[HELP] 5YO (F) Beagle/Dachshund Mix. Wasn’t always aggressive. What do I do?

[proverbsmom]

Hi everyone. New to this subreddit.

My wife and I got Leia when she was 2 in Texas from a shelter. She was found on the street pregnant and abandoned. When we picked her up the description said quiet and good with kids. She instantly won our hearts. She is 20 lbs.

For over a year, she was perfect. She’d play with other dogs, did well at doggy daycare. She only had ONE alarming incident, where we brought over a dog after owning her for about a month... and she just charged and snarled and barked the other dog into submission immediately upon seeing her. So we just assumed it was territorial and refused any dogs to come over, but she was fine outside of her home.

Before we moved, she was attacked by 2 bigger dogs. She was unharmed but I’m not sure if that affected her.

Then we moved to VA and everything changed. We temporarily stayed 3 months at my parents place who have a 16 year old Jack Russel/Dachshund mix. They got into fights every single day for the first few weeks. My dad said it was because they’re both alpha dogs and they were trying to set boundaries. 1.5 years later, Leia and my parents dog get along just fine now, but they never play. They sort of just accept that the other exists and I guess they set their boundaries.

But now, every time a dog approaches her on a walk, she usually ignores them, until they sniff her butt or put their face in front of hers. No matter how playful the other dog is, once they “cross a line” Leia barks and snaps at the other dog. I can tell this is out of fear, but I have no idea what happened. I reactively would grab her snout and say “no,” but after doing research, I’m afraid that might have reinforced her behavior.

I tried taking her to a doggy daycare once since she was great with them in TX, but she “failed” the assessment when a Corgi snuck up behind her to sniff her butt and she did her barking, snarling, advancing on the corgi into submission.

She has also snapped at neighborhood toddlers before who got up in her business and tried to pet her improperly. So far she has not bitten anyone.

We’re planning to move back to TX, and wife is pregnant; we’re worried about how she’d be with a baby.

We don’t mind accepting that she might just not like other dogs and doing some desensitizing training with her to just ignore other dogs. I’m open to other suggestions, even taking her to a behavioral trainer. But is it true that when a kid if a dog’s master’s, they tend to be okay with them? Any suggestions about things I can do to help curb Leia’s aggression before it gets to a point of no return?

I’m anxious and scared for my pupper. We love her and she’s so good with adult humans (even strangers). Any and all advice and reassurance is welcome. Thank you.

 

[kalee81]

@proverbsmom You need to get a behavioral trainer ASAP and consult a vet for medication.

I would normally only recommend the behaviorist but since you are expecting a child you need to take more dramatic measures immediately.

I would be very concerned about bringing a child into a home with a dog like this.

 

[cyjones85]

@proverbsmom So your dog and situation sounds a lot like mine. My dog is a JRT/Dachshund mix that we adopted from Texas. My wife and I lived in IL when we adopted him and he lived with us there for over a year. We moved to CT to be closer to my family and it's like he is a totally different dog in CT than when he was in IL. He was so sweet and loving in IL, but when we moved to CT it seemed like he was on edge all the time and it felt like we lost our dog and gained a monster.

We moved in with my parents and that's when things changed for him. He became aggressive and has bit me, my wife, my dad, brother, step brother, and has snapped at a few other people. None of the bites were bad enough to go to the hospital over, but it was extremely concerning. We thought for a long time, "It's just the fact that we switched from living by ourselves to living in a house with other people. He had full reign of our old house and now he's confined to a bedroom for the day with scary noises happening outside." So my wife and I bought our own house and moved him into it where he's still experiencing some of the same aggression, just at a reduced intensity.

We reached out to a dog trainer who made us very uncomfortable. He claimed he could "fix" our dog by taking him for a month and he'd return with a shock collar. This would cost $3000. We were not comfortable with any of that. Then, we found out about Michael Shikashio. He's the former president of the IAABC and has a specialty in dog aggression. He also holds a certification for working with aggressive dogs that less than 200 people in the world have. He lives in CT so he came to our house to meet with us and observe our dog. He taught us some basic things to help our dog become calmer and less aggressive. Even over the course of 24 hours, we've seen a difference in our dog.

If you have the funds and the time, I highly suggest reaching out to him. You're nowhere near CT, but he does do video conferences to help people with their dog aggression. When we met with him and he taught us the basics, he said, "Here's my number. When you train him, I want you to take videos and send them to me a few times a week so I can critique what you are doing. You can text me any time and I can answer any questions you have." He also assured us that since our dog is super smart, that he's very trainable and that we wouldn't have a super tough time training him to be calmer in our home. Check out Completecanines.com

 

[proverbsmom]

@cyjones85 Very good recommendation, thank you. When we move to TX I’ll see if there’s any local licensed trainers in the area (Michaels website even suggest that), and if there aren’t any we like, I think this is a great alternative. Thank you again!