Dog Training & Health

[6pak]

My 5mnth old rottie mix plays great with our boston in the house.But when they are in the yard she gets out of control and nips our boston on the backside very hard till he gets mad and loses his temper.Usually she does this is only when the boston is barking at a cat or dog or going wild because someone is using the hose or mower outside the fenced yard.The rottie pup targets only the boston and ignores the other dogs and whatever they are barking at and she will do it repeatedly even after the boston has lost his temper with her(boston is 20lbs and she is 50)
I of course am on the other side of the fence and cant get in to correct the behavior in time.How can I stop this from long distance?
I worry this could get out of control when puppy is bigger..

[meezermom]

Hey 6pack, welcome to SeeFido!

You mention "other dogs"........how many are we talking about?? Six? You have a dog pack and the dynamics of a pack are not the same as a pair of dogs....Your rottie mix is showing some dominance to the Boston as well as indicating she does not like what he is doing. She is trying to force him to do what she wants and so far it is just nips. It will escalate into bites. How much training do your dogs have? If not much, you have a dangerous dog pack! When you have a group of dogs, the requirements for training are even more demanding. There is no way you can just allow them to run together. Each dog must have training. And they must know that you and you alone are the alpha dog. You should be able to control the dogs by tone of voice or the "dead dog" look! Read NILIF on our site and put it all into practice right away. It is a method of gaining the upper hand. You also need to train each dog. The rottie needs to learn that she will not put teeth to another dog! It is simply not going to be allowed by the alpha dog.........YOU! As soon as you see her going for him, you call her off. Which means you need to train her to respond immediately. You can teach to her sit on command, drop or whatever. However, she needs to learn to leave him alone. Otherwise she may end up doing major damage to him one day.

The Boston needs also to learn No Bark. He cannot just run around shooting off his mouth because he is then a nuisance barker.... Teach him to alert and then stop.

You need to work on these problems while inside the fence so the training carries over while you are outside! Make yourself a couple scattercans to use.... Use soda cans, empty and toss a couple smallish stones or bolts in them and tape the top shut. Then when the barking or nipping starts, toss a can from behind so it crashes to the ground behind them. You don't want to hit them but you want it to hit as close as possible. It should make quite a noise and they should jump. Tell Ms Teeth to Leave it alone before her teeth come into contact with BarkyButt....BarkyButt needs to hear either No Bark or Silence.... I use Silence often as you can get a good nasty hiss going with it and that bothers some dogs so they stop as they don't like the sound. If dogs hear NO too often, they will tune it out....Also, as the alpha dog, you keep your voice low, growly and harsh sounding when correcting. Screaming, high sounds and yelling get you no where!

[6pak]

Yes we do have 6 dogs. 2 italian greyhounds, 1 chihuahua, 1 very elderly border collie and of course the two trouble makers, our boston and our rott/heeler mix. I do train the dogs, their house behavior is super and they are all good on leash.The rottie mix learned right away that the 3 small dogs were off limits and doesnt bother them except for the normal sniffing behavoir.But she is a puppy and does love to play and her and our boston get along perfect and play all the time in the house.
The dog pen is a small fenced in area for the dogs to go poo or play, with a dogdoor into the house When they are in the dog pen they do act out of control, Ive not done any training in there and they all go nuts over mowers, hoses etc..I work from home so I do spend time daily training one dog or another as well as multiple walks and exersize in the open yard..The funny thing is they dont act like that when they are in our big yard off leash, the dont attack the mower or the cats or anything its only when they are in the pen.
I guess I got my work cut out for me, I dont like going in the dogpen even if I pick up poo there is always one I miss and end up stepping in.BUT I really do want good dogs and am very willing to put in the work.I will make the cans and see what we can do about this.Thanks so much I may have more questions soon if this doesnt work for some reason.

[meezermom]

Could be nothing more than the pen area is simply too small and they may be crowding each other too much! How many will be in there at one time??? It is the nature of dog to poop everywhere and the nature of man to step in it no matter what!! I don't care how well I police the yard, someone will always manage to find a poo-bomb! And when it is German Shepherds, those are definitely bombs!!!

