# Aggression towards new puppy



## badcalorie (Oct 6, 2011)

My almost 2 year old GSD, Kona, is giving me some serious problems with the new puppy. Puppy is 8 weeks and male, Atlas is his name. First introduction happened on neutral ground. They sniffed a bit and things seemed promising. We went on a walk for about half an hour (had to carry puppy most of the time) and came home. They sniffed each other a bit again at home, but Kona tried to bite the puppy. He yelped and cried. I'm not sure if she actually made contact or just scared him. There were no bite marks. He is unharmed physically. 

So, now we are keeping them separated. Their only contact is with Kona on leash and kept at a distance, or through their kennels. Once in the past week, she has growled and snapped at him when he walked up to her crate. I have a nice, leather basket muzzle on order for Kona (the cheap nylon one makes her uncomfortable and she can't breathe well). She really has no history of aggression. Gets along great with my other mutt and well with almost every other dog she has met. She is testy during first introductions, but always warmed up after a while. She has never met a young puppy prior to this. 

What are some ways I can get them to co-exist together? I know that keeping the puppy safe is the number one priority (why the new muzzle is on order). BTW, the older mutt loves the puppy and I really hope Kona can warm up too.


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## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

Ok, what I did with my snarky female and Beau gthe new puppy is she met him on her terms while he was in HIS crate. When she got to where she was choosing to be with him then we got them together. 

Whenever she showed polite interest I was all over how good she was. I made sure that when he went past her crate I was there to eyeball things. Now after 4 days it all seems good. And I can take them outside together no problems.

We made sure the meeting was offlead where she could get away and we could grab her if she went for him which she did not. It worked.


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## mysweetkaos (Sep 20, 2011)

http://www.germanshepherds.com/foru...3-im-back-heavy-heart-i-need-your-help-3.html

Not sure if I put the link to the other thread correctly or not There was a lot of good advice to a similiar problem in this thread. Hope it helps. I can say, while it may be very time consuming I have found the slower the integration goes the smoother it goes.


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## Rexy (Jun 4, 2011)

People nowdays argue with my methods of controlling aggression but I am a firm believer of setting consequences for aggressive behaviour which has never failed me yet.

What I do with pups and older dogs is have the pup in the crate and the adult on leash and let them get to know each other first through the crate mesh. If the adult lights up at the pup, a firm no and hang the adult up and air block him/her straight away. I don't give the dog an inch to think that aggression on the dogs terms will win, it's an instant loss with an air block and is surprising how quickly they learn.

Once they are fine together pup in crate, I bring the pup out and the wife and I control one dog each the adult on leash and slowly increase their interaction together supervised.


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## kiya (May 3, 2010)

Rexy said:


> a firm no and hang the adult up and air block him/her straight away. I don't give the dog an inch to think that aggression on the dogs terms will win, it's an instant loss with an air block and is surprising how quickly they learn.


Bitting my tounge now.


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## catz (Dec 10, 2010)

I dont think that method should be recommended for a number of reasons. Air blocking is not the way to go OP. Introductions that are slow and fun for both dogs involved are much better.


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## mysweetkaos (Sep 20, 2011)

To the OP I would be very wary of treating aggression with aggression. There are a variety of reasons besides being "cruel" I would worry it teaches your older dog that around you he must behave....fact is you won't always be there, so you need the dogs to grow to trust and accept each other. It can be time consuming as I stated, and sometimes the help of a trainer is necessary. Before we adopted our foster pup, we had Kaos redo a round of obedience training, not because he needed the commands as much as the reinforcement that we were in charge.


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## Rexy (Jun 4, 2011)

catz said:


> I dont think that method should be recommended for a number of reasons. Air blocking is not the way to go OP. Introductions that are slow and fun for both dogs involved are much better.


Yes, there will be many reasons that air blocking aggression is not recommended by positive trainers as there are equally as many reasons why positive trainers don't have a great success rate with aggressive GSD's


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## catz (Dec 10, 2010)

I will ignore my personal reasons for not using this method. I am a positive trainer and air blocking is not my style. I will say however, that to use a method such as an air block you would need a proper understanding of how to impliment it. Obviously there is the danger of permantly damaging the dogs neck and to recommend that method to a person you dont know on a forum runs the risk of them really hurting their animal. You feel like you can use this method to correct your dogs behaviour but I assume someone taught you how to use it properly. A person just giving it a go because they read it on a forum could actually end up killing their pet. 
I hope you can see where I'm coming from.


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## Rott-n-GSDs (Jul 7, 2010)

Rexy said:


> Yes, there will be many reasons that air blocking aggression is not recommended by positive trainers as there are equally as many reasons why positive trainers don't have a great success rate with aggressive GSD's


I think you'll find that there aren't a whole lot of purely positive trainers on this site.

I think you'll also find that there aren't a lot of trainers on this site that recommend this method. Heck, even Leerburg has stopped recommending hanging dogs.

There is a difference between a correction and abuse.


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## mysweetkaos (Sep 20, 2011)

Rott-n-GSDs said:


> I think you'll find that there aren't a whole lot of purely positive trainers on this site.
> 
> I think you'll also find that there aren't a lot of trainers on this site that recommend this method. Heck, even Leerburg has stopped recommending hanging dogs.
> 
> There is a difference between a correction and abuse.


I second this. I am not purely positive. I wish that would work but with 2 large dogs I've found wishing doesn't always make it so. To the OP if you haven't done any formal training with your older dog (such as learning how to do a well timed correction) I would recommend you do that before attempting anything. A well timed correction teaches more than 10 poorly timed ones.


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## Rexy (Jun 4, 2011)

Rott-n-GSDs said:


> I think you'll find that there aren't a whole lot of purely positive trainers on this site.
> 
> I think you'll also find that there aren't a lot of trainers on this site that recommend this method. Heck, even Leerburg has stopped recommending hanging dogs.
> 
> There is a difference between a correction and abuse.


