Advice on guarding

[phoenix]

Mine started guarding by 12 weeks when he joined us, maybe we are all seeing variations. It wasn't hormonal at that age.  Anyway, I was advised not to neuter because of possibly worsening his fear aggression to people. His attitude to dogs was excellent all his life, so this just adds more grist to the discussions.  Body handling continued to be a problem. Yet fine with me, the groomer and vets.. Complicated little so and so's!
Sensitivity and high intelligence cause problems in people as well as dogs!

[hoover]

Yes we were also advised not to rush to neutering for the same reason but we were at the stage where we knew we either had to give him up or try something like that and it appeared to pay off. 

I have never fully understood the rationale about neutering making fear aggression worse as to my mind then surely you would expect to see females with a much higher level of fear based aggression due to their naturally lower testosterone levels, but the stats don't bear this out, with intact males showing highest levels of more serious aggression (and if you believe the presently prevailing opinion, stemming mostly from fear) followed by neutered males. 

I think it's interesting to see on this forum that a clear majority of owners posting about resource guarding are owners of male dogs.  There are certainly female dogs with this as well of course  but I think if anyone were to do a search through the forum you would see male dogs over -represented when compared to the general population (I am working to an assumption that there is a roughly 50-50 split of male to female cockers out there but that might be wrong of course)

[lynnemcneil]

Thanks all for the reassurance that we will hopefully get through this and it’s not just us! I know lots of people with puppies just now and they don’t have any of these issues, including the rest of the litter, which probably makes it worse as no one can understand the stress it causes.  They look at me like I’m mad! It has briefly crossed our minds that we might have to think about rehoming Archie if the kids continue to be terrified of him, but I’m not willing to give up while he’s so young, unless of course he seriously bites one of us. He has already been neutered, he was nearly 6 months. We had also had a lot of issues with him mouthing us quite roughly and then continually mounting us. He also wouldn’t settle at times and walk about panting in a frustrated way. We hoped that neutering would help with this. It has helped with the panting, he will still mount and mouth, perhaps not as much though. Since a small pup he would get a look in his eyes and he was not home, he would then launch a ‘shark attack’ on you and mount. He still does this if he gets overexcited, the eyes dilate, mouthing starts and he’s attached to your leg. He has to get time out to calm down.   I did worry that it was spaniel rage but the Behaviorist reassured us that he doesn’t have this and insecurity is his issue and we should be able to recondition him, just this time, consistency and patience thing again!! His guarding issues actually only started a few weeks after he was neutered, so unfortunately we can’t put them back on[emoji15]. Interesting to hear about fear aggression though. He was also neutered a couple of weeks before the kids went back to school and has been left alone more than ever before so I don’t know if this has also triggered something. We have 5 kids (between 10 and 18 years old) so the house was always busy and someone in from when we got him in April as the older ones were around on study leave. We’ll perhaps never know.  I think it is really important though to realise that you are not alone and can come through the other side. On another point, after some reading I have noted that golden especially or single colour Cockers are much worse for guardin, it’s genetic. Archie is golden (with white patches on head and chest only). Just out of interest, Anyone else have golden or single colour with these problem??! Thanks all!


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[phoenix]

TopBarks wrote his thesis for his uni course on this very question! Ask him!  Can't remember much myself, though he did a survey with our contributions.
 One factor to consider is that Firstly Cockers are one of the commonest breeds, so their reporting of problems is disproportionately high compared to to the problems reported by other breeds.
Secondly, the proportion of Goldens and blacks is higher  in the breed,so again it means higher reporting.
Finally, many of us, like  me, joined COL because we had problems. We are the minority.

[hoover]

As Phoenix has already said, just goes to show how complex this all is!  And we are a self-selective forum, as Phoenix says - many of us here because of issues, and not necessarily generally representative of the norms of the breed.

There has been a thought that 'solids' are more prone to guarding issues than multi-coloured cockers and this would seem to bear out through the forums where I've been surprised by how many male solid black cockers seem to crop up with this issue (Ollie is solid black male).  Again you'd really need to know what the overall proportions in existence are...if 90% of cockers out there are solid black and these represent 90% of the total issues raised then this would be entirely proportionate, and any concerns that solid blacks are particularly affected would be inaccurate as this proportion would be expected given the number out there.

