Category: Top Dog

I've had a female Jack Russel for about 10 years. I raised her from birth, and she was always incredibly close to me. She's always been a little haughty and doesn't love snuggling or too much petting, but she's always been happy and pleasant, even adoring, since she was little. My partner moved in with me when she was about 5, and she warmed to him immediately, and became his little shadow. All was alright, until about two years ago. Her behaviour has been getting progressively worse with me.

We have two other dogs, and I treat her the same I as I do them (the difference is that they ask for more physical attention); in fact, they get scolded far more often as they're quite naughty.

The behavioural changes were small at first. When I called her or asked her to follow a command, she would often look to my partner or not want to listen to me, and when I went to pet her (just a small pat on the head, which she previously enjoyed), she would get anxious and move away. For example, I would be sitting on the couch and would say hello to her (no pets), and she would simply get up and move to the other side or even leave the room. It was quite heart-breaking for me, but I assumed she had just bonded with my partner more. I had two other dogs that loved being around me, so I tried not to worry and to be patient with her.

Over time her behaviour has worsened. I will get into bed at night and she will leave to sleep downstairs unless my partner is home. She'll leave the couch if I sit down. She ignore commands. This evening, it is freezing cold outside and my partner is away. I got into bed, trying to be quiet and not acknowledge her so she didn't get spooked. Her reaction was to sprint downstairs and outside. I called her, but eventually had to go fetch her as it's cold enough she could get hurt. I put her in a bed on the floor, and she was shaking for a while and finally calmed down enough to sleep. My other dogs seemed not too fussed during all this.

I try to watch my tone and behaviour, so my frustration doesn't show, but it's getting harder when nothing seems to be working. I've tired ignoring her, rewarding good behaviour, and even getting my partner to help. Nothing works.

She also gets horrible separation anxiety. Despite her feelings towards me, she's fine if I'm home but howls and barks continously when left alone. Also getting worse despite training.

Has anyone had anything similar or can maybe see something I'm missing? I'm at my wits end and starting to resent this little girl I've raised from birth. I used to joke, but am seriously worried now, that it may even be something like dementia.

My gf and I rescued a 3yo male Australian Shepherd from the humane society about a month or two ago who had been surrendered from his previous home due to “not enough time” and now I understand why. I’ve grown up with this breed, and have trained them before so the hyper energy and need to work isn’t new to me. Coming home from the shelter we brought him into a pet store with other dogs and people present, 0 problems, as well as when he met our families and friends for the first week or two, great! But after that period I started noticing when he would see anyone in our apartment building, inside or outside, he would lunge with a very aggressive bark at both people with and without dogs. I have been working at positive reinforcing for not reacting and distracting, and have had multiple times where complete strangers have walked within feet of him without a single sound. However, it seems to be now reversing and getting worse again, and he hardly even checks in with me anymore. And when a reaction starts, it doesn’t end until I’ve dragged him away still barking and lunging. I’m a firm believer in positive reinforcement training, just unsure if I’m missing something here and any possible tips to add-on to my training.

My dog is a corgi mix, I’ve been wanting to go on walks with my dog to help loose weight. I’ve never really taken dogs for walks so I wanted to try with my dog. Though her attitude changes completely, she goes stiff and tries to hide herself. I fear it’s because family members wanted to train the dogs with shock collars to curb their barking, and I fear we made some mistakes in doing so… Now I figured a harness might be better for her, yet she acts all the same. Even when I get her out the door, she refuses to budge. I just don’t know what to do now, I need some advice on how to get her to better work with harnesses. Cause I don’t know what else to do. I will also note they do have a yard to run around in, but I feel walking would be more… stimulating I suppose?

Hello,

I have a 5 month old Malshi (Maltese shih tzu) who has become very very reactive when he gets overwhelmed/ overstimulated. He tries to bite (I call attack, but because he’s so small I don’t consider it an attack). We have been taking training classes at petco and the trainer witness it while we were trying to put a harness on him, he tried to bite just for trying to put the harness on. The trainer said he is too young to be acting like this and it’s not good. Did not make me feel good at all. I wanted to cry because we have never done any harm for him to try to bite/attack.

