I am the owner of a 17 week old Malamute bitch pup and have a problem with her feeding time.
When I am preparing her meal and her food bowl is on the counter out of her sight, she sits next to me patiently. However, if I or anyone else strokes her at this time, she lowers her head, moves her ears out to the side and she finally growls. This growling in turn means she gets held by the scruff of her neck and scolded. This provokes louder growling and struggling until she finally quietens and withdraws a few steps. She does not always go as far as growling, but she clearly does not like being touched at this time.
When I have the food bowl in my hand and she can see it, this problem does not present itself, possibly becasue she is so focused on the now visible bowl.
Since the day I got her, I have occasionally stroked her and have held the bowl while she is eating from it, sometimes adding tidbits etc and she has not shown any negative reaction.
Could this problem be a general dominance one, or something more specific?

Can anyone advise me?

Thanks

There are Mal owners on, Melodysk is one of them. Hopefully someone will be along with some advice for you soon :D

Be very careful you don't teach her not to growl.... it can prove a costly mistake :)

I understand you don't want her to growl. It sounds to me as if she's basically communicating (body language etc first, politely as it were) that she is concentrating very hard on getting her grub and doesn't want the annoyance of being touched.

I'd do sessions of getting her used to being touched away from this scenario, and get her generally very used to being handled - you don't want a dog you cant handle eg at the vets. Most pup classes will include this kind of thing in their curriculum, has she been to a pup class?

It's very imporant the dog actually enjoys this. I'd do it using food rewards, somethingn very tasty. Gradually get the dog used to all sorts, even collar grabs which may be a bit rought, but over time and with lots of rewards. You then have a dog who when grown will tolerate a wide variety of handling and even tugging, etc. It sounds soft, but all my dogs have been trained this way, and have never growled at me nor been bothered if I do stroke them whilst they are eating :) Also Ian Dunbar the Californian trainer has Malamutes and recommends this way for general handling etc.

However, I do respect the fact that they are all individuals and probably wouldn't "irritate" my dog for want of a better word. I mean, would you want your hubby to give you a great big kiss and cuddle just as you were about to tuck into your favourite meal? I'd want it, but afterwards thankyou :D

Hth and good luck
Lindsay
x

Please don't scold her or hold her by the scruff of her neck.  As you can see, this only means that she growls more - the reason for that being that you are proving to her that there is a need to growl and protect herself, because you are a threat to her.  If you continue to threaten her, she will continue to "warn" you.  If you escalate your threat to her (by scruffing her), she will escalate her warning to you (by growling more).

Please also remove any thought of this being a dominance behaviour from your mind.  Here is a link to help explain why: <a class='url' href='http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2004/Debunking.pdf'>http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2004/Debunking.pdf</a>

If I understand right, she is not growling at you for touching her food or bowl - she is growling at you for attempting to stroke her, while she is waiting for food, is that right?  And she growls regardless of whether it is the person preparing the food, or another person who strokes her?

Does she growl at you for stroking her at any other time?  If you have a new toy that she wants, and someone attempts to stroke her while she is "waiting" for that, does she growl?

At what point does she growl?  Does she growl when you approach her, when you extend your hand or when you actually touch her?

It sounds to me like she is saying "Go away and stop pestering me, I am waiting for my food and I don't want to play or do anything else right now".  If I were you, I would throw her bits of her meal while she is sitting there, waiting, and while you are preparing it - while she is quiet.  Then turn around and face her - if she still doesn't growl, throw her more food and turn back again.  Keep doing that.  Then you can face her, take a step towards her, and if she doesn't growl, throw her bits of her meal.  Go back.  Repeat several times.  Walk right up to her.  If she doesn't growl, give her several bits of her food.  Repeat.  Extend a hand (don't touch her).  If she doesn't growl, give several bits of food.  Repeat many times.  Extend a hand and touch her (don't stroke, just touch).  If she doesn't growl, give several bits of food.

And so on until you can actually stroke her.

Then you need to go back to step 1 with someone else approaching her, and you feeding her - just because she is fine with you doing it, doesn't mean she will be fine with anyone else, so you need to generalise it by going back to step 1 with another person.

Remember - she should not growl at any point, and if she does, it's your fault for pushing things too fast, too soon.  Go back and progress more slowly.

You might want to feed her her entire meal like this until you've solved this problem.

Thank you for your fast reply.
She only growls when she is actually touched or stroked (by anyone) while waiting for a meal. She has growled on two occasions when someone has stroked her while she has known there were tidbits on the go but we have not noticed any problems with toys, chews are mostly dropped on command (and rewarded!).

If a dog or even a person is focusing on something, quite often they do not want any interference, a bit like if your OH started caressing you in the middle of a thriller etc (I am only imagining here) :D

If it were me I would probably say somethig along the lines of "pack it in, I am watching the film" etc :D

If you want her to feel more comfortable with being touched at this time, do you think it is  a good idea to actually make her feel less comfortable by scolding her and scruffing her?

You may be in danger of teaching her to associate feeding time with a stressful time and actually INCREASING the unwanted behaviour and/or teaching her not to give a warning signal (the growl) which could then possibly lead to what most people describe as "the dog bit with no warning".......... this is often because the dog has been scolded for warning.

If you wish your dog to become comfortable and relaxed around feeding time and support being stroked etc then I would start off with making sure she is comfortable with this outside the feeding scenario and then gradually introduce boring food from the hand etc until the dog can be very aroused but also relaxed with stroking around meal times.

ps I forgot to say, I don't think it has anything to do with dominance.......

HTH

Hi there :)

Have you been back to your breeder for advice? The breeder of your pup should be the first person that you turn to for help and all good breeders WILL offer help for the lifetime of your pup ;)

I would hand feed her and make feeding an anjoyable time and not a time for her to get stressy. She is still a baby and whilst Mals can be a dominant breed, she should learn early on that growling is not acceptable.

Feel free to email me if I can offer an other help ;) There are a few of us Mally owners here and I am sure another one will be along soon, we tend to be like buses LOL

Thanks folks.