And again, if it became a widespread idea that solids might be more commonly affected then owners with solids might be more predisposed to believe problems that they see are to do with this and interpret behaviour through this lens, an attribution bias that does not accurately account for reality if multicolours are equally presenting with issues that are not filtered through the same lens.

I can say, despite all the issues we have had with Ollie, he has been the most loving dog I have ever had, the most attentive, the most intelligent, the most close to us in terms of how he acts - he operates with us in mind..it is hard to describe but he always has an eye to us and a thought to us in everything he does.
 

[Karma]

To buck the trend, Honey is a female Orange Roan.

[wendall]

Honey is a 5year old golden girl. I’ve had her since 8 weeks old and have never had any guarding issues. When I got Pip nearly 21/2 years ago Honey was not happy to have a sibling, in fact she couldn’t stand her! However, she has never guarded with any of her possessions and Pip being a little pickle, always took her things. There are obviously some issues with your little one that you cannot see, dogs are so complex and pick up on the minutest of things. I would suggest speaking to a professional behaviourist about this, sometimes the cost of this is covered under insurance. Good luck x

[Archie bean]

To buck the trend, Honey is a female Orange Roan.

And Archie (serious guarder) is also orange roan. As has been mentioned Top Barks’ thesis did quite a big study on coat colour and guarding/aggression.  If you scroll down this link you will find his very interesting reply with some of his findings.

http://www.cockersonline.co.uk/discuss/index.php?topic=108579.15

[Finvarra]

We have had four spaniels, one a golden worker fifty years ago, and three show types, all blue roan. The worker and two of the shows were the sweetest natured dogs you could want. One of the roans was a rescue, six months old, he had bitten the child of the family because of guarding issues. We took him on as there are no kids and he could have a good life in the country. We had Milo at the time. Finn the rescue latched on to my husband, as Milo was 'my' dog, and he guarded anything my husband put on the floor, his mug, his slippers, anything, sometimes he guarded my husband from me. He went for me once, which I sorted by flipping him on his back and holding him down while giving him a good telling off, and not letting him up til he calmed down. This was a few years ago, I don't know if that is thought acceptable behaviour now  . However, it did the trick and he never went for me again.

We managed him by avoiding the triggers for his behaviour, and he lived til he was eight. When he died I was sad, but not heartbroken, and in some ways it was almost a relief because you were always on edge, and Milo avoided him like the plague, which was sad as we had wanted a nice companion for him. He could be very sweet at times though. He lived out his life, when he could well have been PTS by his original family. We never solved the issues, but back then I don't think there were behaviourists around, they seem a fairly recent development.

I really hope you are able to sort out the problem 

Lesley and Dylan, who would give you anything from his mouth, lovely boy.

[Murphys Law]

We have had four spaniels, one a golden worker fifty years ago, and three show types, all blue roan. The worker and two of the shows were the sweetest natured dogs you could want. One of the roans was a rescue, six months old, he had bitten the child of the family because of guarding issues. We took him on as there are no kids and he could have a good life in the country. We had Milo at the time. Finn the rescue latched on to my husband, as Milo was 'my' dog, and he guarded anything my husband put on the floor, his mug, his slippers, anything, sometimes he guarded my husband from me. He went for me once, which I sorted by flipping him on his back and holding him down while giving him a good telling off, and not letting him up til he calmed down. This was a few years ago, I don't know if that is thought acceptable behaviour now  . However, it did the trick and he never went for me again.

We managed him by avoiding the triggers for his behaviour, and he lived til he was eight. When he died I was sad, but not heartbroken, and in some ways it was almost a relief because you were always on edge, and Milo avoided him like the plague, which was sad as we had wanted a nice companion for him. He could be very sweet at times though. He lived out his life, when he could well have been PTS by his original family. We never solved the issues, but back then I don't think there were behaviourists around, they seem a fairly recent development.

I really hope you are able to sort out the problem 

Lesley and Dylan, who would give you anything from his mouth, lovely boy.

My old cavalier went for me twice in succession when I tried to take a toy off him (he was about 8 months old) and on the second occasion I grabbed hold of him and pinned him on his back. Not because I had heard of this method before but because I was furious.
I know this is really not an accepted method and it will be frowned upon by the majority, but he never showed any sign of aggression again and grew into the most loyal and affectionate dog you could imagine.

