I've been trying to gather my thoughts for several days on how to write this post. Sorry for the length.
Dogs being discussed:
~ Bailey, male, 16 months, recently neutered, still on light duty.
~ Tucker, his brother, same age obviously, brought into household at abt 9 months and neutered soon after.
~ Suri, female, 5 yr old Shiba Inu, the "cop" of the house. Fearless.
~ Dolly, female, 9-1/2 y/o American Eskimo, very gentle personality, mostly blind.
Before, I might've said Bailey's resource guarding came on suddenly, but that's not true. As I thought about it, as I re-read my own posts, it was working up -- very slowly -- but it was escalating right under my eyes.
Tucker and Bailey, the two littermates got along very well for quite awhile. (months) Then a few tiffs. I learned as I went what the signals were. Things escalated and the tiffs became closer together. Always Bailey starting it.
It was resource guarding. It was guarding me and food.
I did recognize this and learned to change my own ways of dealing with things. There was improvement.
Then one day I was making dinner and opened the fridge and Tucker was right there... and Bailey went at him. So the food guarding had jumped a peg on seriousness level. Prior to this, I could be out in the kitchen for an hour or more, cooking, dropping things on accident and no fights or issues. The dogs might rush to pick up the thing I'd dropped, but no fights. For months we could work obedience, dogs side by side being given commands and no problem. Their one-year old birthday pic shows two dogs in a stay with birthday cake in front of them; no problem....
(Note: the food guarding is only towards dogs. Bailey has no issue with me putting my hands in his food bowl, walking by, etc. He's perfectly fine with humans being near his food. Also, this issue hadn't really come to attn because all dogs are fed seperately.)
THEN things ramped up with a bad backyard fight. First fight that seriously scared me. First fight I couldn't break up physically or by voice. I had Tucker on a tieout (he'd fence jumped recently) and Bailey free. I was walking between them when it broke out, but not paying attn to either one. I ran for the water hose, but by then time I got ready to spray, it was over. It was horribly nasty sounding and appearing. I told Bailey to go inside and crated him up. I examined each dog and strangely, neither one had a single mark? Isn't that odd?
I then went with keeping Bailey on lead indoors. This turned out to be the wrong thing to do. I was advised this was a bad idea, but didn't get that info in time... I had Bailey tethered to me and my blind girl came stumbling up and he went at her. Scared the crap out of her. Gave her a teeny mark below her eye, which did make the area swell and upset me tremendously. I barely interacted with Bailey for the next couple of days, I was so upset. I am quite sure the tethering was the problem there, as he doesn't pay any mind to her otherwise. I feel horrible for that.
I allowed no interaction between boys for a couple of days. I then slowly let them be around one another. Bailey would hackle almost instantly -- all the way down his back. Tucker would hackle in reaction to Bailey. Once I distracted them with our routine game of fetch, they'd focus on that and ignore each other. If Tucker got too close to Bailey, though, Bailey would hackle up. It was tense and I'm sure my tension did add to that, even if I was trying to be cool.
I was being pretty strong-handed at this point with Bailey. Watching him like a hawk and reprimanding him. I had the hose already turned on and waiting, just in case.
It was like Bailey had taken an overnight dislike to Tucker. These are dogs that have laid together, played together, licked each others ears and other parts... dogs that enjoyed one another for months.
So we had a few days of some rather high tension, but no further fights. Then Bailey was neutered, so we're on full rotate/crate now.
So now I am wondering how to "re-introduce" the boys when Bailey's neuter has healed. Start from stratch, dogs on either side of a fence? Get a behaviorist involved?
I should add -- my Shiba Inu, (Suri,) is the *bomb*. This girl puts up with absolutely nothing. Neither dog challenges Suri. I have *none* of Bailey's issues with Suri -- he doesn't dare challenge her and he knows it and doesn't try.
Is Bailey just being a bully?? Tucker is a nice dog that never instigates anything. Dolly is an even sweeter dog that never instigates anything.. and here is Bailey, going after those two -- but never the dog that will not put up with his crap - (Suri) ?? I tell you, he wouldn't even begin to get snotty with that girl. She is definitely the strongest personality in the dog end of the household. She 'controls' the blind girl by not letting her get too close to the steps when I've accidentally left the door open... she is the true "cop" of the house.... She's sure won a lot of my respect the way she bosses these big white boys around.
But anyway... I am sorry that was long and quite involved. Funny how life was pretty good for awhile with this pack and now we have this upset.
Rotate/crate will continue until I feel Bailey is completely past neuter healing and that's why I am posting now... trying to get some ideas and info for when real life resumes.
And yes, re-homing Tucker is on the table, but that's not what I want to hear at this point. I'd be very interested in hearing ideas as to management, my failures, what I should do on the re-introduction, future management, etc.. I'm not saying I won't re-home, but I'd really prefer people just pick apart what I've said and find where I've failed, so I can find where I need to work on, what I can do different, etc..
