What is the right reaction when dog growls at ds?

[allhailtheaubergine]

Dog is 11 month old rescue pup. Has spent some time living on the streets. Saluki cross with ?collie maybe?

Essentially a very sweet girl and adjusting really well to family life. She can't quite decide where to place 3yo ds in the family pecking order. Mostly they get on fine together, but occasionally he will give her a hug and she growls.

What is the best way to react?

show her that your daughter is above her and comes first! do not let your dog on to chairs, beds, settees etc without permission. feed your daughter and yourselfs before you feed the dog. and make sure the dog sees you do this. also get your daughter involved, let your daughter prepare the dogs food and hold the bowl (with your absolute supervision) this gives your daughter more control. you have to be firm with her, because it can easily escalate, shes only a puppy, you need to get it out of her now. a growl can always turn into a bite. dont be nervous around her or fearful in anyway and you need to teach your daughter never to be fearful of a dog. because your dog knows when your anxious. do you every groom your dog? thats a good exercise to do with your daughter. even if you feel the need to muzzle the dog. get her in the bath and have you and your daughter scrub her everywhere! you should be able to touch your dog everywhere without them growling.

if the dog growls remove your son.

a dog growling is essentially a 'piss off and leave me a;lone'

dont let your son hug the dog.

I thought the whole pack order and dominance thing had been discredited? I also think training a child never to be fearful of dogs is a very bad idea - there will come a time when your child meets a dog that isn't at all child friendly and your child not having any fear could be very dangerous!

how long have you had the dog? does the dog have a safe child-free place to go when it all becomes too much?

if the dog doesn't like being hugged by small people then I'd advise you train the 3yo to not hug the dog :)

Our 7 month old rescue pup has growled at dd2 (aged nearly 5) a couple of times, because she ignored my request to leave the dog alone (he was sleeping) and went to stroke him when he needed space.

In that case, he just helped me reinforce my instructions, as in 'see? Now Mouse is saying 'leave me alone', and the only way a dog can do that is to growl - or bite.' She's learned from it, and they are fine now

Telling your child off when a dog is growling sends the message to the dog that it is entitled to growl at the child. And more importantly, sends a message to the child that the dog is entitled to show aggression to the child.

I'd go with what Misslala says.

It's good to 'train' your DS not to hug the dog! Generally dog's just don't like children 'in their face' or being picked up by children (who can be a bit rough and try to squeeze them - I know they are only trying to be nice but the dogs generally don't see it that way!).

As far as I know, the 'pack system' training still works - the dogs need to know who is boss, so no, don't let them on the beds, chairs, etc and don't feed them at the table.

Teach DS how to feed the dog and use the lead. A well trained dog should let you remove his bowl or toy without tearing your arm off (not that I am suggesting letting DS try this!

Have you taken the dog to doggie-school (or whatever its called these days)? If you teach DS very basic sit-stay commands and give a small treat, then the dog is learning and it will be fun for your little one too.

We had a few rescue dogs which went from the soppy dopey dog to the crazed ex-guard dog (which we had for precisely one day as it tried to bite everyone, and managed to maul 2 people - stitches required - in a houseful of kids - what was my mum thinking?). If you don't know the background, then you don't know what situation or object may cause her to react badly.

well if either of my dogs growls at the kids someone get told off and it certainly aint the dog. if you do not allow a dog to growl it has only one other way of telling you to fuck off.

Pack theory has been discredited, children should not be hugging dogs, I dont think it soounds like any aggression at all, it sounds like the dog was saying leave me alone, please allow it the right to do that.
the dog needs to have a safe space where they can get away from children. you need to explain to your ds that it is the only way the dog can talk to him and if she does this he must leave her alone, preferably leave the room.

Another one who thinks that pack theory is total rubbish and a good way of getting bitten.

From what you say this is a child training problem not a doggie one (although there could be a lot of other situations where it could be the dog that needs help). Try to teach your DS to interact properly with the dog, i.e. approach the dog from the front, when the dog is awake, offer a hand for the dog to sniff and be aware of the dog's reaction. If the dog moves away then the child should not insist on contact. Dogs should have space to escape children and an 11 month old puppy is a child itself so it can't be expected to be 100% tolerant. Hugging the dog is not a good idea, at least not at this stage.

By all means though do involve your DS in the dog's training, that is a brilliant way for a child to learn to interact with the dog. Under your supervision get your DS to give commands to the dog and let him reward good behaviour.

Just to add - he did start doing a bit of 'guarding' around chews/bones. I have trained the children to leave him alone when eating/chewing, but I have also done a bit of training with the pup - swapping chew for high value treat, taking it away from him, then giving it back. So that he learns I'm not a threat to his chew

And I've since done that, when dog is relaxed and not guarding, with the dds by my side - so we give him a treat, take chew away for a minute, dd gives chew back. Hence, hopefully, showing him that dds aren't threats to chews either.

Now if I could train the dds not to be threats to my secret chocolate stash....

"Telling your child off when a dog is growling sends the message to the dog that it is entitled to growl at the child."

Well it is entitled to growl. In the same way as you would do the human equivalent of growl when someone is doing something you don't like.

realhousewife I think the issue is that a dog isn't necessarily showing 'aggression' by growling - it can be simply communicating 'I don't like being woken up/squeezed'. Which is fair enough, really.

If my pup growled during play (tugger for example), I taught the dds to stop the game and walk away. I don't tell the pup off, but he has learnt that growling isn't worth doing when playing with kids - they stop playing.

Mind you, he's never shown true aggression - just play growls, and 'go away' growls when very tired and disturbed.

I must have the 'pack' thing muddled up. I believe in treating a dog like a dog and not a 'little person' - ie feeding it at the table, carrying it around or letting it sit wherever it likes! Or dressing it up - that is truly sinister (especially the french maid outdits or swimsuits, deeply disturbing).

