[chelseacopper]

Hey everyone,

I'm looking for some advice/support about the guilt I feel leaving my newly adopted 3 year old foxhound home alone. I adopted him on Saturday, and had to leave him alone for three hours yesterday and felt sooooo guilty about it! He was perfectly fine when my partner came home; he didn't mess in the house, and didn't chew anything at all.

I know I should be encouraging a healthy independence, but I'm such a wet noodle when it comes to training. I'm working on having a firmer hand with him. We start obedience classes tonight.

This is a bit of a separate issue, but part of the reason I am so submissive toward him (bad for the dog, I know!) is because I was attacked by a large dog a few years ago. To be honest, I'm still very intimidated by dogs, despite my love for them, and when Copper growled at me when I did something he didn't like the other day, I felt too scared to correct his behaviour.

I'm willing to work through my fears to develop a healthy and loving relationship with Copper, but it's tough! Anyone else out there with a similar experience?

 

[Rivonia]

My husband is like that, and it's a pain. I have no idea how you could get over it, we've had our dog for 5 months now and my husband still stresses about leaving him alone..

As for the growling, you HAVE to get your attitude sorted out before you break your dog. If he has the predisposition, he will get aggressive in future if you let him get away with it now. If you can't do it on your own, get professional help.

 

[chelseacopper]

My husband is like that, and it's a pain. I have no idea how you could get over it, we've had our dog for 5 months now and my husband still stresses about leaving him alone..

No doubt it's annoying... I hope by 6 weeks I'll be over it because I'm returning to work full time. Thankfully my partner is patient with me as we work on this stuff together!

We did seek professional help because I'm inexperienced.

Thanks for your advice!

 

[PoppyKenna]

The longer you have him, the easier it will get. You'll find a routine that works

Be sure the trainer you choose to work with uses positive methods. Growling is actually an interesting thing to work with because it is a GOOD thing (even though it doesn't seem that way!). Growling is essentially Copper expressing his discomfort so you can adjust the situation. There are trainers out there that will punish for growling - which you really don't want to do - and that gets rid of the growling, so then warning. This leads to dogs who just bite "out of the blue" - because their means of communication has been gotten rid of, or ignored.

How you deal with growling will depend on why he's doing it, but a good trainer can help you out with that

Congrats on the new addition and may you have many happy years together!!
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[Moonstream]

It sounds like good positive reinforcement training will be cathartic for the both of you!

Also, like Poppy said above, growling is actually not a behavior you want to 'correct' or do away with. A growl is often the first signal a person has that a dog is uncomfortable (because people tend not to pay attention to more subtle signals from dogs because they can be hard to notice without practiced eyes). When you correct a growl, you're not making that dog any more 'respectful' or 'safe', you're correcting the vocalization itself.

The reason people see growls leading to aggression is because they are people who aren't addressing the reason why their dog is growling- whether that be fear, resource guarding, being uncomfortable with a certain gender/clothing/hats/whatever. If a dog growls, you should back off and think about why they're growing and how you can address the behavior/feelings that are leading to the growl.

Personally I would avoid any trainers that push you to use corrections. You can train a dog using only positive reinforcement training, and it sounds like you're not very comfortable correcting a large dog anyways. Correction training can sometimes work faster than just ignoring behaviors you don't like and reinforcing behaviors you do but IMO it produces a less enthusiastic dog that doesn't approach training with the same level of "if I do this maybe I'll get a treat" because they've been taught that the wrong thing will get them a leash jerk.

Also, given that he's a hound, and one bred to hunt in a group at that, he's likely not to have the most biddable temperament. I'd highly recommend the book "When Pigs Fly: Training Impossible Dogs". It's a book specifically about training non-biddable breeds (the author has Bull Terriers) and focuses on positive reinforcement only.