Hi, our 4 month old Cavalier King Charles called Benson is getting very aggressive with food. He allows you to put your hand in his bowl whilst he is eating but if he finds scraps around on the floor, and you go near his mouth he really snaps at you. Even though he's only still small he warns us enough that we pull our hands away now in fear of him biting. We need to stop this asap as he may end up biting the children. Should we stop giving him treats and just feed him his own food or will this make him worse? Anyone with any advise or has had the same problem may be able to put a stop to this! Thanks in advance, Helen and Family.

Your dog is resource guarding which is perfectly normal behaviour for dogs; it may not be acceptable but is something that dogs will do as they have been genetically programmed to be possessive of what might, in the wild, be a scare resource, food.

What you need to do is to instigate a programme of counter conditioning which will ensure your safety and remove the competitive element from the situation.

All dogs should be taught to be safe around food, especially if there is a possibility that food could be combined with children; unfortunately people only tend to train for this AFTER the event and, as usual, preventive training is the best option.

If you can get hold of a book by Jean Donaldson called Mine! A practical guide to resource guarding in dogs this will give you a step by step programme to follow and is useful both in the prevention and resolution of resource guarding problems, whether food related or not.

It takes time and should be instigated first by the adults in your family and then followed by the children.

Basically you want your dog to associate your presence with the ADDITION of food not the REMOVAL of it so he becomes completely safe around people and food (not necessarily other dogs but I would not interfere in this case). 

What's his current feeding regime (how much, how many times a day)?

Thanks for the advice. We feed Benson twice a day but he never eats all his food anyway so there's always food there for him. I think the problem started because obviously he prefers our food and we had to stop him jumping up at the kids as he would try and take food from their hands, so now when he manages to get hold of some he REALLY protects it! I will look for that book you mentioned and try and train him otherwise. Many thanks, Helen.

That may be your problem - he needs at least three meals a day at this age, as his stomach isn't designed to take on enough to keep him going from just two feeds - although there may be food down it's lost it's appeal.  Try increasing the number of feeds, and removing it after 10 to 15 minutes if he hasn't eaten it all.

I would split his food into four meals & so that he sees you as no threat put the food into his dish a bit at a time that way he will see you as a source of good things rather than someone who takes food away from him & thus prompting him to guard it

I had a similar probable with my X breed rescue who had been living rough for nearly a year by the time I got her, she quickly cottoned on to seeing me as a food provider & stopped the grumping altogether