my pup (12 weeks) was given his first bone today and he had it for all of 1 minute before it went all wrong!  He is a very canny and lazy dog who eats dried food and has had chicken wings with no issues.  I was able to take the chicken wing away from him the first time he had one (to prevent him swallowing it whole) and he has no issues with his food bowl.

I gave him the bone this morning and he darted to the back door which was slightly ajar.  I moved to shut it to stop him attempting to bury it outside and as I went near him he growled at me then darted into his cage when I shouted at him.  When I went to take the bone off him as I won't tolerate being growled at by him he started snarling and trying to bite my hand.  I took the bone from him and put it away.

5 minutes later I reintroduced the bone with me holding it so he only got to chew it with me holding onto it.  He was fine with this but when I moved my other hand slightly closer to his face to stroke him so he would see that it is me that is calling the shots he growled again.  I immediately removed the bone and walked away from him.  Was this the right thing to do?

I looked in some of the dog books I have and they all said that if there is an object that is an issue the solution is to remove the object.  This isn't an ideal solution as I would like him to have bone every once in a while.

Oh Dear Can you tell me why you feel you need to give & then take food items away from your dog ?

I have never been able to understand why owners think they have to be able to take away a food resource & the dog is just to accept it.

If I were to serve you in a restaurant & just as you were starting your meal take it a away from you I don't think you would be very happy, a similar thing happens with your dog-except the dog cannot verbally communicate to you, it acts on it's instinct. If you continue you will be reinforcing the guarding behaviour & it will get worse.

This is totally different to stopping your dog having something it should not have, that behaviour requires swapping what it shouldn't have for a very high value reward.

Resource guarding especially with youngsters is very common and natural, although understandably has to be trained out of them :)  I don't give anything and then try to take away - be it toys, treats or anything a pup sees of value.

Pups growl when they think they're in danger of losing something they REALLy enjoy - bones are about the highest value to most dogs as you can get LOL.  I use swap techniques to train them out of guarding behaviour - i.e. with a chicken wing, offer another chicken wing if need be - obviously the more highly prized the food or toy (or sock LOL) the more tempting the swap has to be and sometimes only another of the same will suffice :)

Try reading THIS ARTICLE - it's not exactly the regime I would go through with a puppy but the basics are the same.

If I were you I'd avoid giving and taking away as IMO it only serves to prove the pup/dog's first instincts to be correct - they were worried their 'prize' was at risk from being stolen and sure enough, it was!  Better to avoid escalating a problem which IMO removal on a 'because I can' basis is likely to force the growl to a snarl to a bite.

HTH, Teri :)

I usually would do swapping and have been doing this with other things he makes off with but as you say bones are very high value and there was nothing around to do a swap with and I didn't want him to think that by growling and snarling I was backing off.  This is not the message I want him to get.

I don't make a habit of taking things away 'because I can' but did not want the bone taken into the garden.

thanks for the article I will give it a shot.

Hi Ali

> I didn't want him to think that by growling and snarling I was backing off.  This is not the message I want him to get.

I understand that but if you're consistent in training with this behaviour it shouldn't matter if the odd time at this very early stage there's nothing you can do.  For example, had he made it out into the garden and was under a thick thorny bush and attempting to bury it, there's probably not a lot you could do :) In that instance I would suggest leave him to get on with it and retrieve it later when he's shut safely indoors.

Don't set up situations to fail - NB, remember the odd lapse of concentration on our part is no big deal and par for the course when going through the early days as most of us have had quite a few years of bliss since having done it before :)

My puppy last growled at about 6 months over a bone - hadn't done it since he was very young as he's used to bones for food and recreation but perhaps this one seemed better than others or he was feeling more vulnerable for whatever reason.  I just threw him some kibble - not nearly as good a swap as would have been ideal, and picked up the bone with no fuss.  Because he's been trained that things offered to him are not under threat he was quite happy (bit thick maybe LOL) and I wasn't unduly worried as it hardly bore the description of a setback.  He's now 13 months and hasn't done it again since but it's never occurred to me at any point through training youngsters that they take advantage of a situation - you know you're good at giving the right signals, just probably a while since you last needed to think about them :)

>I was able to take the chicken wing away from him the first time he had one (to prevent him swallowing it whole) and he has no issues with his food bowl.

>I don't make a habit of taking things away 'because I can' but did not want the bone taken into the garden

If you don't want him to take bones into the garden, make sure the assess is not available or let him take it into the garden then call him back offering a top quality treat or another bone. I never do swaps with anything I have given my dogs

> I never do swaps with anything I have given my dogs

so what do you do?  I took it from your first post that you do swap the item for one of higher value but your last post states you don't.

I wrote "I never do swaps with anything I have given my dogs

ie if I give my dog a bone, toy, food etc I do not ask my dogs to give them up as why would I have given them the item in the first place

If they have something I haven't given them(ie something that they shouldn't have) then I offer a high valve swap

Agree totally.  If I've given my dog something, it now belongs to the dog.  On the other hand if said dog has STOLEN something or has something inapropriate, (sp!), then I would swop for something of higher value.

I'm afraid I've been known to give the wrong dog the wrong dinner at times of distraction, so then I need to be able to take it away and replace it with the right one. Because I always train my puppies from day 1 to allow me to hold the bowl when they eat (litters are fed individually, not from one big dish) they grow up knowing that human hands around bowls are nothing to worry about.

