# Recent Growling at Kids



## Acuna (Jan 4, 2016)

My male GSD, Milo, is a little less than two years old and is intact. Within the last two weeks he has started to growl at my oldest daughter (8 y/o). There have been four times to date. It is a low, quiet growl, no teeth being barred, but definitely not good.

The first two times it happened was when he was eating and my daughter walked behind him a few feet. She was not approaching him or anything like that, just walking by in the kitchen. I was not there but my wife was and she took action to dominate him.

The next time it happened was two days ago when I was sitting in a chair with Milo at my feet. My oldest daughter walked up and he did the growl. I immediately corrected him with a verbal correct.

The last time was last night and he did it while we were all in the bedroom getting the kids ready for bed. 

None of these situations have involved the kids draping themselves on Milo or being annoying, just coming up.....

A bit of background about our situation. We have had Milo since he was 12 weeks old. Milo is trained (by me) and knows his basic commands (SIT, DOWN, HERE). He is exercised daily (sometimes twice), and my wife is a stay at home Mom so Milo gets a lot of time to roam the house and interact with people. We do not let him on beds and although he sneaks onto the couches from time to time I immediately tell him OFF when I catch him. He is crate trained and sleeps in his crate at night. He has very high prey drive (lives to catch frisbees) and is not super food motivated (doesn't immediately go to his food bowl when you feed him).

99.9 percent of the time Milo is great around the kids and loves to sit outside and watch them while they play in the yard. But for these four incidents, he has been so dang sweet with them and loves to play with them. And yes, we monitor him when he is interacting with the kids.

He does bark at strangers, but will stop when we tell him to, and he plays well with other dogs. He will respond in kind if a dog acts aggressively towards him. There is an intact german shorthair pointer down the street that does not like Milo and is always trying to fight him. They dusted up once, but other than that it has just been posturing and growling at each other. I would categorize Milo as protective, but heads up and not one to growl or bark without reason. He very much looks to us to see how we view the person or dog and follows our lead. He has been a great companion and great protector of the kids. We picked him because he had a personality that was more mellow and better suited for a family.

But back to this issue, I do not believe the growling is food aggression. What I think is going on is that Milo is growing up and is trying to establish himself as higher up than the kids in the pack order. My wife and I are clearly the alphas in his mind. I have read some articles on the internet that suggest correcting him harshly when he growls like this is a bad idea because it teaches him not to growl and he might just go straight to biting or snapping to assert dominance without giving a growl "warning" first. I definitely don't want that, but I do want him to know the kids are above him in the pack and that is all there is to it. I have stepped up the NILIF stuff with Milo since this started and are making my kids do it too so that if he wants attention from them, wants to go outside, etc. he has to obey their obedience commands before they reward him.

Any advice? Will neutering Milo help with this issue? I feel like I need to make an appointment with an animal behavior trainer...

Thanks in advance for any advice. Let me know if you have any questions or need any additional information.


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## Gers4lyfe (Aug 3, 2016)

Can you incorporate your daughter into his day to day dynamics
Such as putting his cOmar and leash on him when it is time to walk, teaching her to walk him on the leash at heel, feeding him with some sit stay control?
These may be some simple ways to elevate her within the pack.


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## LuvShepherds (May 27, 2012)

Do the children tease him, play with his food or are they active and loud around him? Something made him think they are a danger to him while he is eating. Growling is a warning. I would start feeding him in his crate away from children and give him complete peace when he is eating. All that alpha stuff makes us feel good but this isn't about alpha, it is about him warning your child to stay away. There is more going on than who is above him in a pack.

You might want to let your child put the food in his crate and then walk away and let him eat alone.

I just saw it happens at other time. I would involve the children one at a time in some of his basic obedience, too. He needs to not think of them as threats and for some reason he does.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

With a dog that does that, I just accept it as part of his temperament and I never allow those situations where its come up. He's not fed where the kids would be around, he's not allowed in their rooms. He's not allowed to lay where he may think he has some claim to that spot. I know there's are a lot of people that will disagree and say a behaviorist can change his perception, and do all these things. I won't chance it with the kids. Any obedience comes from me at that point too. I take more of a "The kids are mine" approach. In the past, we've tried having the kids tell them to sit and they'll reward them, different things. I just find it easier to change the conflict or competition, whatever it is between that dog and the kids by eliminating first the situations and then with firm rules and ob from me, watching how the relationship changes with the kids. Its worked pretty good for us.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

See if this makes sense with what you're seeing Acuna. Think in terms of respect. Some dogs are just born with respect for family members, the kids too. Some aren't. One of mine has that respect for the kids, automatically. Its hard to explain in just words, because you can just see it. The way he moves for the kids, the way he looks at them. One of mine is friendly and loves contact and affection with the whole family, but he doesn't automatically respect them. I could probably end up with situations like what you're seeing with him, but I just don't allow it to ever come up. That's where you see these things come from, that escalation of uncomfortable to growling to biting. The dog can love the whole family, but not respect them all.


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## LuvShepherds (May 27, 2012)

I agree with Steve, except children come first. If I had a family dog that could be a danger to my children, I would either fix the dog or the dog has to go. How can you have friends over to play with your children with a dog that might harm them? Where do you keep a dog in the house where it can't have access to the family members? That means isolation for the dog.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

Some dogs are just not going to accept strangers in the house, and if those strangers are kids, I'm not chancing it. Isolation is relative to their temperament. Some of them are just better off kenneled when kids come over. You don't isolate them from the family. You just don't turn them loose to do as they please. Instead of laying at your feet between you and the kids, he has to lay over there. Its just more of a focus on obedience and how to behave then trying to make a more pleasant association. You can do that later once you've created those kinds of house manners that eliminates the competitions or confusions in the dogs perception of things.


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