puppy acting agressive with son

[amcmillan]

Hi there-
Hoping someone has some insight on this. We have a 4 month old female boxer who is an absolute sweetheart. We also have a 3 year old boxer and two sons, 8 and 9 years old. The two dogs and two boys play and wrestle constantly, they are pretty much like 4 big puppies! Our puppy is the typical boxer personality, loves people, kids, to wrestle, play, etc. She also loves our 3 year old male but she is definetely more feisty than he is. She has already established dominance with him, he pretty much heeds her every command and if not she lets him know(growls or barks at him) and then he "behaves". She's never shown any aggressiveness to us whatsoever. Then last night she jumped up on the bed after they had all been playing (my 8 year old was also on the bed watching tv with me) and she curled up and laid down and my 8 year old was petting her. Out of the blue she just lunged up at his face and barked like she was trying to bite him. It scared my son to pieces and he started crying, he wasn't sure what was going on. This is our 3rd boxer and i've never seen ANY aggressiveness out of a boxer towards people before. I'm wondering if with the boys being young and always playing with the two dogs just like they are dogs themselves, could she basically see them as one of the pack and think it's ok to nip at them like she would to our other boxer if he was getting on her nerves. I don't know if she was just done playing and trying to go to sleep and him petting her was irritating her and she just dealt with it like she would another dog or what. Is that a reasonable assumption or could she just have a bit of aggressiveness in her? Either way, any advice for dealing with it would be a great help!!! We were told when we first got her that one way to let a puppy know that you are the "top dog" is to roll them on their back, hold their head, and not to break eye contact, make them break eye contact. When this all happened I yelled "NO" to her a bunch of times and then did that with her. I wouldn't let her get back on the bed after that and she just kept putting her head up on the side of the bed next to my son. She knew she was in trouble and it was like she was trying to say sorry to him. I'm not even sure if how i handled it was right....This was TOTALLY out of character for her. If this does happen again i would like to feel like i'm handling it to where it will stop her from doing it again, especially before she gets bigger. Any advice or input would be GREAT!!! Thank You

 

[luvfritz]

It almost sounds like your skin kids are getting the fur kids too worked up. The puppy must be taught to respect your son, in a nice way (no hitting by anyone). Maybe your son can just hold the puppy quietly, feed him, walk him - basically bond with him. It will take some time, but I'm sure this will work out. Just my opinion.

 

[Scorpio]

Myself I don't agree with roughhousing, I would rather play tug of war, fetch, ball playing, etc. Dogs don't know who they can play rough with except each other. Thats just my opponion.

 

[Chewy's Mom]

I definitely agree with Scorpio in that I would not let your two skinboys rough house with the dogs. It's already difficult keeping boxers' energy under control.

And I would bet that the nipping issue was a dominance thing. Rolling a puppy on her back is fine to do, but don't force the puppy to make eye contact with you. If the puppy struggles or stares back at you, the puppy is defying you. If the puppy looks away, she is submitting. And don't yell at the pup or anything like that while you are doing it. Just do it gently but firmly. And you really should have your son do it if the puppy is challenging him. The pup needs to learn to be submissive to him - she probably already knows to be submissive to you. So teach both sons how to do this properly and when to do it.

Good luck (and by the way our Chewy has the same nipping problem toward little kids - so you're not alone in this!)

 

[Mom3]

Originally posted by amcmillan
I'm wondering if with the boys being young and always playing with the two dogs just like they are dogs themselves, could she basically see them as one of the pack and think it's ok to nip at them like she would to our other boxer if he was getting on her nerves.

This sounds like a question best answered by Tulsa-Dan (BW's resident expert on dog behavior), but what you wrote about the puppy seeing your sons as part of her pack seems like a distinct possibility to me. It sounds like the pup has decided that she is an alpha-dog ~ not just over the older male, but also over your sons. A refresher course in defining the family hierarchy seems to be in order; I just wish I knew the best way to advise you to go about that.:rolleyes:

Tulsa-Dan, your advice is needed here!

 

[amcmillan]

Thank you all for your speedy input. I've been thinking about it all day here at work. Maybe i will limit roughhousing between the dogs and children if need be, as the first couple posts suggest. I've always just saw it as them having fun playing together. And the rolling of her on her back was definitely done gently and i didn't say anything to her when i did it. She stared at me for a bit and then looked away(she may be a stubborn one....). To be quite honest i wasn't even sure if that was a tried and true tactic for training, i just didn't know what to do when it happened. She's never needed any serious disciplining so far, just the occasional "no" when she puts her paws up on the coffee table looking for snacks. I'm anxious to see what Tulsa dan has to say. If she does in fact see herself as alpha dog to the kids as well as our other dog, what the best way would be to let her know it's not ok to nip at the kids. I think in the meantime I will cutoff wrestling and just have nice mellow (if that's possible with the 4 of them) play time for dogs and kids. Thank you again

 

[Eric J]

Rolling the puppy on to it's back and holding it down is called an Alpha Roll. If you do a search on it, you will find it does not work. Here is a link where Tulsa Dan discuss's it http://www.boxerworld.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23112&highlight=alpha+roll

I would definately reccomend picking up a copy of the Dog Listener by Jan Fennell and use the techniques in the book to teach your new dog the alpha hierarchy in your house. Especially make sure your children follow it also, so they are able to handle the new dog when you are not right there.

 

[Chewy's Mom]

Hey Eric (and Tulsa Dan if you happen to chime in),

My understanding of a true "Alpha Roll" is that it is kind of an aggressive, yelling in the dog's face, kind of punishment. I could see why this type of Alpha Roll would not be effective, and might cause futher aggression in a dog. However, what we have done is almost more like a time out, just very gently taking the dog and rolling him over, just gently keeping our hand on the dog's chest to give him a minute or two to calm down. There is nothing aggressive about this form of discipline, so why would this cause aggression? We have done it, and it has been effective with our boy. But I think what we do is just very different than a true Alpha Roll. Whaddaya think?

Monique

 

[Eric J]

I have not heard of it described with the barking, just rolling them over to assert your power over them til they give in, your barking description was the first for me (but then I dont have the knowledge of a Dan either). I did a search and came up with the following link for reading:

http://www.mans-best-friend.org/dom_train.html

I also did a search on this website, and came up with this thread, Tulsa Dan covered the topic:

http://www.boxerworld.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18624&highlight=Alpha+roll

I showed this thread above, but it has good stuff in it for sure.

 

[Chewy's Mom]

Thanks for the links, Eric. As defined by the first link, "The enhanced "human" version consists of throwing your dog on its back to the ground, holding him down by the throat, and staring into his eyes."

This is quite different than what we have done. We don't "throw" our dog on his back, or hold him down by the throat, nor do we stare into his eyes. I wouldn't do any of those things.

In your second link, I do like what Tulsa Dan had to say on the topic that instead of being a dominator, he is just the leader of his pack, and leads by example. This all makes good sense, and even though what we have done with Chewy is nowhere near a true Alpha Roll, I'm sure we could find something else that is effective. Some good food for thought. Thanks again.

Monique