He did bite my sister one time when she was walking him and he tried to eat a piece of burger that was on the street, she took it out of his mouth and he made her finger bleed.

At home we have used the air corrector spray, bitter spray, treating when doing things correctly but he still acts this way.

I need help, I really do not want him to grow up to be a mean dog. I don’t know what else to do in terms of training to correct this behavior.

We live in NYC if that helps anyone recommend any trainers or places. At this point I am open to any ideas because I would like to correct this asap before he gets older

Thank you!

So its a bit of a funky situation I just was hoping for some opinions and insight for, and if anyone has any, some tips/tricks that i can do to try and reduce this behaviour

He is a 2 year old Hairless Chinese Crested, that I would say is 80-90% toilet trained. I have heard from many other crestie owners that the breed has a nasty toileting issue, including marking, and while he does still mark the house on occasion, i can tell these are not his marking pee's.

Some extra details and notes about the house and his behaviours:

• He has 24/7 access to the backyard
• I have also bought in indoor turf container for him, with real grass turf that i have put in the room he pees in, in hopes he will use that instead (also for cold weather months.) So far he hasn't taken to it other then pooping.
• During the day, he goes outside on his own to toilet, no issues at all
• During the night is when he will go and he has one specific room in the house he constantly pee's. Also because we have been unable to catch him doing it and re-direct him, I am aware he likely thinks this is an ok behaviour to do.
• I have done my best to get him to go to the toilet before bed, in the turf mat or outside, whichever he chooses at that moment. He doesn't always go (i wait about 10 minutes) but even if he does pee/poop before bed, more often then not when I wake up in the morning there will be pee in the room
• He does have 24/7 water access, however i am reluctant to do the method of pulling it up for the night as I am not a reliable morning waker, and dont want him to go without for too long because i couldn't get up in the morning (especially during hot weather)
• I did also try to crate train him the moment we got him as a puppy, but (as expected of his breed) he has major seperation anxiety (which is also why we elected on a doggy door installation instead) so at this time, crate training for his accidents is not an option

He is healthy, no medical issues that would cause incontinence, so I can only assume maybe he doesnt like how dark it is outdoors, but since he has an indoor option, im at a loss for what to do going forward. I think he goes between 4-8am when everyones still asleep. He was pretty decent with his toileting until the last couple months he's been peeing inside almost every night.

I know this is a long post, sorry about that but thank you for reading through it and i appreciate any tips

There’s the possibility I might be taking in my brothers dog (C), who I helped raise. However, my boyfriend’s dog (B), who I also helped raise, hasn’t done that great with her in the past. Looking for any advice.

The short of it is: C is around 7 years old. B is about 5 years old. When we first introduced them it was at C’s home, and B was less than a year. C “bullied” B a bit, and was definitely trying to assert dominance and teach B. Fast forward a few years later, and they meet again. C doesn’t try to dominate B, and is trying to play, but B is very anxious and wants to hide from C. They meet again a few months later and B is obviously anxious about C being there. B will run if C comes near and looks obviously anxious. However, B would walk up to C and sniff her etc, but when C acknowledged B did that, B would jump away.

Background:

C: grew up in rural area and then moved to city. Lived with me and brother for almost 5 years. Doesn’t eat on schedule. Like to graze throughout the day.

B: Covid puppy who was given away from his mother way too soon, around 4 weeks. For the first 3 years of his life, he was very rarely left alone. Never interacted with other dogs much. Is very regimented and follows a pretty strict schedule.

I lost my 17yr old Service Dog (Chihuahua) today. I'm not looking for sympathy as that just kickstarts my grief all over. He had Congestive Heart Failure for the last year of his life and required a lot of care; it definitely wasn't sudden.

I am not replacing him or getting another dog but I live alone in an apartment with no family or close friends in the state. I didn't want to be in an empty house all weekend to wallow so I got a Weekend Foster.

They didn't have any little dogs like mine but said they had a 8month puppy Terrier mix that was just spayed and needed a calm quiet place to recuperate and it was their smallest dog.

