Ut Oh! Bone Aggressive! Need Help!

[Cookiebaker]

I am so upset right now.

We were doing toenails tonight, and Malone got aggressive on us again. It took both of us to pin him down at the end. He was snapping and snarling. We have never had a problem with toenails before.

What is going on??? Where has my sweet boy gone???

I'm definitely going to try and get a hold of our trainer tomorrow.

[kingrattus]

Has Malone had any problems with his ears???
I met a girl along time ago & she told me her GSD had an ear infection, & the infection got into the brain & started to kill the brain & the dog went vicious one day & it kept getting worse until the dog tried to kill a person. Thats when they found out what an ear infection can do to a dog.

So check his ears to see if hes ok.. I don't think its normal for a dog to suddenly become vicious.

[binka_nugget]

Oh no..sweet malone is turning to a very naughty boy. Tell us how it goes with the trainer

[wolf_Q]

Hmmm...a similar thing has happened with Lady. She's never been necessarily *good* about nails, but the past 3 times.......for no apparent reason.....she has been AWFUL. She's the sweetest dog in the world about everything else. I've had to muzzle her, she almost gets insane now if you even *touch* her feet.

You definitely need to help with this before it gets worse....

I'd start over again, like he's a puppy. Gently pick up a paw and just use the clippers near it. If he acts calm, give him a treat and praise. I'd pratice this frequently, and also play with his feet.

He's still growing up, and it may just be a phase, but I think contacting a trainer is a good idea.

[micki76]

Where does Malone sleep? If he sleeps in the bed with you, that can cause a huge problem with him asserting himself. It puts him on equal footing with you. Chester sleeps with me now, but he must ask for permission to get on the bed first.

How about food? Do you eat first? Or does he? Even if he eats 30 minutes before you, he still sees that he ate first, which means he's alpha to him.

Do you allow him on the furniture? If so, I would not allow that until you have this situation under control.

I strongly urge you not to swat him on the snout. He may very well react badly to that and become even more aggressive to you. You will achieve a lot more with positive reinforcement in the long run. It's a natural reaction if he does. It seems like Malone is asserting himself within his pack, not just being grouchy.

I really advise you to make him ask for everything he gets. I have found this to be the most effective method with Chester. And if anybody's ever had aggression issues, it's Chester.

And calling your trainer is the very best thing to do. Has Malone had any obedience training? If not, then get him in classes ASAP.

[KYS]

Well maybe this is far fetch, but is malone feeling
under the weather? IF he is, this could cause
a mood change.

Now I never thought labs went through
the adolescent power change, but maybe they do too?
IF Malone is not ill, maybe he is testing the waters
of who is alpha, what he can get away with,
as he is leaving his puppy stage to adolescent stage.

Please let us know what Malone's trainer
tells you.

[Cookiebaker]

Thank you so much for the replies. I didn't sleep too good last night, and the whole ordeal was the first thing I thought about this morning.

Micki, Malone sleeps in his own bed (across the room from our bed) about 90% of the time. Once every couple of weeks he is allowed up on the bed. (Not any more until we get through this problem) Oh, and he also must wait for us to "invite him"

As far as eating...in the morning we eat before him, but at night we feed him as soon as we come home from work. I just talked to Mark about this, and we are going to try to make sure that WE eat first from now on.

He's not allowed on furniture, and when we are walking up/down the stairs he has to go "NICE" which means no charging ahead. When I stop, he stops, and when I go, he goes.

We have never really "hit" him, though when he is *reallly* nawtee, Mark will grab him by the neck, and growl at him. (Yea, that's a sight to see ) But I get kinda confused on the positive reinforcement, because it sometimes feels like Malone will be bad for 5 minutes, good for 10 seconds and then is rewarded; and really he feels that he is getting rewarded for the 5 minutes of badness.

Amy, that's a really good idea about starting back slowly. I'm thinking about going to see the trainer on my lunch break today. That way I can talk to her in person instead of just calling.

[tatsxxx11]

Nawtee Malone! It definitely sounds like he's challenging you for the alpha role! I know it's upsetting to see your sweet boy behaving like this. But he's really still in the puppy stage of Lab life. They actually don't fully grow out of the puppy stage until age 3!

