Fear aggression towards other dogs

Owner: Mrs Wiltshire
Dog’s Name: Milo
Dog’s Breed: Jack Russell
Dog’s Age: 4 years old

Mrs Wiltshire contacted me over her concern for Milo’s aggressive behaviour towards dogs, some he would accept whilst others he would run at from quite some distance away, very aggressively, but as yet had caused no damage to another dog. Taking Milo for walks had become very stressful. Once Milo started to run towards other another dog he would not respond to Mrs Wiltshire’s effort to call him back.

Milo also pulled quite badly on the lead.

History

Milo had been rescued from a dog’s home at the age of about 3 years old. His behaviour card had indicated that Milo was not good with other dogs but this was recorded as being a fear-based aggression. He was very sociable towards people especially towards the carers at the Rescue Centre.

There was no record of Milo having any previous training – puppy socialisation classes or adult training, so I had to assume that the chances are that he had not had sufficient socialisation towards dogs up to this point.

Mrs Wiltshire had tried to control Milo’s aggressive reactions, by running after him shouting and then grabbing him by the scruff if he ran towards another dog whilst off lead (he was now muzzled on walks). On lead she would also shout at him and give him a firm check on the lead.

Mrs Wiltshire had done no formal training with Milo since re-homing him.

Thoughts / plan of action

As with most rescue dogs, it is very difficult to get a clear understanding of where a current behaviour started, or how previous owners had interacted with the dog during these aggressive sessions. We have no social history or training background to go on. But what we can do is to start addressing the current owner’s interactions and work on trying to build in some social skills and better general control. It was clear from our first few outings with Milo that his behaviour was fear based but made worse by the type of interaction from Mrs Wiltshire during these aggressive episodes.

He would run towards other small dogs, very growly, when he got there he would run around them growling, barking and doing little snapping behaviours. When larger dogs approached he would try to get away and on one occasion he just ran home.

Firstly I needed to increase the owner’s confidence with her dog and to increase the strength of the recall command so that at least Mrs Wiltshire could call him back and stop him from running towards other dogs. At this point we were not addressing the issue but putting it under better management.

Over the next few weeks we worked with Milo to better socialise him and get him more relaxed around bigger dogs. For this we worked on a 1-1 basis using my 6 dogs as stooges. We started off by just walking together all dogs on leads and in a relaxed state of mind. It is surprising how quickly dogs begin to accept each other by just walking together.

Once Mrs Wiltshire could see that Milo was happy to be around my dogs even without his muzzle she began to relax a little and we could start increasing the intensity level.

To do this we worked with just one of my dogs at a time, Milo off lead, doing recalls away from my dog for lots of treats each time he came.  We did this with all 6 of my dogs one at a time so that he got a broader history of recall away from other dogs

We did the same thing again only this time I was throwing a ball for my dog to chase, as soon as my dog started to run towards the ball, Mrs Wiltshire would call Milo. If he came he got a treat, if he didn’t, Mrs Wiltshire would clap her hands loudly and say “ah ah” to gain his attention.

Over the following weeks, we introduced smaller dogs into the equation, waking at first all on lead, followed this time by walks off lead (muzzle on). There were one or two occasions where Milo ran at another dog, but Mrs Wiltshire was able to call him away much quicker than before.

We also carried out lots of socialisation where we did nothing other than let Milo and the other dogs be dogs, with the odd clap of the hand is Milo became a little intense, but overall he was great.

Progress was slow, but there are no quick fixes or magic wands with behaviour problems. Very often in cases like this owner confidence is low and they begin to get edgy when other dogs are around, this insecure energy feeds down to the dog and you get a reaction.

I worked with Mrs Wiltshire and Milo for about 6 weeks on a 1-1 basis before Milo came along to his first group class. All the other owners were very understanding of Milo’s behaviour (some had been the same route), which helped Mrs Wiltshire with her beginner nerves. Within 3-4 group sessions Milo was happily running around with the dogs in the group including another jack Russell and other smaller dogs, without his muzzle.