# My GSD displaying dog/dog food agression - help!



## DawgHaus (Dec 21, 2011)

I have a 8 month old female GSD & a 3 year old Toy Poodle. They have been getting along fabulous till last week the GSD jumped the Poodle who tried to take her bone treat and then today when the Poodle tried to sneak into the
GSD wet food dish. (today she got canned Salmon) .
Now I know what you are thinking, get the Poodle away from her food but I can not watch them 24/7 and 
how do I know the GSD will not think of something else as her food? 
Generally the GSD is great, very playful, shares toys, with our dogs.
She does not like strange dogs, and so we do not try the dog park anymore.
:help:
My question is: Do you feel this is a bad situation waiting to happen?
Should I consider rehoming the Poodle. I love her but do not want to see
her get hurt and she is not the shy type. They are both females as well.
Please advice and why?


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

Hi DawgHaus, welcome to the forum!



DawgHaus said:


> My question is: Do you feel this is a bad situation waiting to happen?


It could, two females, one maturing into a pushy teen, the start of resource guarding - this is a situation that will require YOU to manage the two and not set up situations that could turn bad. 



> Should I consider rehoming the Poodle. I love her but do not want to see
> her get hurt and she is not the shy type. They are both females as well.
> Please advice and why?


That is a loaded question, and I'm sure it will draw some very hot responses. If it were me, no, the poodle was there first, has seniority, and if the situation was not workable, the new dog would be rehomed. Every situation is different of course, but I hate to see older dogs displaced by a younger dog. 

A lot of people post on here asking for advice on what to do about these kind of doggy squabbles over meal time. Often they say the same thing: They want a magic bullet that will ensure that the dogs are trustworthy when eating together in close proximity with no supervision (because, life is hectic, who has time to stand there and supervise,) and anything more is just too much effort, so if they can't be trusted, one has to go. 

I think, if as owners, we are dedicated to the safety and physical and emotional well-being of all our dogs, big and small, old and young, then changing up a few things from how we have always done things to ensure peaceful co-existence and prevent problems should be a welcome solution, instead of an unworkable suggestion. 

So a few things - 

Two females together can be bad news. If squabbles and disagreements escalate in frequency and seriousness, you may not be able to ever trust them together, not even for a second. This is were musical crates, 100% supervision, or last resort - rehoming one, comes into play. 

If the squabbles are limited to the food dishes, then it really does not take much to start feeding them separately. In different rooms, or one or both in their crates. It takes very little extra effort. My two are fine, and have not had any issues, but my female can be pushy and a bully, so I follow a couple of simple procedures to ensure that they both can eat in peace, and not feel like they have to fight for their food:

The alpha/older/senior dog in the household gets their food bowl first. The Beta dog will more naturally accept the alpha's position if he sees that I, The Supreme Leader of the Universe and Everything, support and respect Keeta's 2nd in command position. 

Keeta gets her food in the kitchen, Gryffon in his crate. I tell Gryff to get in his crate, he runs to his crate (in an adjoining room) and waits for me. I put Keeta's bowl down, then I bring Gryff's bowl to him. Lately, at meal times, Gryff runs to his crate and waits for me on his own without me saying anything, which is working. That's all the extra effort it takes:
Put one food bowl down, walk a few steps to the adjoining room, and put another food bowl down. That's it. 

They do eat together sometimes, but I stay there and supervise. No issues so far, as I have said, but a few seconds of my time ensures that it stays that way. 

So the squabbles over the food does not mean that it will escalate to bigger things, it may stay limited to meal times, and may stay limited to high-value meals, like the canned salmon. But your dogs, both of them, should not feel like they HAVE to guard their food from the other dog. Manage feeding time so that both can relax and feel safe that their food is theirs to enjoy. 

But I wouldn't get complacent about this. I'd stay aware of their interactions and always manage them AS IF there was potential for trouble.


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## middleofnowhere (Dec 20, 2000)

1. Feed them seperately and take up the food dishes when meal time is over.
2. Isolate for treats, too.

This greatly changes the attitude about food.


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## Mac's Mom (Jun 7, 2010)

My question is: Do you feel this is a bad situation waiting to happen?
Not necessarily. Are your dogs crate trained? One solution that worked for me was only feeding treats and meals in their crates or in different rooms blocked my a baby gate. I know you cannot watch them 24/7 but you can separate them while they eat. It worked for me. And I cannot explain why but after doing this for a few months I have been able to give treats freely w/o resource guarding. But I am careful to give them both a treat each time.

Should I consider rehoming the Poodle. I love her but do not want to see
her get hurt and she is not the shy type. They are both females as well.
Please advice and why? In my opinion, rehoming a dog is the worst case scenario...only an option after you've exhausted all other options.


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## msvette2u (Mar 20, 2006)

We have 9 resident dogs here and manage to keep them from killing each other over food/treats.

