For a very good guide to all sorts of dog training processes and dog behavior challenges, I use and recommend Clickertraining ...that link goes to the description of this terrific ebook you download immediately, wherever you are! -- Rosana

Dog aggression can turn up in a dog you dearly love and may have had for years. There may have been some subtle or not-so-subtle clues that your dog might attack or bite other dogs or even people, or you may not have noticed anything. Then, one day, something serious happened: your dog attacked another dog you own or he got in a fight while in a dog park. Or maybe he bit a child.

Whatever form it takes, dog aggression can be heartrending to the dog’s owner and a huge challenge to deal with. What are you going to do? How much time will it take to deal with this situation? Will it cost a lot of money?

All too often, dog owners do nothing after an incident of dog aggression.

After all, otherwise the dog may be very loving, well behaved, and fun. The thought of having to give away the dog, to do some unknown number of things to address the problem, or even to euthanize your pet if the event was quite serious, is just too much to deal with. There’s a natural human tendency to let it go this time.

But if you do this, you have lost something: you’ve lost some flexibility in your management and training options. If your dog attacks again, it may cause even worse harm or be at an even more inconvenient time for you to deal with it. Merely hoping your dog won’t display aggressiveness again isn’t a very good strategy.

So… what do you do? A veterinary consultation is an excellent idea, for starters, because there are many physical conditions in a dog that can trigger violence. I remember reading once about a beloved family pet, I think it was a Golden Retriever. Suddenly, for no apparent reason, she began snapping at the other dog in the family when it tried to play with her. She snarled at the people when they tried to pet her. They were beginning to come to the conclusion that she had gone crazy but they did take her to their vet. He found a hairline fracture in one of her bones. Once that was dealt with, she returned to her usual sweet self.

Another good reason to involve your veterinarian early is that if it does become necessary, tranquilizers are one of the management tools used in dealing with dog aggression. Xanax, Valium, their generic equivalents, and other drugs can be used, preferably to gain some time for you to work with a good dog trainer.

When I say a good dog trainer, that’s kind of a loaded phrase. Who you will think is good will partly depend on your own attitudes and beliefs about how to train dogs. Since you’re reading this on my website, you can just look up at the top of the screen and see my point of view. I am among the many dog trainers and owners who are finding that pain-free methods work best for all aspects of living with and training dogs. To find a trainer with this point of view, I suggest you take a look at the dog trainer search feature of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers. This organization, which I belong to, advocates dog-friendly training. This does not mean that every trainer listed will be using only pain-free methods, but you can ask questions of anyone in your area. By the way, this search feature lists trainers internationally.

Something you can start right away is management: getting your dog more exercise to tire him out and supervise his contact with others. Consider his food too: last year I wrote up a detailed case study of a dog whose aggression problems went away when his food was changed. That link takes you to the first of three articles I wrote about Marley. Working with him on training helps too, and often going back to the basics is a good strategy here. How reliable is his sit-stay or down-stay? Will he hold them even when distracted?

Clearly, I have barely begun to scratch the surface of this important topic. I plan to write more about it soon…. I’m working on an article giving tips about handling your aggressive dog, as well as an article listing other informative websites on dog aggression.

Here’s a book I liked: THE DOG AGGRESSION WORKBOOK by James O’Heare. The link takes you to Dogwise, which also has other books on working with aggression in dogs. And whatever you do, keep your dog and everyone around him as safe as possible while you address these issues! Dog bites are absolutely no fun.

[tags]dog aggression, dogaggression, dog bites, dogbites, aggressive dogs, aggressivedogs[/tags]

Training deaf dogs is something I’ve written about before, not because I have ever done it but because I’ve heard from some owners of deaf dogs. Recently I got an email from Becky, whose deaf dog Otis you can see in a previous article. He’s grown up a lot since then.

Becky can hardly write about Otis without exclaiming about how smart he is! She writes:

I had a gum ball machine here that held dog treats and instead of money going into it, it has a lever for the dog to use his paw to push down. Then dog treats fall out the hole, like gum balls would fall out of a machine for humans. This machine has been in my basement for several years, ever since two dogs I had before had died. The other dogs here are afraid of it. SO I had decided to give it away. I even had it in the box to go to Goodwill, but I kept taking it out as I did not have the heart to get rid of it.