I picked her up and the dog is huge. I've never even spent time with a dog this large. It's about 50lbs and has no interest in relaxing. I take her out every 2 hours but she pees in the house on the off hour (1,3 vs 2,4) not peeing outside at all. There is usually no warning or signs and she often goes close to her water dish which seems odd. I've only ever had male dogs who have clear signs and will pee even if they don't have to when they see something to mark. She will smell pee and poop but not pee herself.

She doesn't know any trigger words like "treat", "outside", or "potty". But she is very smart and picking up "outside" already.

She's trying to chew everything and while I tried to pick everything up she can always get higher than I expect. She is currently chewing my bed pillows. I don't know what to do with her, I never had this trouble with my Service Dog and I did all his training myself.

I don't know if it's the size, the breed, or if I am just so used to my Hospice dog but I'm beside myself.

I plan to take her to the dog park 2x Sat and Sun. Is there a good time for that to coordinate sleep? Same with meals? Should she be eating close to bed or at 5/6pm?

I have a decent sized apartment but her zoomies are damaging furniture. Every time she's asleep I'm terrified to move or she'll wake up and it'll start all over.

I've learned my lesson, 20lbs or less for me. I just need to get through the weekend.

Any advice or ideas?

For context this would not be for self defense. I’ve been wanting to try something new for my dog to learn that she also finds fun and I got to wondering about a bite sleeve. My dog loves tug more than any other style of playing, and I was wondering if we could change things up a little by using a bite sleeve for this. My thought was this would allow her to sit and wait and have running starts and really go to town doing what she likes. I’ve been trying with just normal toys to do something similar, but when she tries she chickens about because I think she’s scared to bite my fingers. I also think it is important to say I would always be the one with the sleeves and giving the commands, never having someone else wear the sleeve and me sending my dog to “attack” another person.

She has a, imo, awesome drop command that would be helpful. She has also never offered to redirect on anything/anyone, even if I am giving her shoves or grabbing her booty to make her tugging more exciting.

Please don’t bash me if this is a horrible idea and I am stupid, but is this a good idea? Would there be any downside to using a sleeve over a toy? Any tips? Thanks yall

Context

I'm living with my parents for the time being, and they have a very anxious dog who they have not trained very effectively or consistently. I'm trying to help them out by educating myself on training and finding resources for them, but I'm having trouble figuring out exactly what I'm dealing with.

I've read through the guides on house training and separation anxiety, but their dog seems to display issues with both at different times.

He used to pee in the house whenever my parents would leave, so they started locking him in the office with his crate while they were gone. That seemed to work for quite a while, but more recently he started peeing and pooping in the office while they were gone. My best guess is that this is related to my arrival, and the anxiety of having a new person in the house.

We are implementing a new training regimen to help manage his anxiety, and so far he seems to be a lot more chill when we leave the house and come back.

The Problem

The issue that I can't seem to understand is his tendency to pee on stuff in the house when we are at home and in the same room as him. Sometimes this happens in rooms that he's allowed in, e.g., earlier this week, he peed on my parents' bed, which is where he sleeps every night.

This also happens in areas he's not normally allowed. E.g., I live in the basement and there's a gate preventing the dogs from coming downstairs. Earlier today I let him come downstairs with me while I grabbed something, and he almost immediately lifted his leg and tried to pee against a cabinet.

I'm trying to identify the root cause of the issue so we can correct it appropriately, but it's tough to figure out what exactly is causing him to pee all the time.

I really need help. We got an 1 year old American Foxhound puppy in November. She is sweet as can be but she is afraid of my in laws. So much she shakes when they’re and barks at them when they get home. She has gotten closer with mil but she is still on edge around her. The issue is that it has come to her refusing to go downstairs when they’re in the kitchen and ends up going to the bathroom on the carpet upstairs. Outside of these moments she perfectly potty trained. When they aren’t home she comes and goes out through the doggy door just fine and no accidents. I don’t know what to do because I have walked her down on leash or even carried her down to go out when they’re downstairs and she anxiously runs back to me .