Jack has been starting to show some food aggression starting about a month ago. we feed him some of his food by hand at each meal. He always eats as fast as he possibly can, I'm pretty sure he doesn't even chew most of his food. He has always eaten like this since we took him home at 7 weeks, he's about 6 months now. We have also been petting his mouth area while he eats and he will growl sometimes. When this happens his food is taken away for a few mins.

Anyways tonight I let him have one of his bones that he was chewing on for quite some time. He took it in to his crate and was chewing on it for a while longer. Then he came out of his crate and looked at me as if he had to go to the bathroom. So i got up and said the usual "Go outside, Go potty?" Usually he gets excited at this point to go out. This time he went right back in his crate, which is were his bone was. I went up to give him a pet and before I touched him he let out a growl. I backed my hand up for a second and told him NO! then reached in to pet him and he attacked me biting my hands and arm. I took my hands out, then reached in for the bone this time. He did the same thing. Yes I did yell at him. (how couldnt you?) drug him out by his collar and pinned him down. All this time he is still attacking me. He wiggled out of my arms and I grabbed him and pinned him again. I then put him back in his crate, and never got the bone.

I went to the kitchen to calm myself before attempting again. Inspecting the cuts on my hand, I was bleeding.

He started whining after a few mins and I let him out. His bones are now nestled in the garbage.

What the heck do I need to do to stop this behavior? Its obviously not getting better, but worse.

I'm not sure if any of my advice will really help when we were going through this we were told that since our girl was the runt of her litter that is why she was food aggressive. We worked with her for several months and what ended up working for us strangely enough is just to leave her food down all day. We ended up going with a hunch after everything else we'd tried didn't work and she was barely making any progress. But here is something our trainer told us to do which seemed to help some with her before we started leaving her food down. At meal time you feed your dog entirely by hand giving him a small handful at a time, eventually the goal was to get the pup to look to you for more food, you can get them to do a trick before you give them some more so they are working for it, and to get them to refocus on something for a second. I know this is super stressful and good luck, hopefully someone else will be able to give you some more advice.

I'm going to be honest, alpha rolling may have made things worse. Resource guarding is a fear driven reaction, you are reinforcing that fear by alpha rolling. Here's my experience with it:

https://www.itsahuskything.com/t2828p40-i-really-need-some-helpits-an-emergency

I agree. Alpha rolling not once, but twice most likely made it worse. Like Megan said, it a fear based reaction. They think you are coming to take that amazing thing away from them...and you did. Not only did you take it away, you bullied them.

Alpha rolling doesn't work the same from human to dog as it does dog to dog; usually. In most cases, when a human alpha rolls a dog, all the dog is thinking is, "OMG! What is going on?! I have to get away!", and they panic. It's not the same reaction they would have from another dog doing this to them.

You need to build trust. If this has been an ongoing problem, I would personally contact a behavior based, positive trainer. Meaning somebody who trains in a positive manner based on behavior modification. In my experience, when an owner alpha rolls a dog, let alone a puppy, said puppy is going to put up a wall and trust will be lost. You need to build that trust back.

Start with hand feeding EVERY MEAL. Go slow, one or two pieces of kibble at a time. Do not give bones or toys yet. Build that trust up first, then slowly introduce bones/toys.

But I would really think about getting in touch with a behavior based trainer. I took my girl Sheba to a behavior based trainer and it only cost me $70 per session and it was a life saver.

In a perfect world with green grass and hugging bunnies, I know I could have handled it differently. I Rolled him to gain control of the situation, and for my safety. I also think 99% of you would have probably done the same thing had you been in my situation. In all honesty do you think I should have let him continue until he was done, Then give him a treat and say good boy for letting go? I think not.

Jack is an extremely good dog, minus this one issue. We also train him with as much positive reinforcement as possible, and I would appreciate if you would focus on my question on getting advise about how to work with him and NOT what I could have done differently in the past.

Also hiring a trainer is not something we are going to do, But thanks for the suggestion.

NovasHuman thanks for your input. Did you leave a full bowl of food down all day or just at mealtimes? I have a feeling that if I left food out all day we would be going through a 33 lb. bag every two days.