As others said, get crates for them (at least one for the Shepherd) and feed them in crates. Do not leave treats and food laying about.

If things escalate still you may wind up using gates, etc. to keep them apart.


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## sashadog (Sep 2, 2011)

We have two females that don't get along at all and my first piece of advise is DO NOT LET THIS ESCALATE! It is very possible that this will continue to get worse if you don't intervene and could carry over to the rest of their relationship. Not a guarantee but is likely. 

Feeding time is always a separated event in our house and the dogs actually really appreciate it, it's not punishment for them. They are all calm, don't scarf their food (like they did when they weren't crated), and although we've had multiple fights between our girls it's never been over food. 

Why would it be difficult to separate them? Are they free feeding?


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## Clyde (Feb 13, 2011)

No dogs in my house go near another dog while the other dog is eating. I don't even let them think about it. If I catch a dog eye-balling another dogs food or moving in on another dog I interfere usually by walking into the space of the dog until it looses interest. This way my dogs feel confident that when something is given to them it is theirs and they do not need to defend it because I defend it for them. By doing this my dogs can now be lying next to each other even if only one of them has a chew or something and they are totally relaxed. My most recent addition would start to get guardy with the other dogs if they were watching him from across the room. Once he realized that I would not let them do this he now lets them walk right by him while he is eating. Also this way all the dogs learn that they are not allowed to bother another dog while eating.

I only recommend this if you have a good relationship with your dog with regards to its food. If your dog has guarding issues with you and its food this needs to be sorted out first.

You do not need to watch them 24/7 but you do need to watch them when food is involved or at least be in the same room. There should not be food items or chews scattered around the house while you are working on this unless you are in the room with them.


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## Warrior09 (May 8, 2011)

Hachi and Bella are both food aggressive towards each other but not when Im touching or grabbing their food bowels. I usually just feed them in seperate rooms, I don't care to do that at all if it helps them and lets them eat in peace. Bella lets me put my hand in her bowel while she is hitting and she will lick in between my fingers to get a piece of kibble LOL and then she looks at me and licks me in the face LOL. 
Hachi is just a goof ball, I'll pour his kibble in his bowel and he will loook at me while chewing on his kibble and making his groaning noises that he is saying yum yum LOL. when he is done with his he will pick his bowel up and practically throw at me LOL which is funny to watch. I would love to have a cam corder and video tape it so you all can watch. My camera only does 10 secs without a memory card, which i do need to get.


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## DawgHaus (Dec 21, 2011)

*Thanks everyone -but one more question*

Thank you everyone for your advice. I do have baby gates all over 
so it's easy to feed separate but it's not the reg dry food that 
caused a ruckus but treat bones and canned salmon. 
I will just need to work on the GSD training more.
Before I got her I did allot of research to be sure this breed was not dog aggressive (like a pit bull) 
so she would be ok with other family pets and she is... 
she plays with my cats all the time. I think she prefers them to the 
other dogs. :hug:
One other thing, do you feel that spaying her would help her not have issues
with other females or agression?
She is not spayed yet because she had demodectic mange and is just
recovered from that. This mange is also the reason she could not be
socialized enough as a puppy.
I also have a mature boxer and of course the poodle. All girls, these two
are also spayed. The poodle is a bossy brat, the boxer very laid back.


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## msvette2u (Mar 20, 2006)

Demodex mange isn't contagious. You could have socialized her just fine.
Spaying won't help necessarily - but will help her not relapse with the mange, since hormone fluctuations will cause flareups.

As for canned salmon, separate for that too. Don't let them be together for _any_ feedings.


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## Clyde (Feb 13, 2011)

DawgHaus said:


> I have a 8 month old female GSD & a 3 year old Toy Poodle. They have been getting along fabulous till last week the GSD jumped the Poodle who tried to take her bone treat and then today when the Poodle tried to sneak into the
> GSD wet food dish. (today she got canned Salmon) .





DawgHaus said:


> Thank you everyone for your advice. I do have baby gates all over
> so it's easy to feed separate but it's not the reg dry food that
> caused a ruckus but treat bones and canned salmon.
> I will just need to work on the GSD training more.
> ...


The aggression you are discribing displayed by the GSD is a result of a training issue to do with the poodle not the GSD. I would work on teaching the poodle that all the treats in the house are not hers for the taking. I don't get why anyone would think it is okay to let one dog steal food from another dog. I did read the original post right? Both times the poodle was trying to steal food from the GSD?

Show your dogs that you are in charge and that you will not let one take advantage of the other they all must respect you and you will enforce the rules. I mainly mean don't let the poodle bother the other dogs while they are eating something.


