I took the step today of calling for an appointment with an in-home trainer for Lilly. There's no way I could take her to any classes that had other dogs.
It seems the more comfortable she's gotten in her new home, the more she tends to read the riot act to any person or dog not in this family. She may be withered from the waist down, but from the waist up she's a barking, lunging German Shepherd who wants a confrontation. What was at first embarrassing is now getting a little scary as she won't listen to me when she's trying to get at somebody and all I can do is hold on with all my might. So far she's not snarling or snapping when she's doing this, so thank goodness for that. Once she actually meets the stranger (and there are a LOT of brave strangers out there), she's as nice as can be. But she really shouldn't expect the whole world to submit itself for her approval.
I'm out of my league trying to modify canine aggression, so I'm forced to try something completely new and call in a professional.
Except for that, she's a very sweet girl.
Posted by floridacracker at January 15, 2005 06:32 PMI suspect she's just protecting all of y'all, the best (and only) pack she's ever had, and your home, the only turf that's ever really been "hers." And she's gotta have an extraordinarily strong personality, or she wouldn't have survived what she'd been through. Having a somewhat smaller (50lbs) Cujo-wannabe, I can only imagine what Miss Lilly looks and sounds like. I also suspect she does expect the whole world to submit itself to her approval. What's wrong with that? :-)
Seriously, good luck with the trainer. That's a good idea.
And thanks for the Lilly update. I've been wondering how things were going.
Posted by: Amy at January 16, 2005 08:15 PMI agree with everything you said, Amy.
However, she has to learn to be a good citizen. Part of the problem for me is that when we're walking, I also have a 40-pound dog on the other arm, pulling.
Shiloh doesn't bark at people, but she damn sure starts pulling to whereever Lilly's wanting to go so she can get in on the shit too. I could start walking them separately and concentrating on bits of training I've learned of, but to tell you the truth, I think this is more than I can turn around with a handful of tricks. Part of it is the fact that she *is* a German Shepherd and this is part of the breed's nature, then there's all her background, and finally there's my inexperience in training any kind of dog that wasn't pretty much ready out-of-the-box to be a nice little dog.
Don't think for a moment that Lilly's going anywhere. She most certainly is not. I feel silly calling in a behaviorist, but barking and lunging at 90-year-old ladies in their yards as we walk by is behavior I want changed.
Yep, it definitely needs to be changed. When I said "What's wrong with that?" I was just thinking out loud for Miss Lilly. I'm sure she's extremely proud of herself for scaring away all the geriatric miscreants and interlopers that are obviously after your food or your "den" or may even wanna eat you. ;-)
Don't feel silly for calling the trainer. If I'da had the money when Lulu was a young dog, I might have done the same thing.
Posted by: Amy at January 16, 2005 11:42 PM