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Dog getting territorial over people

Eever · 2011-05-03 10:15:33

Hi, sorry this is longer than I meant it to be but if you have the patience, here it is! Just a bit of background. I moved back to my parents house about two years ago with my dog. My mum has a dog too and my sisters dog lives at home aswell so we're over run with them! My dog and my mums dog didn't get along at all when I…

03-05-2011 11:15am

#1

Eever

Closed Accounts Posts: 86 ✭✭

Join Date: March 2011

Posts: 78

Hi, sorry this is longer than I meant it to be but if you have the patience, here it is!

Just a bit of background. I moved back to my parents house about two years ago with my dog. My mum has a dog too and my sisters dog lives at home aswell so we're over run with them! My dog and my mums dog didn't get along at all when I first moved home as mine is quite domineering and while my mums dog isn't quite so domineering she's no pushover either so there were a few scraps (all of which were instigated by my dog but won by my mothers dog on account of the fact that she's about five times his size!). Anyway, fast forward two years and they get along grand now, despite that my mum is the one feeding them all my dog still sees me as his owner I guess because I walk him but he no longer minds the other dogs coming up to me and being petted and all that because I guess he just had to get used to it.

The problem now is with my boyfriend. When he is over, we tend to sit in the small, rarely used sitting room and my dog comes in and lies on the rug. Recently he's started growling at my mums dog if she attempts to stick her head in the door! I know he's only giving a warning and not actually starting a fight but I thought maybe he was starting to see the room as his territory where he hangs out with us and I didn't want to go back to square one with them fighting so I no longer let him in that room when we're in there. But now over the weekend he started growling at the other dog when she walked into any room where my dog was sitting with my boyfriend.

Any advice on how I can address this behaviour? I always put him straight outside when he does it but I'm worried that might be the wrong thing that he might not understand why he's being put outside. I've thought about bringing my mums dog on walks with us so maybe my dog won't see my boyfriend so exclusively as his property but my mums dog is not so easy to walk, I wouldn't be able to let her off her lead at all as she wouldn't come back for me and she has noisy breathing problems so other people tend to presume she's going to attack them all the time!

Anybody ever have to deal with anything similar before? Any advice? Or should I just have to encourage my boyfriend not to pay any attention to my dog, unless he's maybe paying attention to them both at the same time?

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