> I'm afraid I've been known to give the wrong dog the wrong dinner at times of distraction, so then I need to be able to take it away and replace it with the right one. Because I always train my puppies from day 1 to allow me to hold the bowl when they eat (litters are fed individually, not from one big dish) they grow up knowing that human hands around bowls are nothing to worry about.

JG, I'm glad I'm not the only one that has managed to give the dog the wrong bowl :) Wasn't a problem as I have done the same as you in teaching hands are not a problem around food :)
There can be other reasons to take something back from a dog once you have given it, eg. I often take Busters rope toy from him if there are loose threads on it, or occasionally while he is chewing on his kong stuffed with goodies I have taken it off him thinking I have spotted a rip in it. His toys are inspected before & after him using them but it doesn't take long for him to destroy them, so I do feel I need to be able to take them off him mid-play if they look as if they could have become a hazard. The same for any chews/food (he doesn't have bones), it's possible for a food item to pick up bits of things the dog shouldn't be eating, in which case you may want to take to food item back in order to clean it.
A simple 'wait' is now enough for him to realise that I am not stealing his toys/food and he will patiently wait for the object to be returned or replaced with a treat :)

ok, that is clearer.  What do you do if you are near a dog and they growl because they percieve you are too close to them and their resource?  I don't want to take it, just get on with what I am doing that happens to be near the dog?

Hi again Ali,

I make a point of keeping treats in my jeans or a bum-bag on all the time with youngsters so that should I want to attract or distract them at any time I've got the 'tools of the trade' to hand :)

If my pup gave me a grumble just by chance, I'd use it's name (as often as not the little blighters aren't so brave as to be looking at us LOL) so getting it's attention and toss a treat a little ahead of it.  It matters not really if they go after the treat (i.e. biscuit doesn't usually win over slippers in our house ) but it takes their mind off being defensive and you can then carry on to do what you want to do without fear of ankles being filleted :)

> (as often as not the little blighters aren't so brave as to be looking at us LOL)

too true, lol

> What do you do if you are near a dog and they growl because they percieve you are too close to them and their resource?  I don't want to take it, just get on with what I am doing that happens to be near the dog?

Strangely enough I have never had it happen to me with any of my dogs. I've racked my brains to think an incident from the past but I cannot remember one. Even when Loukar had hunted & killed a mouse he released it to me as he would a toy to throw again.

I spend a lot of time doing T Touch on my dogs & having one to one quality time with each of them everyday(even do this with the cats ;-) ) probably because I want a very close bond with my dogs for showing & doing obedience with them I do put a lot of effort into my dog ownership as I see it as a privilege & not a doG given right. I think because of this my dogs never perceive that I am a threat to them & whatever they have, be it food, bone, toy etc

> I think because of this my dogs never perceive that I am a threat to them & whatever they have, be it food, bone, toy etc

I'm sure that's the case with you MM - but I can't say it's been my experience with at least half fo the pups I've had and I've never considered any of them should see me as a big scary about to steal my fave bone monster LOL.  But pups are pups and in my (briefer) experience of raising my own, whether bought in or home bred, there's always been the odd grumble in the early weeks.  I've just put it down to learning - theirs and mine - and it's never progressed to anything worse nor been something carried on into the kevin/tracey stages so not any different to me than working through initial house training for eg :)

regards, Teri

I started to have this problem with my gsd when he was about 6months old. The trainer I had then advice me to keep moving his food around , remove the bowl and keeping pulling him away with aleave command having kept him on a lead when feeding. The result ? the problem get worse until he snapped at me and mearly bit as I walke dpast him with abone. In tears I rang his lovely breeder , advice was leave the trainer ,only add food to his bowl until he gets confident around you. he also had a weeks holiday with her and her dogs when they share bones etc all the time.
i now have a lovely calm dog who will give me anything if necessary , it rarley is and if I have to take something I give a food treat .
I also still occasionally add bits to his bowl whenhe is eating so he sees me as provider not taking away. 

> I also still occasionally add bits to his bowl whenhe is eating so he sees me as provider not taking away.

Now that is positive reinforcement & the correct way to reassure your dog that you are no threat to his food, in fact just the opposite. I often tell people to add food a bit at a time to a dish if the dog is tending to be resource guarding & this acts as positive reinforcement.

I wouldn't expect people to do what I do exactly because most don't have the time or need the close bond, but I always tell people not to give food, toys etc & then take them away, because as you found it is very counter productive

Sorry...MM, but I'm a bit lost...do you mean access and do you mean value rather than valve? I got a tad confuzzled with those????

> Sorry...MM, but I'm a bit lost...do you mean access and do you mean value rather than valve? I got a tad confuzzled with those????

Pedantic aren't you :-( Yes I did mean Access & Value

Jeez off to spell/grammar check all your posts now

You want to try being dyslexic for a few hours then you might be slightly more tolerant

> I got a tad confuzzled with those???? Now do you mean confusable ? confabulated ? confused ? or confuted ??

> I got a tad confuzzled with those???? Now do you mean confusable ? confabulated ? confused ? or confuted ??

Confuzzled

(Apologies for the occasional rude word in the definition on the link.)