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Permalink Reply by Jennifer Markley on December 1, 2009 at 7:20pm

I know tons of people are going to comment on this one! Seanna was the same way when I got her. Corgi's are notorious according to my vet to act this way. I tried the "Nothing in Life is Free" program, and it worked some, but I found out the only thing that truly worked is the Cesar Milan philosophy. You MUST be the pack leader. When she acts like this, you must win the fight and pin her down, and not release until she is submissive. I make it a common thing to flip Seanna over on her back quite frequently, as this is a total submissive position. It allows me to groom her ears/teeth and nails without difficulty. It was a fight at first, but once she knew she wasn't going to win, she gave in. You need to clue in on what posturing she does before becoming aggressive, and stop it right then. I can just do a snap with my fingers and say "uh uh" now, and she stops. Hope it helps.

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Permalink Reply by Stephanie on December 1, 2009 at 7:27pm

My sister-in-law said the same thing, but she has a schnauzer and I don't know much about their personalities. As far as posturing, it's so fast, but I'll keep an eye out.

The weird thing is, Bear obviously recognizes me as the pack leader (if he has something he's not supposed to, all I have to do is walk near him and PLOP out of his mouth it goes). He seems to dominate her - so I guess in my mind, I made a sort of chain of command - Bear is submissive to me, she is submissive to Bear, therefore she is submissive to me - but it seems not.

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Permalink Reply by Mary on December 1, 2009 at 7:38pm

Nibbler was the same way too. In fact one time she bit my nose so hard that her teeth got stuck. Flipping Nibbler over just made her fight and bite harder. Even if we held her down for a long time. I think because she thought I was fighting back and she took it as a challenge. The only thing that seemed to work for us was to immediately isolate her every time she bit. We didn't use her kennel as this is supposed to be a pleasant place, so we would lead her to the bathroom, or if she was really crazy we would just leave the room and go into another one for five minutes. So whatever works probably depends on your corgis personality, but this is what worked for us. Good luck!

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Permalink Reply by Bev Levy on December 1, 2009 at 7:58pm

I really don't think the flipping over bit is a good idea. Cesar does not use it on puppies or dogs that are not very aggressive. When it comes to vet procedures I have them muzzle Sparty because he has had his share of painful procedures and just is scared to death. I would work with a trainer that can evaluate Goldy. The NILF plan should be started immediately but training since she is so young is the best way to go. Be careful doing things that are suggested by someone that has not evaluated her because you could end up with worse problems. A trainer should be able to figure out where the aggression is coming from. If it is fearful aggression rough methods will just make it worse. Hang in there she can be worked with! Remember corgis were bred to keep critters out of the garden and tell a couple 1000lb cows what to do so they can have a lot of attitude. When Sparty was a puppy I went to classes early because he really had my number!

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Permalink Reply by Beth on December 1, 2009 at 8:07pm

Hmmm. Jack would scream and fight but never bit. I mean, he would nip like crazy in play, but never bit me for reals. He did the screaming and fighting thing, though.

I am personally very leery of the flip-and-hold thing. I respect that it works for some people and would never tell someone that it worked for that they were wrong!

The "alpha roll" is more of a beta roll; submissive dogs voluntarily roll over for more dominant dogs. I have seen many, many dogs drop and roll when Jack struts his stuff. I've seen him flip dogs IN PLAY but never has he had a fight. In a fight situation, when one dog rolls another it is quite frequently to try to kill it. IMO, and in that of many behaviorists, when you do an alpha roll your dog thinks you might want to kill it by going for its throat, and your dog will fight for its life because it thinks it's literally fighting for its life.

Personally I would back up a bit and continue with NILIF. If you want something that is not as threatening as an alpha roll, but is still physical and shows your dog you mean business, you can hold her by the scruff (hold tight from the top and there is no way she will be able to reach you to bite), lift her front feet JUST SLIGHTLY (like her tip-toes could touch if her legs were straight) off the ground, do NOT shake her, and tell her in your sternest "So help me god I'm going to kill you" voice "No". You can give her a short lecture. What you say won't matter, it's your tone and you have to really mean it. You should not be losing control angry (and I can't imagine you personally would be) but you should use a very low, very growly voice to show that you are, in fact, the top dog in the house and the nonsense has ended, thank you very much.

However, honestly I would personally only do that with an older pup who was not out-of-control at the time, and only very rarely as it's a very serious correction. By "rarely" I mean if you do it twice in the pup's lifetime, to me that would be enough, and only for a dog you are sure is being willfully dominant. From your description of what she does when you try to hold her still, I think she may be in a panic and no learning can occur when she's in a panic. You might want to just back up and praise, praise, praise if she lets you, say, touch her ear while she's standing free. When she lets you touch, move up to looking inside, and so on. Take baby steps and praise often.

