Question about a barmy dog!
Discussion
Hi everyone.
My Mum & Dad have a 4 year old Terrier. She's possibly Tibetan but it's debateable, what we do know is she jumps, a lot. They rescued her about 3 years ago.
The situation is as follows. When there are any visitors to the house (or my house) she is unpredictable. Sometimes she will bark quite aggressively (although usually with wagging tail) from the off, sometimes she will allow the visitor in to sit down or whatever but without fail if a visitor dares to stand up or sometimes even lift their arm (even after hours of being there) she will launch at them, usually just jump up barking but sometimes with a small nip on leg or finger etc.
When said visitor leaves, she will then leg it all over the house to every window barking like mad.
She does this to visitors she should know fairly well, my mates etc & does not stop even if you give her a good telling off.
I'm thinking it could be a territory thing?? As if she meets people on walks (on or off lead) she is very friendly to them.
Does anyone have any advice or suggestions on how we might be able to stop her doing this? We don't really want to isolate her from visitors as this wouldn't solve the problem, plus she'd destroy whatever she could get hold of. We're just getting concerned as she doesn't seem to be getting better & don't want to risk her hurting someone.
Thanks very much, Ben.
My Mum & Dad have a 4 year old Terrier. She's possibly Tibetan but it's debateable, what we do know is she jumps, a lot. They rescued her about 3 years ago.
The situation is as follows. When there are any visitors to the house (or my house) she is unpredictable. Sometimes she will bark quite aggressively (although usually with wagging tail) from the off, sometimes she will allow the visitor in to sit down or whatever but without fail if a visitor dares to stand up or sometimes even lift their arm (even after hours of being there) she will launch at them, usually just jump up barking but sometimes with a small nip on leg or finger etc.
When said visitor leaves, she will then leg it all over the house to every window barking like mad.
She does this to visitors she should know fairly well, my mates etc & does not stop even if you give her a good telling off.
I'm thinking it could be a territory thing?? As if she meets people on walks (on or off lead) she is very friendly to them.
Does anyone have any advice or suggestions on how we might be able to stop her doing this? We don't really want to isolate her from visitors as this wouldn't solve the problem, plus she'd destroy whatever she could get hold of. We're just getting concerned as she doesn't seem to be getting better & don't want to risk her hurting someone.
Thanks very much, Ben.
No she's totally fine with food, she has never been even slightly aggressive towards us....& even the 'aggressive' barking, jumping up etc at visitors seems to be 'tongue in cheek'! (if that's possible for a hound! Usually tail wagging & when we shout at her she'll take notice but just wags tail as if to say 'I'm only joking!' & then carries on.
Wouldn't surprise me if she does think she's the boss. My parents are quite soft on her, meaning she can go where she likes in the house, rarely told off & hardly ever left alone.
Thanks for the replies. Ben
Wouldn't surprise me if she does think she's the boss. My parents are quite soft on her, meaning she can go where she likes in the house, rarely told off & hardly ever left alone.
Thanks for the replies. Ben
benm3evo said:
No she's totally fine with food, she has never been even slightly aggressive towards us....& even the 'aggressive' barking, jumping up etc at visitors seems to be 'tongue in cheek'! (if that's possible for a hound! Usually tail wagging & when we shout at her she'll take notice but just wags tail as if to say 'I'm only joking!' & then carries on.
Wouldn't surprise me if she does think she's the boss. My parents are quite soft on her, meaning she can go where she likes in the house, rarely told off & hardly ever left alone.
Thanks for the replies. Ben
Wagging a tail doesn't necessarily mean 'happy'. Different patterns / directions / speeds all mean different things. For instance, tail up & fast might mean: is confident with people it knows; is a 'ready to fight' stance to another dog; or 'ready to bite' at a stranger.Wouldn't surprise me if she does think she's the boss. My parents are quite soft on her, meaning she can go where she likes in the house, rarely told off & hardly ever left alone.
Thanks for the replies. Ben
ETA And because I'm a miserable sod tonight, 99.9% of the time it's the people around the dog, not the "barmy dog" itself, that are at fault.
Edited by bigandclever on Saturday 3rd November 00:23
"Blame" won't really help anyone, but I'd agree that 90% of the time, a dog exhibiting undesirable behaviour can be traced back to the owner failing the dog in some way, usually through insufficient boundaries or lack of thorough exercise and stimulation...
J&J asks a pertinent question - her body language will tell you why she's barking. It does sound a lot like she thinks she's ruling what happens in the house... if this is the case, your parents need to step up and give her some guidelines for acceptable behaviour.
A starter for 10 would be not letting visitors into the house unless one dog bottom is firmly planted on an appropriate dog bed. A follow on for a bonus 5 points might be to not let the dog bottom off the bed until an owner expressly allows it.
As a more extreme method, they could consider use of a house-line on the dog as a damage limitation exercise, but this on its own will not do much to address the root causes of the poor behaviour and ergo will not do much about solving it.
J&J asks a pertinent question - her body language will tell you why she's barking. It does sound a lot like she thinks she's ruling what happens in the house... if this is the case, your parents need to step up and give her some guidelines for acceptable behaviour.
A starter for 10 would be not letting visitors into the house unless one dog bottom is firmly planted on an appropriate dog bed. A follow on for a bonus 5 points might be to not let the dog bottom off the bed until an owner expressly allows it.
As a more extreme method, they could consider use of a house-line on the dog as a damage limitation exercise, but this on its own will not do much to address the root causes of the poor behaviour and ergo will not do much about solving it.
if you saw Tilly with no other dogs about youd say "awww, what good doggy...
if you saw her when she sees another dog youd say "nutter"
if she charged off the lead at your dog youd say "im being attacked"
UNTIL....she got to your dog, then it just rough play time, scary before and she can "nip" (a sheepdog trait im afraid, but usually only me or the wife)
first dog - dog meetings are tense for every dog, you will never weigh em up
if you saw her when she sees another dog youd say "nutter"
if she charged off the lead at your dog youd say "im being attacked"
UNTIL....she got to your dog, then it just rough play time, scary before and she can "nip" (a sheepdog trait im afraid, but usually only me or the wife)
first dog - dog meetings are tense for every dog, you will never weigh em up
The position of the ears doesn't give many clues as they're pretty useless floppy things that she seems to have little control of!
I think the insufficient boundaries is probably nail on head. It's definitely not lack of exercise, she gets at least 2 very good walks a day, plus regularly gets to play with my Nan's puppy...also....when she is at my Nan's house with people she knows she doesn't have any of the bad behaviour mentioned. I guess this is because it's not her territory.
I think I will suggest to Mum & Dad that she's made to stay on her bed when visitors are there until she's told she can move. I know this will be easier said than done but, although my Mum especially is soft with her, they do want to get the problem sorted so I'm sure they will stick at it.
Once again, thanks for replies. All appreciated. Ben
I think the insufficient boundaries is probably nail on head. It's definitely not lack of exercise, she gets at least 2 very good walks a day, plus regularly gets to play with my Nan's puppy...also....when she is at my Nan's house with people she knows she doesn't have any of the bad behaviour mentioned. I guess this is because it's not her territory.
I think I will suggest to Mum & Dad that she's made to stay on her bed when visitors are there until she's told she can move. I know this will be easier said than done but, although my Mum especially is soft with her, they do want to get the problem sorted so I'm sure they will stick at it.
Once again, thanks for replies. All appreciated. Ben
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