I worked hard with my Lab Star from puppyhood to avoid this when she was very young. We could see from early puppyhood that she was definitely the type to challenge for the role of leader of the pack!

We did the hand feeding, petting her while she ate, picking up the bowl mid meal, having her wait for the command before she could begin to eat and feeding her after we ate. We also taught her the "drop" or "give" command when she was playing with a toy, eating a bone etc. After taking giving the command "drop it" or "give" we would gently take it from her, praise/reward then make her do sit, do down, some command before she got it back. We repeated this several times per training session, daily. It seemed to work because she is totally fine with us taking anything from her. She eats right beside Cody and does not dare go near her bowl, either. You've gotten great advice already! I think with a little patience and some work he'll work through this adolescent phase. I think contacting the trainer is a great idea. The important thing is that you're on the case and ready to begin correcting this little slip backwards.

Below is an excerpt from a great article on resource/food guarding and how to retake the alpaha role! Now, Malone...be a good Labbie boy and mind your Mommy!!

Food Guarding

[zanzanfergie]

I'm sending lots of good wishes to you both that Malone will settle down. He is still pretty young so hopefully this is just a phase. Labs are supposed to go through adolescence from about the age of 8 - 18 months, aren't they? So you were probably bound to come up against some challenges around this age. Nevertheless, nawteeness of this magnitude is never to be ignored so let's hope you can nip this in the bud before Malone gets too much older. It must have been quite frightening to have your sweet boy react that way, so I'm sending lots of good wishes to you too. Bad boy Malone!

Lucy growled at me once, but it wasn't over a bone. I was trying to exract a chewed up juice box from her mouth. She found it up at the doggy park. It was pretty scary, because she'd never done anything like that before, so I know how you feel. All of those dominance tricks are excellent, but hard to enforce when you don't actually live with the dog!

[Cookiebaker]

Just wanted to give a small update...

Mark & I went to visit our dog trainer at lunch today. I can't even tell you how much I APPRECIATE this woman!! She's absolutely supportive, comforting, and instructive.

Anyway, we described for her both of the scenarios that happened this past week, and she completely understood. She believes that it is the adolescent stage and he's trying to be alpha (exactly what everybody has told me here ) She gave us some pointers and basically told us that when he acts like that, "Don't give up and don't give in" She assured me that it will get better and not worse. I sure hope so!!! I'm taking a leap of faith to believe that it will get better, I guess. My biggest fear is that "next time" it's going to get worse and worse.

So now, we are strongly working with Malone restrengthening the fact that WE are alpha. No sleeping on our bed at all; hand feeding; heeling on ALL walks;putting him into a settle position every day.

The weird thing is, this bad behaviour seems to have come on overnight. He wasn't like this last week!! But I guess it's been a slow progression towards it, and we have been getting lax on formal training sessions. I feel guilty that I haven't spent very much time doing actual training in the last couple of months. And now I'm reaping the consequences. It's not fun.

Meanwhile training starts on September 9th. I do hope that at the end of the 6 or 8 weeks of this training we will see some improvement. I guess I'm just feeling discouraged. Class helps so much because it gives incentive to work with him throughout the week and working towards a goal.

I'm sorry this is so long! It just kind of flew out of my fingers. This really has been bugging me all week, and I guess I needed to vent. Thanks for listening!!

[clara4457]

Glad you got good advice from the trainer. I'm sure with time and patience you will have your sweet babe Malone back. I would also suggest getting the booklet from Patricia McConnell titled "How to be Leader of the Pack, and Have Your Dogs Love You For It". It talks a great deal about body blocking, which can be very effective with a dog that is challenging for alpha position. Also the NILIF program outlined by Micki76 and your trainer is a MUST.

Good Luck - I'm sure Malone will be back to his old self very soon.

[wolf_Q]

I think the trainer gave you some good advice! I know how you feel....I've kind of been lacking in the training sessions with Nebo also. It gets so frustrating sometimes. We're starting another class this week. It's so much easier to get yourself in gear with a class!

Hope everything works out for you and Malone.....if you ever need to talk, just let me know! I have an adolescent bratty young male too!