Can I pick your brains on a little scenario that happened to Missy and me at the weekend?

A bit of history - Missy is a rescue ESS who joined my household 4 years ago.....  She was quite 'sharp', particuarly with my #3 son (who has what in riding circles we might call a 'hot bottom' but not for horses, but dogs - he just can't adjust his body language to relax a dog, no matter what he does.....)  she's a lot better with him now, and that's not really a problem for us anymore.  What I didn't know at that time (because she gets along so well with my other dog - a very steady now 13 year old ESS x BC bitch) was that she also has issues with other dogs, and this came to a head at a Ttouch seminar I went to shortly after I got her - she was inside, on lead, and saying 'hello' to a friends dog - nose to nose sniffing, suddenly I felt a rumble travel up the lead, and before I could do anything, she'd snapped at this dogs nose, and was hanging on!!  We've mostly cracked it since then with a 'watch me' command, but it rather boiled over again, at another Ttouch workshop (inevitably I suppose the dogs that attend already have 'issues' and it was rather heavy on the BC side, with lots of eyeballing going on.....)

The upshot is that Missy was in her new travelling crate, which is fabric, and has mesh side panels, through which madam Missy could see out fine, but other dogs couldn't see in.........  She had several 'I'm going to gnash you' attacks but because the other dogs couldn't actually SEE her, they carried on doing what they were doing (which was walking past on lead). This seemed to confuse her, and towards the end of the afternoon, she was settled in her crate ignoring the other dogs walking past.

What I'm wondering about is the sensibility of exposing her, in a controlled manner, to other dogs while she is in her crate, so teaching her that gnashing is NOT going to acheive the result she's looking for.......

Hi Digger - been musing over this one for a bit.

I'm not sure that I'd follow on with this exposure ...... in fact I probably wouldn't.  Missy could be appearing to settle down for a number of reasons as far reaching as being so stressed she's exhausted herself onto she's worked out it's pointless, but she'll get them another time - basically anything in between those two extremes.  I know you said she appeared confused but an ESS isn't going to stay in that state for long.  

I'm assuming Missy is a smart cookie and on that basis if nothing else is not going to be desensitised by habituation in a partially concealed "den" - IMO she will, if she hasn't already, work out that it's a temporary barrier between herself and what she objects to and I can't see how that can alter her behaviour outside of the crate in the long term.

The "watch me" method is what I'd personally persevere with - particularly as you've had good success with that already.  IMO that's the area which needs fine tuning.  My first dog detested other males but after juvenile delinquency ran its course and I'd mastered how to keep him focused on me, from around 2 years of age he was acutely aware that bullying or any form of bristling behaviour wasn't allowed.  While I never managed to prevent him wanting to put every male dog on the planet in it's place I did manage to completely overcome him actually following through.   I'm trying to picture how he would have behaved had soft crates been around in those days and I suspect it would have been much in the same vein as Missy has so far ;)

I think you have to trust your instincts at the end of the day - my own view is that as you have doubts, you're not sufficiently convinced it's the way to proceed either.

regards, Teri

Hi digger

Well, there are pros and cons and no one can really predict what might happen, least of all us, who don't even know the dog in person (or "in dog" if that phrase exists!). 

It IS possible that if you continued to do this, she would eventually relax and allow dogs to walk past without snapping at them, from within her crate.  It is also possible she MAY then generalise this to being outside of the crate.

However, it's also possible that she would find it really stressful to be in the crate with loads of dogs passing by outside.  This is a technique called "flooding", where you literally "flood" the dog with the feared thing (other dogs in this case) until it is physically or emotionally exhausted and unable to have the aggressive response anymore.  Then it is able to experience the feared thing, without the aggression, and begin to make a new and more positive association.  Flooding can work, but it is also controversial because it does stress the dog out, and because if you DON'T see it through and wait until the dog IS exhausted and stops the aggro, then you can make it worse - because the dog will be being aggressive when you stop and remove the feared stimulus (other dogs).  So think carefully.

Lastly, being inside a small dark crate, and being outside on a lead by your side are two very different situations.  Even if she completely stopped having a go at dogs when she was in the crate, there's no promise that this will generalise to being outside the crate, at your side.  It may do, it may not.

I think it all depends on - how desperate you are to fix this, what other things you've tried in the past, whether you mind just managing it permanently or if you are prepared to do anything to make it stop, and of course on Missy.

There are other variations on this you can try, which is - sit by the crate with a clicker and treats.  As soon as another dog comes into her sight, click before she has a chance to get aggressive, and drop a treat in the crate from above.  Keep doing this - make sure you don't click the aggression, but almost anticipate her seeing the other dog.  In time she might come to learn that seeing another dog means a click and treat, and so stop being so aggressive.  You may then think about using this technique outside of the crate, for eg, on the lead.