I went and picked up the round treats from the pet store and filled it up. It took Otis about two hours to learn this. We had to take breaks while learning as Otis has had a very bad temper ever since he was a pup. I showed him what to do. He got where the treat came out from but did not quite figure what to do to make the treats come out. Then he started smacking the machine around with his paw because he was so mad that he could not figure out how to get the treats to come out.

SO after a few breaks and two hours he finally got it to work on his own.

I do enjoy stories about how “differently abled” dogs manage in this world. I recently had a first-hand taste of what it’s like not to hear well, because for nearly two months I had a persistent ear infection which at the worst cut the hearing in my left ear down to about half of what I’m used to, giving me loud tinnitus in that ear to boot. Happily, I am completely back to normal, but it was quite a learning experience. I have a new compassion for the hard of hearing, of whatever species! Of course, I was going without a faculty that I was used to having, where Otis seems to do just fine in the world he has always known.

If you happen to have a deaf dog, or know of one, here’s a page where I review a couple of books about living with and training deaf dogs.

[tags]deaf dogs, training deaf dogs[/tags]

Where do you get your dog supplies? If you are like many people, you do some shopping online for dog beds, leashes, toys, car seats, and all the other things you may want for your dog or dogs. It’s more convenient — well, unless you happen to live right near a big box store for pets! But even then, there is so much variety online that you can get exactly what you want. If you live in a remote area or have small children (or puppies) that keep you home, online shopping is better too. I’ve used it a lot myself, getting many of my own dog supplies from eBay, Sitstay.com and a few other places.

So a while ago, I started another website, Online-Dog-Resources.Com. So far it’s mostly resources from eBay, organized into categories… It uses “datafeeds” from eBay, so the listings are current every time someone goes to a page. I used to be a librarian, and I do love to organize information! I include some tips for buying on eBay, such as how to register and get the hang of eBay, how to evaluate sellers, and more. It’s really amazing what you can find there. Often the prices are really low, though you do have to be a bit watchful.

I just mentioned Sitstay.com… it couldn’t be more different from eBay, and I like it a lot too. A family-run business in Nebraska, they carefully test every product they carry. There are discussion boards and some dog training articles written by one of the owners of the business, herself a member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers, as am I. So far, I only have one link to them over at my new site, to Clearance items at SitStay.com. A good place to start looking around!

I’m planning to add lots more resources, from a variety of online stores, over time.

To get to my new site, Online-Dog-Resources.Com, just click on the dog at the computer! I didn’t draw it… it’s clipart that I have the right to use, and every time I look at it, it makes me smile. I wonder which of my dogs will be the first to push me away from the computer and take over!

[tags]dog supplies[/tags]

If you’ve been clicker training your puppy or dog, there will be times when you don’t have a clicker handy. How do you handle the training then?

Well, this has come up quite a bit for me lately, as our Rottweiler, Lola, has developed a good understanding of the basic commands in the months we’ve had her. So I often find that I am using the sit, the down, the stay, and the recall in our daily lives at moments when I don’t have a clicker in my pocket.

You can do a couple of things in this situation. Give the command or cue, and then when the dog does what you want…

[1] Click your tongue. It’s a clicker that is always with you, even though it doesn’t make as crisp a sound as the kind you buy!

Or..

[2]  Use a praise word, "Gooood!" or whatever you like.

In either case, if you don’t have treats on you, use enthusiastic praise.

MAKING A TRANSITION TO NOT USING CLICKERS MUCH IN DAILY LIFE

I hope you’ll reach a point where your dog knows all the basics. Then, while you may choose to train more advanced behaviors or tricks with a clicker, you may not need one much in daily life.

Just ease out gradually, sometimes using the clicker, sometimes not. By the same token, you can sometimes you a treat, sometimes not.

You may notice some backsliding, and then it’s a good idea to go back to more click-and-treat routines. For instance, I noticed Lola coming less willingly if she didn’t think there was a treat involved, so I have fooled her several times by in fact having the treat. I’ve also done the reverse: during what she knows is a regular session,not giving the food treat every single time once a behavior is pretty well established.

FOR LOTS MORE ON CLICKER TRAINING

See the ultimate site, Karen Pryor’s Clickertraining site.

[tags]clickertraining, clicker training, dog training, dogtraining[/tags]