So we have a border collie, who we got from rescue at 8 weeks old.
We realised pretty early in that resource guarding with his food would be an issue, we think it stems from communal feeding at the shelter.
We have young kids and have taught them from day one never to go near the dog when he's eating or sleeping these are the number 1 rules, by which they abide for the most part.
Bear with me for the next bit...
So the dog now 15 months is starting to get bored of his grain free (very expensive) food, so puts off eating it unless he's certain there's nothing else. sometimes il mix it with some scraps or gravy etc, but he always eventually eats it.
He hadn't yet had his tea, before DH took him out for a walk, when he returned home he trotted into the living room to where my 5 year old was finishing up her tea (never normally eats tea in the living room, just let her as a little Friday treat) as dog was out for his walk anyway. He approached her and she was excited to see him so put her arms round him to hug him and he snapped at her scratching her nose. Her nose bled a lot but when we got it cleaned up saw that there was barely any mark looks more like a tiny paper cut really, but can't be easily seen.
She is naturally very shaken and upset, and we naturally were very cross with the dog putting him outside immediately. But being a collie and being very clever, he knew straight away what he'd done, and has been skulking in his bed ever since.
He's usually got a lovely nature with the children even the toddler, licking and playing etc, but the food has always been a worry for me.
Our initial reaction was "we've got to get rid of the dog" but in hindsight now, I know exactly what went wrong with the whole situation and that it could very easily been avoided.
I know this is incident is entirely my fault, on a number of levels, so I feel very guilty to consider rehoming the dog when the situation could of been avoided. However with 3 young kids in the house and life often busy, I cannot take the chance that this could ever happen again, and god forbid be much worse.
What on earth should I do? I love the dog dearly he's usually a great boy, but this is a massive risk.