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## mebully21 (Nov 18, 2011)

alot of dog breeds can be same sex aggressive - female/female or male/male. it all depends on the dog.. i agree to separate the 2 at feeding behind gates or crates, and since the wet food triggers it as soon as the dogs are done eating remove both food bowls and put them in the sink and add water and soap to them. if you continue to have scuffles over food it will spill over into toys and then the 2 dogs will have be be crated/rotated as they wont be able to be together. and you will have to do that for the next 15 years. some female dogs will hold a grudge,if that happens the dogs will have to be separated forever..

i seperate my 3 at feeding time, and once each dog is done the food bowl gets lifted and put in the kitchen sink and soap/water is added..


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## Oskar der Drachen (Oct 28, 2011)

his seems to be the Thread for me!

The issue I am having is between my 6 month old male GSD Bear, and the oldest dog in the house. The oldest dog is a female Fox Terrier Vixen and she is (best guess) 13?

Bear and my 1st dog, Fred (large 8yo Lab/pit/? cross) don't have any issues with food guarding, both are straight forward with food, and don't have sharing issues. They can eat close to each other in the same room. Bear did have some thieving issues from Fred, but this has been firmly discouraged.

Vixen is another story. Her choice of food is stolen, *any* stolen food is better than what is in her bowl. Vixen has indulged in active theft, even if she has her own food. I had taken to feeding Vixen outside the kitchen where my wife would take her food bowl outside with her.

Bear, not being stupid, has reacted. It started with a yip and rush if he saw Vixen coming into the room where he has his food. Bear has chased Vixen out of the kitchen even if she had not gone near his food. Tonight though, my daughter fed all three dogs in the kitchen. Raining outside. Fred always gets his food first, Bear is second, Vixen is third. Fred started eating, Bear started, and Vixen didn't want hers and was hovering.

Bear took a breather to get a drink and Vixen had a go at his food.

Dogfight, with all the bells and whistles. Vixen ended up pinned, and might have suffered injury had my 17 year old daughter not broken it up.

Thoughts? Have I answered my own question?

Thieving is a dominance game, Vixen is convinced she is four foot at the shoulder with teeth like railway spikes. She ain't. How can I bring her safely down the dominance chain? 

I don't see any way of elevating her, and I frankly don't want to try. She does not *need* any more reason to be aggressive and dominant.


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## jetscarbie (Feb 29, 2008)

Oskar and OP.....do you feed your dogs on a schedule? Or do you free feed?

I have never had a problem with my 4 dogs. They each have their own water and food dish. When they were younger....I always monitored and supervised them. If I had one dog that looked like they were more worried about what the other dogs had....I would redirect them back to their own dish. I also found that schedule feedings were the best solution. Once in the morning, once at night. If I just put food in the bowl and left it all day.....I would take the risk of one of the dogs surfing bowl to bowl. Bad for two reasons. #1 The dogs feel like they have to guard their food dishes all day. #2 One dog gets way to much food and one doesn't get enough.

If my dogs were to fight over treats and such....I would remove that item. Sometimes I will give them all their own bone. Works fine for awhile, then my oldest starts eyeballing the other dog's bones. Sometimes, I think my female tries to tease him. I just remove everybody's at that point.


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## Bismarck (Oct 10, 2009)

this is where crates work wonderfully for everyone (original op and oskar).
crate the dog, and feed inside crate.

no free feeding. they are fed on a schedule and if they don't eat their food, after a 20 min period to eat, it's picked up and they wait until next feeding time.


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## Oskar der Drachen (Oct 28, 2011)

I have a scheduled feeding in the morning and in the evening, as close to the same times as I can manage every day.

All the dogs have their own food bowl, but there is a common water bowl.

The bowls are in different corners of the room so the dogs face away from each other as they eat. The irony is that there is trouble when the food *isn't* that interesting and they are not focused so tightly on eating it and attentions wander.

I think the main issue is that Vixen is a small grumpy old bitch who *thinks* she should be in charge (but has always been 2nd place), and Bear is ten times her size male puppy who is 2nd in command now, headed for 1st place as Fred slows down.

How do I get her to gracefully accept that?


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## kiya (May 3, 2010)

Oskar der Drachen said:


> I have a scheduled feeding in the morning and in the evening, as close to the same times as I can manage every day.
> 
> All the dogs have their own food bowl, but there is a common water bowl.
> 
> ...


I feed everyone in thier own "space" I watch them, no intrest in the food around the 15 minute rule, fine I take the bowl up, saves me money, you get it for dinner.
Vixen sounds like my Apache, he gets very snarley if the other dogs even look at his food. It was never as big of an issue until I brought Lakota home. She is not afraid of him and they have this love/hate relationship. They will drink water from the same bowl or bucket at the same time. Water isn't as high value as food.
I don't give any bones unless Lakota, the pushy one is in a different room. I think she should respect his "space" she doesn't. I don't think you can really change how they feel about each other, well at least I haven't figured it out.


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