I could never physically confine Jack when he was a pup. I had to follow him around to tape his ears. Once he learned a sit and a stay I could work on him more, but he still gets a bit funny if you try to hug him, hold him still, etc. But like I said, he never tried to bite me. He would swing his head around in a panic, but didn't go for me.

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Permalink Reply by Stephanie on December 1, 2009 at 8:37pm

We do a lot of NILF, although probably not on purpose, but because I'm a teacher and I believe in the power of consistency. She sits for her leash to go out, she goes into her crate when I say "crate" and waits for her treat, she sits for her dinner, she waits to get out of the car. I'm researching it more now to see if there's more I can do.

I hadn't thought about the scruff grab, although I can't imagine that going well...but at least it would save my hands. The good thing is, I've never gotten angry, more than anything she confuses me.

We did a little training session tonight and worked on her letting me pull on her collar and fiddle with her toes while giving her treats. But I think you're really on target with the panic thing - it's like she's oblivious when she does it...but she's not a fearful dog overall.

Ugh, it's harding than kids because doggies can't talk :(

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Permalink Reply by Beth on December 1, 2009 at 8:52pm

Many dogs don't react to scruff-grabs the way you would think they would. A mother dog transports her pups by the scruff and they instinctively go limp when grabbed there. It seems to me that a residual bit of that instinct lingers. My dogs never have collars around in the house, so if I need to physically redirect one's front-end, I will grab the scruff and sort of use it to guide them, like a make-shift lead. Jack my confinement-fighter does not resist the move at all.

You might try just grabbing her scruff and sliding her an inch or two on a tile floor when she's calm just to see how she reacts. If it has a calming influence on her, then you can try it next time she has a fit and see if it helps, and if she connects with her teeth you can use it to give her a "no." If she just fights it, I wouldn't do that either.

The problem with dominance moves on our part is if our dog is actually reacting out of fear and we punish them in a scary way (to them), we are just heightening the fear and increasing the chance of aggression.

I like The Dog Whisperer and have seen him alpha-roll successfully, but he also assesses dogs carefully and I saw a fear-biter on there and he didn't even address the biting, just worked with the dog to make her more confident and worked with the owner to show her how to approach her dog in a non-threatening way. He alpha-rolls a very small percentage of the dogs he works with, if you watch the show regularly, and not even the majority of dogs who have bitten get rolled. In his explanation, he only rolls the ones who mean real business and would kill him given the opportunity (even if they are too small to do real damage).

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Permalink Reply by Beth on December 1, 2009 at 9:16pm

I just realized Bev must have been answering when I was and I missed her posts, but she sort of says what I ended up saying about Cesar rarely actually using the alpha roll, and that strong corrections can make aggression worse.

If she is going into panic mode and just swinging her head around and snapping, that's not necessarily the same thing as targeted biting from an adult at all. Puppies are still working out their social skills, as you know. Aggression can mean different things at different ages. Think of a human child: kicking and biting from a one-year-old that is being forced to do something she doesn't want to is not the same thing at all as a first-grader who bites and kicks. Some puppies are very wild which does not necessarily mean they'll grow up to be aggressive adults (though they can). I agree that some time with a behaviorist will help sort it all out.

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Permalink Reply by Beth on December 1, 2009 at 9:55pm

I wanted to add that my dogs are very use to having their scruffs handled. I give them neck massages all the time, so to them grabbing the scruff is not anything startling.

If I need to hold my dog still I'd rather the scruff than the collar because I don't like to choke them, and also I've gotten my hand caught in collars before by writhing dogs. No fun!

I just don't want it to sound like I'm advising the old-fashioned "scruff shake" where the dog is picked up forcibly and shaken around. What I'm talking about is simply holding the dog still while kinda growling at it. I use almost all positive training, but some dogs do need a correction now and then, in my opinion.

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Permalink Reply by Sunni A. on December 1, 2009 at 11:09pm

I'm just going to add that you should incorporate quick, sudden movements into your training sessions. This really helped with Eddy biting. It helps in the long run too because in many many situations (like the eating cat poo) our 1st instinct is to rush-and-grab. Your sudden movements should not be stressful for her, and her instinct should not be to bite, she needs to get used to that.

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Permalink Reply by Beth on December 2, 2009 at 7:04am

That's good advice! You can incorporate quick moves into rewarding behavior, like grabbing a ball to throw for fetch, or tossing a treat near them. You could start with your quick moves at enough of a distance that they wouldn't bite, then make them closer to the dog.

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