Another signing in for the Pack theory is complete Bollocks line!!

And as for not letting them on the sofa?? Pah fat chance in this house. Fluppy's upside down taking up half of it and the Staffy's sitting as close as he can without actually sitting on me.

The closest my 2 have ever got to growling at my DS is a woof when he forgets that he has treats in his hand for them. (A wandering autistic mine!)

realhousewife of course the dog has the right to growl at a child (or adult for that matter). How else is the dog supposed to communicate that it's not happy with the situation?

the growl described above is a warning - the dog is saying 'stop the hugging and leave me alone!' and it's a perfectly acceptable thing for the dog to say. It's not aggression, it's communication :)

I remove the child when our dogs growl. Telling the dog off for growling gives them no opportunity to give a warning if they feel threatened. A very dangerous situation then as the dog will snap with no warning. I teach DD that growling means leave her alone. I also do not let her near their beds as it is important that they have 'safe space'.

With our rescue dogs we have always made sure that there is a place in the house that the dog can go that DD is absolutely not allowed to follow her to.

When DD was 2 we had a JRT X, we put one of those 'soft crates' (umm a travel crate maybe?) under the table and DD was told that if the dog went there that she DID NOT bother her.

We've never allowed DD to 'hang off' a dog, but she certainly plays with them as if she is one IYSWIM. If ever JRT got annoyed and growled (like your dog is doing), dog would be told (not shouted at, just normal voice) to go and lie down, and DD told to keep away from her.

OP Has your dog got a place it can escape to? Would you be willing to give it one? Whatever you do, you must 'train' your child alongside training your dog. I understand your fear, but the dog has the right to be happy too.

I would agree with the poster that says to involve your DC in training the dog. Treat training works well when a child is involved (rather than fear training).

(Oh and dogs on the sofa? Well MuttDog isnt supposed to be - but I spend more time on the floor than she does!)

Absolutely - 100% agree about the child training issue and I have explained to ds all about how dogs communicate and told him very clearly never to hug the dog. There are grey areas though, as sometimes ds they will sprawl lovingly together to watch tv for an hour. I keep a close eye.

Yes, puppy has a crate that is entirely her own space.

The trouble lies in the fact that because she is a rescue, and because we've not had her that long, and because I don't know her history I don't know exactly what she is saying in the growl. If she is saying "please leave me to snooze" then that is perfectly okay and I agree with those who say she has a right to say it and ds must respect it. If she is saying "do that again and I'll bite you" it is less okay.

She would not growl at me in the same way, so I feel it might be a boundaries issue rather than a simple "leave me to sleep" in dog language.

Jasper growls when we play tuggy games, and my trainer said that was fine as it's a play growl and not a threat. In fact, she recommended growling back and occasionally even letting him 'win' the toy as a way to make the game fun for him. His tail is always wagging when he play growls.

Glad to hear she's got a safe place to go to :)

If she growls and your ds then stops what he's doing that upsetting her, you're training her that growling works (which is a good thing in this instance). Obviously none of us can guarantee it, but I'd suggest that she's unlikely to bite next time as last time growling worked, so she'll try that again :) So as long as your ds stops what he's doing when she growls, I think you'll be fine.

You might well find once she's lived with you for a bit longer and got used to how your ds behaves, she might growl less, even at the same behaviour. She's got to learn to trust you (and you to trust her) :)

I think her not growling at you shows she trusts you to be a bit more predictable. 3 year olds are much less predictable - mine shrieks at nothing, leaps about the place and roars fairly often.....

All hail - if she is saying "Do that again and I'll bite you" you should actually be pleased. Inhibiting a warning growl is lethal - this teaches the dog that there is no point in giving you a warning and they will simply escalate to biting. The dog won't be growling at you, since you are not a small child who is wandering over to hug it uncomfortably. And yes, dogs do have different boundaries with different people and again that's fine. We do too. We accept close physical contact from intimates that we wouldn't from relative strangers.

Please, please ditch any thoughts about "family pecking order". This bonkers school of thought has thankfully been discredited. Your dog recognises you as a human, not as a mysteriously clothed, bipedal dog who has a flat face! Fortunately your dog is also not a wolf, and does not behave like one. It would be like me advising you to rear your child according to the principles demonstrated by a tribe of chimpanzees. Have a look here at the APDT website www.apdt.com/petowners/choose/dominancemyths.aspx which explains some of the myths about dominance and common pet behaviours. The rest of the site has some very useful articles too.

Also, your dog sounds lovely - can we have pics?

What would you do if your DS hugged a friend in the playground and the child said "don't do that please I am not comfortable with being hugged"?

That is just what the dog is saying.

So the polite thing to do would be to stop DS hugging the dog - sorted

Sorry all the pack theory stuff is complete bollocks - the dog has no concern to truly dominate your family or your child. Just feels a bit uncomfortable being hugged by a fast moving child.

Telling the dog off for growling gives them no opportunity to give a warning if they feel threatened. A very dangerous situation then as the dog will snap with no warning.

A do should not feel threatened by a child hugging it. This is the issue here. You are putting the dog before the child. The dog has canine teeth that can rip a child apart. The child is not a threat to the dog and it is an adult's responsibility to teach that to the dog. Teaching a child fear of dogs is frankly absurd, coming from a dog owner.

realhousewife that is total bollocks, to be hugged is totally alien to a dog and there is no reason for a dog to suffer it if it does not wish to, some dogs are accepting of such things, some hate it.

Children do not have the 'right' to hug, cuddle and kiss dogs, that's what teddies are for.

[hmmm]

of course telling a child not to hug a dog is not outting the dog above the child. how obsurd.