Please do not get defensive. You asked for help, everyone here gave you great advice. They weren't just telling you what you could have done differently in the past, but to avoid it again in the future. No one was condescending to you or blaming you for anything. Many people on here have been exactly where you are and they are just trying to share their experience.

You need to listen to your dog. Growls, hard stares, freezes, lip licks... These are all signs of stress and signs of impending bites.

Since you don't want anyone commenting on how you could have handled the situation better... Here is what you need to do for the future:

Get your hand out of his bowl and off his face while he is eating. As evidenced by what happened in the past- this is not curing his RG and will continue to exacerbate it by making your dog increasingly uncomfortable with you around food and other high value items. You are presenting yourself like a rude person who doesn't understand the plethora of communication your dog is shooting your way. Growls don't mean "yes keep doing it" or "I'm a dominant dog, you need to put me in my place." They mean 1 thing: "I am uncomfortable- bite is imminent." Punishing the dog for WARNING you, will make him NOT warn you in the future. Do you want a bite with no warning? I don't.

Work on trust around high value objects. I have a dog who was a nasty RG. He tried to bite someone over a napkin he found once. He was 5/6 when he got here so this behavior had been going on a while. With effort and trust building around food and other high value items- he is a different dog. I began feeding by dropping pieces of food at a time in his bowl while I sat next to it on the floor. Not facing him, not intimidating him, not asking him to do anything before eating. Just dropping pieces of food in the bowl. Little by little your presence is seen as calm and non intrusive. Shoving your fingers in his bowl and around his face and then punishing him for telling you he is uncomfortable is working backwards. Your dog is giving you the answer on what you both need to work on, you are ignoring that and taking away his food.

Put bones up. There is no free access to bones. Start teaching a non-threatening leave it and reward heavily. Start upping the value of what he is leaving and what you're rewarding with. Continue to work at this. You can also introduce trading by having 2 decently ranked items and let him have one at a time, the only action needed before getting the 2nd is dropping the first. Slowly introduce bones back but hold the ends first and ask for a drop/leave it after a few and reward nicely (a glob of PB works.) Once your dog is comfortable leaving higher value items you can start giving him bones to have (bully stick ect that are short lasting) and call him off of it, reward with something GOOD and release him back to finish. We need to fix your role as "one who steals things I need" to "person who lets me have all of these goodies." You are teaching your dog what to do to get BETTER things and that you aren't here to steal from them, you're here as a positive force of where good things come from.

Implementing these FORCE FREE methods WILL help to lessen and eventually fade out these RG issues. Dogs who RG and are met with force don't learn, they are only controlled with fear.

Also feel free to PM me any input as some others have done already with very helpful information. I can see this thread may get out of hand quickly.

Thanks to those that posted or sent me such helpful tips and positve feedback.

Keep them coming!

It doesn't need to get out of hand when you act like an adult. Just sayng. And no, I wouldn't have done what you did, but you keep thinking that.

Good luck.

MGoBlue wrote:

Please do not get defensive. You asked for help, everyone here gave you great advice. They weren't just telling you what you could have done differently in the past, but to avoid it again in the future. No one was condescending to you or blaming you for anything. Many people on here have been exactly where you are and they are just trying to share their experience.

Sorry if I came off that way. I wasnt trying to get defensive, I just dont want this thread to go into bashing what happend and everything I did wrong. As I stated I know it could have been handled differently.

arooroomom wrote:

You need to listen to your dog. Growls, hard stares, freezes, lip licks... These are all signs of stress and signs of impending bites.

Since you don't want anyone commenting on how you could have handled the situation better... Here is what you need to do for the future:

Get your hand out of his bowl and off his face while he is eating. As evidenced by what happened in the past- this is not curing his RG and will continue to exacerbate it by making your dog increasingly uncomfortable with you around food and other high value items. You are presenting yourself like a rude person who doesn't understand the plethora of communication your dog is shooting your way. Growls don't mean "yes keep doing it" or "I'm a dominant dog, you need to put me in my place." They mean 1 thing: "I am uncomfortable- bite is imminent." Punishing the dog for WARNING you, will make him NOT warn you in the future. Do you want a bite with no warning? I don't.