Thank you very much if you made it this far.
Dogs being discussed:
~ Bailey, male, 16 months, recently neutered, still on light duty.
~ Tucker, his brother, same age obviously, brought into household at abt 9 months and neutered soon after.
~ Suri, female, 5 yr old Shiba Inu, the "cop" of the house. Fearless.
~ Dolly, female, 9-1/2 y/o American Eskimo, very gentle personality, mostly blind.
Before, I might've said Bailey's resource guarding came on suddenly, but that's not true. As I thought about it, as I re-read my own posts, it was working up -- very slowly -- but it was escalating right under my eyes.
Tucker and Bailey, the two littermates got along very well for quite awhile. (months) Then a few tiffs. I learned as I went what the signals were. Things escalated and the tiffs became closer together. Always Bailey starting it.
It was resource guarding. It was guarding me and food.
I did recognize this and learned to change my own ways of dealing with things. There was improvement.
Then one day I was making dinner and opened the fridge and Tucker was right there... and Bailey went at him. So the food guarding had jumped a peg on seriousness level. Prior to this, I could be out in the kitchen for an hour or more, cooking, dropping things on accident and no fights or issues. The dogs might rush to pick up the thing I'd dropped, but no fights. For months we could work obedience, dogs side by side being given commands and no problem. Their one-year old birthday pic shows two dogs in a stay with birthday cake in front of them; no problem....
(Note: the food guarding is only towards dogs. Bailey has no issue with me putting my hands in his food bowl, walking by, etc. He's perfectly fine with humans being near his food. Also, this issue hadn't really come to attn because all dogs are fed seperately.)
THEN things ramped up with a bad backyard fight. First fight that seriously scared me. First fight I couldn't break up physically or by voice. I had Tucker on a tieout (he'd fence jumped recently) and Bailey free. I was walking between them when it broke out, but not paying attn to either one. I ran for the water hose, but by then time I got ready to spray, it was over. It was horribly nasty sounding and appearing. I told Bailey to go inside and crated him up. I examined each dog and strangely, neither one had a single mark? Isn't that odd?
I then went with keeping Bailey on lead indoors. This turned out to be the wrong thing to do. I was advised this was a bad idea, but didn't get that info in time... I had Bailey tethered to me and my blind girl came stumbling up and he went at her. Scared the crap out of her. Gave her a teeny mark below her eye, which did make the area swell and upset me tremendously. I barely interacted with Bailey for the next couple of days, I was so upset. I am quite sure the tethering was the problem there, as he doesn't pay any mind to her otherwise. I feel horrible for that.
I allowed no interaction between boys for a couple of days. I then slowly let them be around one another. Bailey would hackle almost instantly -- all the way down his back. Tucker would hackle in reaction to Bailey. Once I distracted them with our routine game of fetch, they'd focus on that and ignore each other. If Tucker got too close to Bailey, though, Bailey would hackle up. It was tense and I'm sure my tension did add to that, even if I was trying to be cool.
I was being pretty strong-handed at this point with Bailey. Watching him like a hawk and reprimanding him. I had the hose already turned on and waiting, just in case.
It was like Bailey had taken an overnight dislike to Tucker. These are dogs that have laid together, played together, licked each others ears and other parts... dogs that enjoyed one another for months.
So we had a few days of some rather high tension, but no further fights. Then Bailey was neutered, so we're on full rotate/crate now.
So now I am wondering how to "re-introduce" the boys when Bailey's neuter has healed. Start from stratch, dogs on either side of a fence? Get a behaviorist involved?
I should add -- my Shiba Inu, (Suri,) is the *bomb*. This girl puts up with absolutely nothing. Neither dog challenges Suri. I have *none* of Bailey's issues with Suri -- he doesn't dare challenge her and he knows it and doesn't try.
Is Bailey just being a bully?? Tucker is a nice dog that never instigates anything. Dolly is an even sweeter dog that never instigates anything.. and here is Bailey, going after those two -- but never the dog that will not put up with his crap - (Suri) ?? I tell you, he wouldn't even begin to get snotty with that girl. She is definitely the strongest personality in the dog end of the household. She 'controls' the blind girl by not letting her get too close to the steps when I've accidentally left the door open... she is the true "cop" of the house.... She's sure won a lot of my respect the way she bosses these big white boys around.
But anyway... I am sorry that was long and quite involved. Funny how life was pretty good for awhile with this pack and now we have this upset.
Rotate/crate will continue until I feel Bailey is completely past neuter healing and that's why I am posting now... trying to get some ideas and info for when real life resumes.
And yes, re-homing Tucker is on the table, but that's not what I want to hear at this point. I'd be very interested in hearing ideas as to management, my failures, what I should do on the re-introduction, future management, etc.. I'm not saying I won't re-home, but I'd really prefer people just pick apart what I've said and find where I've failed, so I can find where I need to work on, what I can do different, etc..
Thank you very much if you made it this far.