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Food Aggression

1K views 4 replies 5 participants last post by  pets4life 
#1 ·
I hope this is the right place to put this post. I have a lab mix and for some reason he is food aggressive…kinda. He is 4 years old and I have had him for 2 years and 6 months. The old owners abused him and kept him in his kennel 24/7. Well I got him and you would never guess he was abused. He even loves his kennel. Well when I got him I would feed him and my toy poodle at the same time. My toy poodle would walk over to his bowl every time just to see if they got the same food and then go back to hers. He didn't mind at all. Well when I moved out I left my toy poodle with my mom and took my lab mix with me. He gets fed twice a day at 7am and 7pm (just like he was before) well now he is food aggressive. I don't think anything changed. He isn't food aggressive to me just to the cats and if there is another dog around. He gives them an evil look and maybe sometimes a low soft growl and the cat or dog always walk away. He has no problem with any human touching his food. He thinks the human will add something to the bowl I think. Well I have just been separating him from the cats at breakfast and dinner. He gets 15 mins to eat and if he hasn't touched his food then it gets put away until the next meal. Well I don't mind doing this i'm just wondering if there is anything I can do to stop this behavior. I'm getting a puppy on June 18th and of course I will feed them apart. Any advise will help.
Oh also when it comes to treats he has no aggression problems. I have all the animals sit and they all get treats one at a time. If I go to a friends house with him and another dog is eating dinner or has food down he is just fine with leaving it alone. Its just weird that he is only aggressive to animals when it's his dog food and his dog bowl.
 
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#2 ·
I don't think you have a serious problem.Separating the other animals and the new puppy from him is a perfect solution.I wouldn't do anything that would make him feel that he needs to protect his bowl.IMO that just makes dogs more anxious and the guarding behavior escalates.
He may be asserting himself as higher ranking now in the new household.The toy poodle may have had higher status before.Not necessarily a bad thing.Usually the critters peacefully work out how everybody fits together:)
 
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#3 ·
I feed my puppy in his crate and my other dog out in the kitchen so there is no question whose food bowl is whose. My older dog will growl a little if the puppy is out and tries to eat her food, but he doesn't care if she wants a sniff of his. I can take food away from them if necessary with no consequences. Once my puppy got hiccups and started choking on his food but wanted to keep eating. I was very glad I trained him to let me pick up his food, which I did until he was Ok, then gave it back to him.
 
#4 ·
My father ended up getting a dog from the shelter that had food aggression issues. She not only guarded her bowl, but would go to my dog's bowl when he was eating and run him off from it. It was an easy fix though, and just took a few steps and some time to get Shelly to quit this behavior. I started out having her sit and stay before I would even put the food bowl down. Then made her wait to eat until I gave the ok. At first I had to physically grab her and have her sit back in her spot several times for she would go straight to the bowl after setting it down. But as long as you keep correcting until you get the result the dog will stop challenging and start to figure it out. After she was consistent with sitting and waiting for at least a few seconds, I would give the ok. With each meal we would practice this, but extend the time she had to wait before I gave her the ok. When she could hold the stay for a good length of time I decided to add on that she had to focus on me while staying for she would previously sit there and wait, but fully focused on the food bowl! I'd also step it up a notch and take the bowl away while she was eating, and then go through the process of having her sit and wait again before I'd let her finish the rest. You want to be careful with doing this for some dogs will bite out at you, so make wise choices on how you plan to do this. Shelly was ok to let me take dry food away from her, but if it was canned or meat scraps she would snap out. I would move my body into hers and force her out in this instance instead of getting my hands in the way. Also adding in a solid correction for the bad behavior. Doing this repeatedly worked well for me though, so now she automatically waits to be fed until you give her the ok, and is fine with me even taking the meat away from her without a fuss. (I should also add in that I would feed my dog first before Shelly so to give him time to finish while I was training/working with Shelly. Shelly still eats last and has to wait until my dog is done eating before I'll give her the ok to touch her bowl. Works really well in putting her in her place and learning her position within the family.)
 
#5 ·
Don't feed dogs in the same aera, or cats or any other animal. They all get to eat in peace. ALwAYS or they will eat way too fast to finish it quick before the alpha dog comes in steals their food making it stressful. My cats are fine with my czech dogs but when they eat they all eat ALONE. NO cats no dogs no nothing.
 
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