Work on trust around high value objects. I have a dog who was a nasty RG. He tried to bite someone over a napkin he found once. He was 5/6 when he got here so this behavior had been going on a while. With effort and trust building around food and other high value items- he is a different dog. I began feeding by dropping pieces of food at a time in his bowl while I sat next to it on the floor. Not facing him, not intimidating him, not asking him to do anything before eating. Just dropping pieces of food in the bowl. Little by little your presence is seen as calm and non intrusive. Shoving your fingers in his bowl and around his face and then punishing him for telling you he is uncomfortable is working backwards. Your dog is giving you the answer on what you both need to work on, you are ignoring that and taking away his food.

Put bones up. There is no free access to bones. Start teaching a non-threatening leave it and reward heavily. Start upping the value of what he is leaving and what you're rewarding with. Continue to work at this. You can also introduce trading by having 2 decently ranked items and let him have one at a time, the only action needed before getting the 2nd is dropping the first. Slowly introduce bones back but hold the ends first and ask for a drop/leave it after a few and reward nicely (a glob of PB works.) Once your dog is comfortable leaving higher value items you can start giving him bones to have (bully stick ect that are short lasting) and call him off of it, reward with something GOOD and release him back to finish. We need to fix your role as "one who steals things I need" to "person who lets me have all of these goodies." You are teaching your dog what to do to get BETTER things and that you aren't here to steal from them, you're here as a positive force of where good things come from.

Implementing these FORCE FREE methods WILL help to lessen and eventually fade out these RG issues. Dogs who RG and are met with force don't learn, they are only controlled with fear.

Lots of good info, I will put some of it to use. Thanks

Sheba&Kennedy wrote:

It doesn't need to get out of hand when you act like an adult. Just sayng. And no, I wouldn't have done what you did, but you keep thinking that.

Good luck.

seams like the pots calling the kettle black here.
Thanks anyways

All I did was explain WHY alpha rolling is not a good idea so you didn't do it in the future and then wonder why it's not working. You replied with a less than mature post. I understand not wanting to focus on things you can't change, but when people are offering constructive advice, you don't need to get offensive. I for one would like to know it I was doing something potentially harmful to my dog.

Seeing as how my husband did what you did and got clawed (he did deserve it), I don't think I would do the same thing.

I actually practice NILIF training and have made great progress. I can give most things to her now without issue. The only time I take something away is if it is a choking hazard or dangerous. I don't do that by rolling her. I trade her for something better and if that doesn't work I get her harness and say "walk." She nows leaves it behind without an issue.

Sheba&Kennedy wrote:

All I did was explain WHY alpha rolling is not a good idea so you didn't do it in the future and then wonder why it's not working. You replied with a less than mature post. I understand not wanting to focus on things you can't change, but when people are offering constructive advice, you don't need to get offensive. I for one would like to know it I was doing something potentially harmful to my dog.

You seem to be taking this a bit personal as if you feel I was directing this directly to you. Not the case.

please see above post about me not intending to be defensive. Thanks




It seems it may be misunderstood that I rolled Jack to take the toy away. That is not the case. I wasnt even trying to take the toy away to begin with. Just pat him on the head. I pinned him due to him attacking me to the point that I was bleeding.

When we got Harry, our older dog became a bit food defensive. We went to feeding them both by hand with training tricks for about 3 weeks. Food defense hasnt been a problem since. Hope you find something that works for you. We also use Harry's bone/antler for tricks and fetch. We also established boundaries for each dog, esentially protecting one's foodfrom the other so I think that helped build trust for each. We can leave babygirl's food down all day and Harry will look at it but wont get closer than 4-5ft as thats the boundary we established. Best of luck to you.

hi - we just got a new 12 mth female rescue - she is very food aggressive especially with our other pup - also the girl that got her from the pound (she was about to be killed & was some distance away) said that she bit her husband on the hand when he was feeding her - she also killed one of their chickens - not a popular girl.

initially she would not accept treats of any kind by hand but now is accepting them even in the presence of our other dog - so as others have said, feeding by hand seems to do the trick however might i also suggest, in the meantime, not to give bones that she can guard long term.

@ChillyBeach Did you feed them both by hand at the same time or fed one completely then the other? We just got a rescue and we're having resource guarding issues.

We had them both performing tricks at the same time. Each would get a small amount of food for each trick. We'd alternate between the two until the two scoops of food were gone. At first we stood between them and acted as the guard for the food but eventually they were fine being next to each other.