Question for those with more than one dog, fighting?

[Jadapit]

Last night I was out in the yard, cleaning up dog poop. The fur kids were outside with me. There was a stick that Ebony and Jada both wanted at the same time. I saw them both tense up, I pretty much knew what was coming but I couldn't stop them in time. The fight was on.

I was surprised at how calm I remained, I hate dog fights they freak me out. I said "knock it off" in a very firm voice, that fell on deaf ears. I finally took the shovel handle and put it bewteen them that caught their attention enough to stop the fight. I guess I should count my blessings, thats the only bad fight they have ever gotten into. I think thats pretty good for having all females and a pit pit/mix.

If your dogs have ever gotten into it how do you deal with it? How do you stop them from fighting?

[caseysmom]

Casey goes off on bubba occasionaly, once I even had to get a pillow and knock her over the head. I just tell my daughter not to get in the middle which she does sometimes.

[finn's mom]

I haven't really had what I'd call a fight, yet. Although Dudley is constantly trying to mount Finn, so, I know it may be just a matter of time before there's a real altercation. As of right now, it's just Dudley being retarded and barking, Freckles barking, and, Finn running laps around the living room, bumping the two small ones around with his big butt. He isn't usually affected by it, but, I did have to nip it in the bud the other night. Dudley got too fresh or something, and, Finn's entire body changed and he wasn't playing anymore. I just raised my voice, but, lowered the tone, and, that was that. I don't know what I'd do if they actually started fighting. Whatever I could, I guess. :/ I'm glad you were able to stop it before it went too far. Toys cause aggression at my house, too. I don't leave any out at all, but, they have griped at eachother over sticks, too, and, that's kindof unavoidable.

[Glacier]

We've had lots of fights. They are less frequent than they once were, but it still happens. Pack fights are the worst. Two or three dogs going at it isn't nearly as bad as 12 or 15 of them in the same fight! Dang near lost Pacer when he ended up on the bottom of pack fight in May 2004.

I think you handled it pretty well. Staying calm is very important. If you start freaking out, yelling ect, you've become part of the fight as far as the dogs are concerned. The odds of you getting injured go way up at that point. I don't intervene at all if it's just posturing. Muskwa and Founder currently have a little debate going about who is the alpha. Muskwa is, but he's aging. Founder will be the boss dog someday, but Muskwa isn't ready to give up yet. They don't actually fight, but there's lots of trash talking going on. I ignore that stuff. They'll settle that on their own.

I know it's not an option for you, but I keep my females seperated, except for the mellow old girls. Greatly reduced the number of conflicts. Girls tend to fight differently and intentionally do much more damage than males. Kayleigh would quite happily kill another female dog. (She'll take a round out of a male too, but she has issues!) One of the worst fights we've ever had to break up was Kayleigh and her littermate. Seperating two, 110 pound ticked off female wolf-hybrids was not fun! Kayleigh had massive injuries after that fight. Summit had gone for her throat, if she had ripped much more, Kayleigh would have died. Males generally fight til one of them submits and that's the end of it. Males tend not to hold grudges. Females have long memories! As Stuart says, there's a reason the word bitch has taken on such negative connotations!

If I can see it coming, I try to get them apart. If they haven't gone into full fight mode yet, a loud noise will sometimes distract them. I keep a marine air horn by the door. A blast from that will sometimes get their attention long enough for me to intervene. I've also banged shovels on doghouses, hit metal dishes on trees. Anything that might distract them. If you have enough water pressure, a blast of water from a garden hose sometimes works too.

If we are both home and it's a relatively small fight, (2-3 dogs), we each grab a dog under their back legs and lift straight up. Do not grab the tail, unless it's a life & death situation. You can injure the dog by grabbing their tails. Usually once you lift up, the dog will look back to see what the heck is happening and you can pull them apart. Works best with two people.

Fighting is unacceptable in my pack. When it happens, every dog involved gets punished. I don't give a hoot who started it. Every participant gets in trouble. Punishment around my house is getting seperated from the pack. Combantants go on chains for a couple hours or get put into small pens alone. Nothing a husky hates more than being alone. They get allowed back into their pack slowly, a couple dogs at a time. The instigator gets reintegrated last. Nothing positive comes to them from a fight. A successful fight(ie the dog got what it wanted), means another fight is going to happen.

I hope neither of your girls was injured and they are buddies again soon!

[Rachel]

I've had to literally pull mine apart several times, but considering they've lived together for 7 years now, I guess that isn't all that bad. Tucker is really laid back and takes a lot of guff off of Hannah, but when he has had more than he can tolerate he reverts to being a *street dog* and there are no holes barred.

Since both of them are under 30 pounds I am strong enough to pull one or both of them by whatever part I can grab. This is no time for being particular on how I do it. I get very loud and move in quickly. Fortunately once they are separated, they do not try to go at it again and within minutes its like nothing ever happened.

When I see Hannah trying to lord it over Tucker, I get stern with her and let her know that is not acceptable. I can't speak for others, but with my two, it is better to keep my Alpha in line.

