Tempest Posted November 24, 2008 Report Share Posted November 24, 2008 I'll try and go into as much detail as possible but basically Jess is a 3 year old lab that i've had for 2 years now and my OH (Chris) has been living here for around a year now I also have Ollie an elderly collie x lad and he is definately 'in charge' when it comes to Jess' position in the household. I currently work from home and the dogs are very much 'my' dogs and I do all the feeding/walking etc. OH gets on fine with the dogs and plays with them etc but I do all the day to day care. This is going to be changing shortly as I'm going to be going out to work Tues-Sat and he'll be walking Jess on Friday and Saturday. He's been out with us walking a few times and I think Jess sees him very much as a 'fun' person that plays ball/tuggy with her. Anyways on Saturday afternoon he took Jess out for a walk while I was out shopping and basically she was offlead and ran over to another (apparently quite small) dog - Chris called her and she didn't come back (which I was amazed at as she's got fantastic recall). The dogs sniffed all was fine and then the dog came running over to Chris. He said they were fine together but he dropped down and started stroking/fussing the other dog and apparently Jess had a real bark at it and tried to 'chase it off' but Chris grabbed her by the collar and said 'no' and the other dog ran back to its owner. I was really really shocked by this behaviour as I've never seen Jess behave like that in the 2 years that I've walked her. Chris also mentioned that a few months ago when he took her out when I was poorly he went with a friend of ours and her dog and apparently when Tess (the friends dog) jumped up at Chris, Jess 'told her off' in a similar way. Again she's never done this with me and Tess usually jumps all over me. At the mo I'm thinking that Chris has a high novelty factor for Jess as she's not used to him walking her and gets very excited when he does and that she's perhaps viewing him as some kind of 'toy' or 'posession' and doesn't want him interacting with dogs other than her? As he's going to be walking her regularly I want to nip this behaviour in the bud - I've told Chris that if they do meet other dogs to just let them sniff and keep walking as there's no need for him to get on the floor with them or stroke them as Jess had been fine with the other dog until the point he did that. I did speak to our trainer about it this morning and she was saying she thinks that Jess is viewing Chris as a 'playmate' rather than a 'leader' and perhaps thinks its her job to protect him and said that he shouldn't play on the floor with her, let her up on the sofa. But I'm not sure I buy into that kind of pack theory. Chris definately does let Jess play too roughly with him and I do moan at him about it - so he will play 'rough and tumble' type games with her and she gets far too excited and I usually stop the game - so I think that these definately need to stop? Any ideas muchly appreciated though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanishPastry Posted November 24, 2008 Report Share Posted November 24, 2008 maybe you should let Chris himself be the one who stops their rough games, so you are not always the one who "interferes"? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempest Posted November 24, 2008 Author Report Share Posted November 24, 2008 maybe you should let Chris himself be the one who stops their rough games, so you are not always the one who "interferes"? I'm planning on telling him tonight that there will be no more rough games!!! He can play with her with toys but no more 'wrestling' type games and if she does jump or mouth then the game ends Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanishPastry Posted November 24, 2008 Report Share Posted November 24, 2008 (edited) do you think you could teach him some games that are more training orientated? Without telling him it is training, as he might fins that boring but sneakily get him to try things where Jess has to perform before they play with the toy or something along those lines? That might make her more aware that he is to be listened to as well as had fun with, preferably both at the same time edited for spelling. Edited November 24, 2008 by DanishPastry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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