn’t supposed to have (socks, a piece of mail ect) usually he gives them up no problem but every once in a blue moon he decides he needs to guard it. 

He has sensitive tummy issues so besides his kibble he basically only ever gets boiled chicken. I will try to work with him with chicken and hope he doesn’t get bored of that and continue to guard.

[Carol and Truffle]

Good ideas; I remember back to when we had golden retriever puppies (many years ago; got our first in 1999, then bred her in 2004; had mom until 2014 & son until 2017) & being told that working with them from the get-go (as soon as we brought them home), handling their food bowl when they were eating, handling their toys, just lots and lots of handling while they were engaged with any type of activity, was key to them not building up a resource guarding reaction.

Now that we are expecting a Multi-gen Labradoodle puppy to come home mid-May, I'm having to learn this stuff all over again.

[Leann]

Thank you so much these are great ideas!!!

[Leann]

Thank you so much! Great ideas, we will definitely try this!