[dab_20]

Molli and Sammy have a couple fights every week. I don't think they've figured out who is the dominent one yet. I usually have to end up pulling them apart because Sam is so big compared to Molli. I was told to grab the back legs of one dog and pull them away. I don't know how easy that would be for you, because you've got bigger dogs. I think you handled it very good. Freaking out won't do any good, but keeping your self calm will help you break it up easier.

[Jadapit]

Two or three dogs going at it isn't nearly as bad as 12 or 15 of them in the same fight! Dang near lost Pacer when he ended up on the bottom of pack fight in May 2004.


Omg, I cant imagine dealing with that many dogs fighting. I'm so glad Pacer wasn't killed. Thank you so much for all the advise. That was all very, very helpful. When a pit bull fights, if the other dog goes into the submissive mode the pit will ignore that and keep right on fighting. I NEVER leave my three alone together. Ebony is crated when we go somewhere. It's up to me to keep them all safe, that is my job as a pet owner.

I forgot to say, both the girls are fine. They were over it in about 5 minutes. They are friends again.

[pitc9]

My two pups have never even as much as raised a hair to one another but my friend has two male Malamute litter mates that are 2 or 3 years old and they will tear into each other like there's no tomorrow, but will cry and not eat if you seperate them. They each are over 110lbs, pulling the back legs is the only thing that works for them.
I hope your girls snap put of it and calm down!
No more fights girls!!!!

[beeniesmom]

Beenie and Frankie go at it when they want the same toy, bone whatever....
To make them stop I usually just yell NO and Clap my hands really loud or get 2 wooden spoons and pop a counter top or whatever hard surface is near. That usually startles them and they quit.

[animal_rescue]

Roxie is the one that usually starts fights here(and it's usually with Alex) and she's so small we usually pull her off the other dog and crate her. Probably not the smartest thing to do but it works.

Good Job at staying calm! When I see a big dog fight I can't help but freak out.

[Flatcoatluver]

I know in the past we have had fights, I know Zoey is very protective of I and the food bowl, and we have to feed them sep. but that is mainly the only fights we have at our house, I guess where lucky.

[4 Dog Mother]

Since my dogs hate water, we throw water on them. Even in the house! Depending on the dogs involved I can usually pull them apart. Taggert almost always seems to be one of the ones involved. Usually it is over food or rawhide. If I see Taggert starting to get possessive (hair raises on his back and he starts a growl), I can usually tell him to knock it off. We know feed them in their crates but that is more because Snoopy will eat everyones if he gets a chance.

[ParNone]

With my 3 males, I haven't had any real fights. If Gull and Murph are irritated at each other, they'll bark back and forth at each other, which doesn't last long, since I get annoyed and tell'em to knock it off.

Gull can be kind of prissy with Oz though, over food, toys and attention. He'll shove him and nip at him. Oz is submissive, so no actual fight starts. But I'll usually grab Gull by the collar (probably something I wouldn't do if I had a different type breed), pull him away from Oz and tell him to "Be Nice to Oz". Then I make both sit and be calm, then they'll get rewarded. This type of occurance is rarer now, I guess since he knows it's the sitting and being calm that's rewarded and the snippiness is getting him the collar grab.

When I had Maddie though, she would get so cranky with Murph. He could just be laying asleep at the foot of the bed, no instigation on his part at all, and out of nowhere she'd go after him. It sounded really ferocious, but the most she ever did was yank some hair out.

I got to where I could tell when she was gonna strike. We'd all be laying on the bed, with me watching TV or surfing the web. I'd catch her body language change out of the corner of my eye and without even looking over, I'd swing my leg over in between her and Murph. She'd then charge and put her front feet on leg. There she'd be hanging off my leg, spewing doggie curse words at Murph, but she wouldn't go past my leg. Murph got to where he didn't even look up anymore, when she charged. He trusted I'd get my leg up in time. I uh wouldn't recommend this technique for most dogs or situations though or the collar grabbing technique. With my dogs it works, with others you might end up getting bitten.

Par...

[luvofallhorses]

Buster and Jenny get in fights over food. all my dogs are food aggressive, except Rocky. Buster also goes after Rocky sometimes. he doesn't hurt him, he just scares him. Buster and Ginger really don't like each other. Ginger acts like she has something and she DOESN'T and starts snarling at Buster. We have to feed them all seperately, except Rocky and Ginger eat in my parent's room since they don't have a problem with each other. and Buster eats in the kitchen and Jenny eats in the living room. We haven't had any serious fights, though..thank goodness! I hope that never happens.

[Husky_mom]

in my case everything was fine i had my three girls and my boy together and no problems at all my boy ruled them and showed the who was the boss, the bad stuff came when my boy passed then the most dominant girl tried to rule the others and they got a few really nasty fights a couple when i wasnt home so i had to be called and so i rushed to get them separated cause it was bad, blood and all, since then fights were more often and i separated them in two batches (dominant - the rest) but then the other one started fighting with the one she was with so i had to separate them too......they still hang out but theres always a fence in between to prevent fights, before they even snapped through the fence now its like nothing happened, but i take no chances since China is way to submissive and Ninja well shes the boss and could seriously hurt China as she is very petite and shy.......

glad they came buddies again, hope it never triggers again, it really is a scary situation to be in prescence with.....hugs