May need to come up with an idea or a way to not have too many in the pen at one time or to separate them somehow.....need some measurements and such! Don't worry, we will solve this!

[6pak]

LOL got to love that dog poo there are times I wish I could cork their butts but Im lucky because the little dogs stuff pretty much disappears in the grass...I have considered making the dog pen bigger.Its as wide as the house and extends about a third of the backyard so I could make it much bigger. But it doesnt seem to matter they all congregate in the one corner to have thier hysterics..I do like them to bark some, I have a chicken pen and they tell me when a stray dog is in the yard..As to how many are in the yard, well aside from the normal one or two for a poo or a nap in the sun, they will all run out if one of the dogs bark with the exception of the border collie who is mostly deaf so doesnt always hear them.....Iggies and chis are notorious yappers of course

[meezermom]

Well, it just might be that the rottie is finding a certain dog's bark really really irritating! Or maybe she wants him to shut up when she wants him to and he is not getting the idea! She may be more alpha than he is and she is asserting her position in the pack....Keep an eye on things and see how it plays out... To be honest, right now, my nearly nine month old has finally hit the point where the others are no longer tolerating her stuff and she is getting her backside booted everywhere. I have no idea what she tried the other day but she was laying in the backyard looking like a traffic accident victim and the others were pounding on her! If she so much as raised her head she got it again. When things were done, the one female went over and grabbed her neck scruff and drug her around the yard....lots of dew so she was easy to move... She has been a bit subdued since then which has been needed... She has been acting up more than was right for a dog of her age..... It was funny though!

[6pak]

Wow that is scary, how many dogs do you have, I assume all german shepards?
We have squabbles but minor ones so far.Our boston wasnt neutered till he was two and he quite dominant and Im sure he is struggling with the fact that Sasha outwieghs him by 30lbs.I was hoping that the nipping was just play behavior.I have been going out every single time they bark and telling them to go in the house. They do listen to me but this I guess wont stop the unwanted nipping if Im not home..
I know when my dh brought Sasha home I was very nervous about getting a rottie heeler mix.We had a rottie male for 11 yrs many years ago but he was much calmer then this little girl and he was an only dog for several years.I have always disliked heelers, the ones Ive met were aggressive and hyper.But after complaining and threatening to get find her a new home the first month(it really was heck to get used to such a rambunctious and large pup).Ive come to be very attached to her and she follows me everywhere.I cant even imagine not having her now.

[meezermom]

I have four German Shepherd Dogs and even worse, they are all female!! Right now, I think I am the only one in the city with four females. Generally speaking, the females are the dangerous ones... Males posture and threaten and may even push and shove some, but the girls don't. They will go at it and if necessary, they will kill. There is a lot to handling four large female dogs...The one that got her butt beat is a not quite 9 month old that is from the only litter we had. She is darling but thinks she can get away with anything by being cute....The others have let her get away with too much and now it has come back to bite them...They have had it with her crap and have taken her in paw...She has a bad habit of running up behind her mom and yanking her back leg out from under her!! Or she would fly across the yard and body slam one of the others.. Well, she did it just once too often to the alpha who grabbed her and lit into her....Willow, the pup, started to yell before anything really happened to her and figured that was all she needed to do but this time she did have to take her "medicine"! Still, with all this, I have not had to suture any of my dogs up! My son's one female yeah but not mine!

I do want to mention though, I have been training for almost 40 years and that does help...The girls do know that I AM the alpha female and they will not step out of line too far...they do know that if they do, if I stare at them, they will fold. Recently I had throat surgery and have not been able to talk, and there has only been a small amount of trying to pull things. They simply do not want to take a chance of getting me mad. That is the worst thing that can happen to them in their book.

The heeler/rottie cross may simply be more stubborn! From comments from those here who have that cross, I gather they are. Hounds are rather notorious for being stubborn and difficult... Terriers are not a lot better...You have your work cut out for you but I am sure you are up to the challenge. It simply takes a lot of time and effort and there are days you feel like you do nothing but work with the dogs!