[ips]

We have had four spaniels, one a golden worker fifty years ago, and three show types, all blue roan. The worker and two of the shows were the sweetest natured dogs you could want. One of the roans was a rescue, six months old, he had bitten the child of the family because of guarding issues. We took him on as there are no kids and he could have a good life in the country. We had Milo at the time. Finn the rescue latched on to my husband, as Milo was 'my' dog, and he guarded anything my husband put on the floor, his mug, his slippers, anything, sometimes he guarded my husband from me. He went for me once, which I sorted by flipping him on his back and holding him down while giving him a good telling off, and not letting him up til he calmed down. This was a few years ago, I don't know if that is thought acceptable behaviour now  . However, it did the trick and he never went for me again.

We managed him by avoiding the triggers for his behaviour, and he lived til he was eight. When he died I was sad, but not heartbroken, and in some ways it was almost a relief because you were always on edge, and Milo avoided him like the plague, which was sad as we had wanted a nice companion for him. He could be very sweet at times though. He lived out his life, when he could well have been PTS by his original family. We never solved the issues, but back then I don't think there were behaviourists around, they seem a fairly recent development.

I really hope you are able to sort out the problem 

Lesley and Dylan, who would give you anything from his mouth, lovely boy.

My old cavalier went for me twice in succession when I tried to take a toy off him (he was about 8 months old) and on the second occasion I grabbed hold of him and pinned him on his back. Not because I had heard of this method before but because I was furious.
I know this is really not an accepted method and it will be frowned upon by the majority, but he never showed any sign of aggression again and grew into the most loyal and affectionate dog you could imagine.

I did exactly same thing when eze was six months and going off and a really really wild zoomie. I don't consider it aversive in any way as adult dogs will pun down naughty pups (so I believe)

[Karma]

Alpha rolling (or pinning down in any way) is really dangerous advice and could easily make matters many many times worse.

[Ben's mum]

Alpha rolling (or pinning down in any way) is really dangerous advice and could easily make matters many many times worse.

My thoughts exactly, but didn't want to get shot down in flames for saying it!!
A trainer at an agility club I used to go to did it to Ben once without my consent, i didn't go back.

[Archie bean]

Alpha rolling (or pinning down in any way) is really dangerous advice and could easily make matters many many times worse.

My thoughts exactly, but didn't want to get shot down in flames for saying it!!
A trainer at an agility club I used to go to did it to Ben once without my consent, i didn't go back.

Completely agree.

[Finvarra]

Alpha rolling (or pinning down in any way) is really dangerous advice and could easily make matters many many times worse.

I've never heard it called that. This was quite a few years ago, and things have changed. There were quite a few things done in years past that wouldn't be acceptable now. However, I have to say that it did nip the behaviour in the bud. It's the only time I have ever done that. And also, as I mentioned on another thread, I had five Scotties, the eldest of which was the number one dog. The first four all dwelt in harmony, but when number five was introduced she took on each of them in order to get to be number one. They acquiesced until she got to the oldest Tessa, who was having none of it, and she did exactly what I did to Finn, she flipped the 'upstart' Scottie over on her back and actually stood on her while giving her a growly telling off. as IPS said, it's what mothers do to their pups or cubs.

I'm not advising anyone one way or the other, one must do what seems right for their dog. I can only say what worked for me.

 I took Dylan to puppy classes two years ago to socialise him, particularly after he had been pounced on by a jack Russell the first time he went out, and was terrified of dogs consequently. The first place I went wanted me to put him on the ground in the hall where the other dogs, mostly quite large ones, were tearing around off their leads,  which was the last thing Dylan needed. This trainer ran the KC scheme, so I imagine she had some sort of accreditation, but this seemed madness to me and needless to say I did not go back.

The second place I went was much better, and the trainer was very good, but methods had changed a lot in the thirteen years Since I had last been to classes, some for the better, but some not. Same thing I guess with children, what was OK sixty years ago is not OK now (though some of the little darlings would benefit from a bit of old school  ). New doesn't always mean better in every case.

And I would never shoot down in flames my friends on COL , we've all had different experiences so will have different opinions, so,shouldn't be afraid to express what we think. The nice thing about this group,is that we can do that without the flaming that goes on in so many online groups, as has been mentioned in another thread.   Your opinions as all respected 

Lesley and Dylan