Kingdom of Pets

Posted by angelmummy2
Jun 22, 2011

Hi,

I have a 3 1/2 year old Australian Cattle dog. Chloe is not spayed, I have owned her from a young pup (she was dumped in my backyard) She know's sit, stay, come, drop and does really well with them when there's no distractions. I also have two other dogs, Rosie a greyhound x cattle dog and Bindi a bull terrier x staffy. Both Rosie and Bindi are very gentle pretty easy dogs to handle.

I'm sorry this will probably be long but I have to give you an idea of the whole situation. I have a rather strong suspiscion that Chloe is crossed with a dingo (I live in Australia) there are dingos on the property I beleive she comes from, and she has a few of the characteristics, along with really pretty unusual yellow eyes. About two years ago I was feeding my horse when one of the other horses came and tried to take its feed, I shooed the horse away and Chloe was at my feet, she turned around and attacked Bindi, I tried everything to get her off, yelling, clapping, water, a metal stick and even in a moment of panic poked her in the eye, nothing worked. I managed to grab a hold of her collar and lift her up, long enough for Bindi to get away, I had no doubt that she would have killed her had I not been able to grab a hold of her. Fast forward to last week, without incident other than a growl or hair raise here and there, I was feeding the dogs the other night, Chloe jumped up on the table (outdoor table) the food was on. I told her to get down and when she did she attacked Rosie, and Bindi joined in which is very out of character for her. I had to wake my fiance up to stop the fight which he did by yelling hey. Then a few days later I was feeding the dogs again. I tied them all up this time and waited till they had finished before letting them off. However I made the mistake of leaving the dog food bag on the table and Chloe stood over Bindi growling at her, I again made the mistake of giving Chloe a light tap and telling her to leave it, which set her off.. She attacked Bindi and I could not get her off. Bindi was screaming and I was running around like a headless chicken trying to figure out what to do.. I was at home by myself with my 16 month old daughter who luckily was asleep. The fight went for a good ten minutes before I managed to flag a truck driver down, who came in and levered Chloe or Bindi with a shovel. The injuried Bindi sustained where serious and severe, and Chloe was covered in Bindis blood. Again, had this man not stopped to help me, Bindi would be dead. I have bought Chloe a muzzle, which she now wears at all times unless eating and then she is tied up. I desperatley need help, but there are no trainers who deal with aggressive dogs around me. The normal trainers treat me like she has the plaugue. I do not want to give up on her, but something must be done.

Sorry about the length of this post, and thank you in advance for your suggestions.

Jessica

Posted by MaxHollyNoah
Jun 24, 2011

Hi Jessica,

It must be heartbreaking to see your beloved Chloe has changed to become an aggressive dog to her buddies.

I don't know what to say but I think it's a good idea to keep a muzzle on her when she is with the other dogs.

I wonder if spaying might mellow her down a little bit.

Is she good with all kinds of people? Is she obedient when she is not at the uncontrollable state? I think you will need to train her one on one without other dogs. You might want to consult your vet for some kind of remedies to calm her down. I am not familiar but I have seen people talking about DAP on this forum.

Sorry I cannot give you better advice but I wish you and Chloe the best.

Posted by KOPCaroline
Jun 26, 2011

Hi Jessica,

That is strange! It doesnt sound like there is a suitable trigger we can pinpoint to train her away from, and as MHN says, its heartbreaking when you start seeing problems like this in familiar, loved dogs.

I definitely think the muzzle is a good idea at home when she's around other dogs. Other than that, can you feed Chloe away from your other two dogs? Maybe take her around the side of the house, away from the normal feeding area? You can still tie everyone up, but this way at least if the foods forgotten out or something, Chloe isnt directly around to potentially start something.

You could try a shock collar of sorts on Chloe to use when she starts these fights. It doesnt have to be an actual shock collar, you could try the citronelle collars that are available - its personal preference really. But setting one off as soon as she starts in might startle her enough to break it up. Similarly, find something that makes a lot of noise to help you break the fights up (much like your husbands "hey!") - a can with stones in it makes a pretty good noisemaker. This might at least let you get enough time to grab someone out of the situation.

What do you do with Chloe after these fights? It would be my suggestion to tie her up/lock her up somewhere with a stern "NO" command, to at least try and start training her that fighting is bad. Make sure she cant get out/away, and that she's alone to calm down.

It is tricky. Following MHN's advice, maybe talk to your vet about anti-anxiety meds or DAP pheromone spray that you can use at mealtimes at least. Ive heard multiple people say theyve had good results with such methods and aggressive dogs.

Let us know how you get on! Good luck!

Posted by angelmummy2
Jun 30, 2011

Thank you for your advice, I am going to get her spayed asap... hoping it will make a difference, even a small difference would be great. She has been muzzled all the time, and I have been feeding Bindi away from her. She remains tied up for about fifteen minutes after eating just to make sure and I do not let her off until she is sitting and calm. I got home the other day and she stood over Bindi snarling, had the muzzle not been on another fight would have broken out! After the fights I have tied her up and she has been left there for most of the day. I will try the can with rocks, it might help to get her attention when she is ignoring me also. She also spends a large part of her day standing at the fence to our next door neighbours house waiting for their dog to move so she can bark, and they often chase eachother aggressively up and down the fence line. She has quite an obbsessive personality I think, which is probably typical of her breed. I read a post by someone on here talking about the steps to becoming the alpha of your pack, she mentioned ignoring the dogs for 48 hours except for feeding etc, could someone please tell me where I could get this information? As I think that is a huge part of the problem, Chloe sees herself as the alpha, if I could put her down a peg it might really help the situation.

Thanks again

Posted by KOPCaroline
Jul 6, 2011

Hey Jessica,

To access the training material, start at kingdomofpets homepage, and go to "members login" at the top menu. Log in (haha), and go to downloads at the top. The basic "secrets" are the first option, but if you go to the "bonus" tab, theres a download specificially about alpha training there. Hope this helps, let us know if you need anything else!

Dog Aggressive Cattle Dog