What do you think Cesar Milan does with his slip leash right in front of everyone's nose and rarely anyone picks up on it? There are no magical powers taking aggression drive away from the dog other than air blocking. Leerburg uses their stabilisation collar or DD collar where an air block is performed without even lifting the dog's front feet off the ground.

The dog has to learn that an aggressive response results in A. unpleasantness and B. doesn't achieve the result the dog wants. A correction isn't strong enough to over-ride defence drive, in fact a correction can result in redirected aggression towards the handler. With that said, I don't know too many trainers good at rehabilitating aggressive behaviour with reliability and the trainers I know who are good at, all air block, every one of them?

Air blocking is also the only reliable method of dealing with handler aggression, many good working GSD's in drive can come back at the handler in frustration and air blocking is the only correction that will A. prevent a trip to hospital, and B. teach the dog not to do it again.


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

air blocking? hanging? sorry not for me, and I am not a purely positive trainer.. I 'believe' in corrections when necessary, but unless I've got a savage beast on my hands, I don't think I"ll be doing the air blocking routine.

To the OP, when I had my now deceased queen of the castle witch of a female, I brought in three puppies (different times as in years apart) while she was here. She was not a fan of puppies, could be snarky but not downright vicious ..Mine tended to check the puppy out, and then avoid them for a week or so, but be able to co exist as long as her space was respected. After a week or so, she usually ended up being best buds with them but would 'correct' a puppy if it got out of hand.. Some correction I allowed, but some I did not, it wasn't her place to correct, but it worked out ok

Of course puppies are curious and don't really know any better to keep out of snarky dogs faces..Supervise supervise supervise is key..what your doing with the crate is a "good" thing...I'm not surprised your older girl didn't appreciate puppy near her crate, that's kinda normal, it's HER crate, HER space.. Might be easier to have the PUPPY in a crate and let HER check him out..

Can you take them both out say, for a walk together, keeping them apart? 

You also don't want the older girl to traumatize your puppy, I think a muzzle may cause frustration on her part, but it's worth a try..

Hopefully you'll get some other good suggestions as well.


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## MaggieRoseLee (Aug 17, 2001)

First of all, I never would have brought a puppy into my house unless I pretty much KNEW how my older dog(s) would behave.

And I'd KNOW how they would behave because of all the training and socialization for the YEARS prior. I tend to have a FIVE year split between dogs because I know that it takes time to do this well. I go to dog classes. I visit my dog friends, I visit friends with puppies, I go out to places where I may meet other dogs/puppies.

If I didn't KNOW how my older dog would behave if I brought a young puppy into the house, I wouldn't add that puppy until I did know. 

Not the OLDER dogs fault I have failed to be responsible and TRAIN as well as socialize it. So to just suddenly have 'rules' and expectations that involve hanging them wouldn't be fair. 

Also not fair to the tiny puppy who is clueless to the situation. 

Best fix for this, the RESPONSIBLE fix for this, best for BOTH dogs .... is to call the new puppy's breeder and explain you made a mistake and bring back the puppy. Then spend the next few years with the necessary training and socialization so the NEXT puppy will fit right in.


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## MicheleMarie (Mar 29, 2011)

i had an older dog that was like that. i let them know right off the bat that if they were in "their space" the other dog wasn't allowed to pester the other one. for instance-when snickers is on her blanket, that's a signal that she wants her mean time and i wouldn't let samson go and pester her. when samson is in her crate snickers isn't allowed to entice or tease him. i did this from day one and now he's 9 months old and they get along fairly okay. i make sure there is no food or toys lying around they could squabble over.

i would walk them outside together and then bring them inside keeping them on the leash and walking them around in the same manner you did outside (assuming that it goes well lol) and just take it a day at time.
praise praise when the dog is good, don't the puppy pester him...the puppy just wants to play but the other dog may not. it's your job to play with the puppy not his job.

you could prong him and correct him, then praise him for listening. it's the little things lol


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## badcalorie (Oct 6, 2011)

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. The pup and Kona are getting along much better. She is wearing her new muzzle for the time being and getting tons of praise (and treats) when she is decent to him. She seems very comfortable in the new muzzle. Its a leather basket one and is a huge improvement over the frustration creating nylon ones. They played chase for the first time yesterday in the yard. It went great. Both her and the pup were making play sounds and taking turns chasing. They also are walking together every evening. Kona could care less that he is there on walks. I haven't seen one lip curl or growl out of her since I posted, so I think with time they will learn to co-exist. 

BTW, Kona has been through lots of obedience and tracking training, but I really appreciated the suggestion to give her a 'refresher' course. Every morning before work, we take 20 min to work through all her obedience and enjoy some non-puppy time together.


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## Rott-n-GSDs (Jul 7, 2010)

Nice to hear the positive update! Just make sure that while you are making sure your older dog doesn't hurt the puppy, you are also making sure that the puppy isn't allowed to harass the older dog. Learn to interpret your older dog's signals when he is DONE with playing, and at that point remove the puppy from the situation.



Rexy said:


> What do you think Cesar Milan does with his slip leash right in front of everyone's nose and rarely anyone picks up on it?


I didn't say anything about Cesar Milan, I was talking about the members of *this site*. I'm not going to start doing things "because Cesar Milan does it and therefore it MUST be okay!" :crazy:



JakodaCD OA said:


> air blocking? hanging? sorry not for me, and I am not a purely positive trainer.. I 'believe' in corrections when necessary, but unless I've got a savage beast on my hands, I don't think I"ll be doing the air blocking routine.


Yes, this was my point. A trainer doesn't have to be all PR to realize that air blocking/hanging isn't a great training method.


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