Expert: Lindsey - 2/8/2009

Question
I have a 4 year old male boxer. We just had our third child and we have been having aggression issues with our boxer for a little while now. Tonight it got really bad, we have another male boxer that is 21 months old. They have always been real close but tonight my older boxer became very jealous and attacked the younger one.It was to the point that we had to pull him off the other dog more than once. This is very concerning to us since we have a new baby and two younger children in the home. Our dog is like one of our children and we want to do all that we can to help in changing this behavior. He has never hurt any of the children , actually he is overly protective of them. If he thinks we are hurting them he will jump at us. It scares me that he might hurt someone. We are unable to let him outside in our backyard by himself because he will jump the fence and has lunged at the neighbors. We have worked with him with the back yard technique and he still seems to have this issue. Any help is grealy appreciated.

Answer
Understanding and altering dog behavior revolves around understanding dog behavior and the importance of dominance and submission in the dog. It is important to remember that in the dog's mind the family is a pack unit and everyone in that family has a certain 'position' in the pack. In most families, one or both of the parents are considered the pack leaders and the dog is subordinate to them.  But when small children are involved, it has been my experience that dogs almost always consider the children equal or lower in the pack hierarchy than they are, and this is where the problem arises.  They must be taught that all humans in the household, large or small are superior to them and they must submit to them. The fact that your dog is overly protective of your children may seem cute but it is actually very bad.  Because you state he jumps at you during certain interactions with your children, he definitely does not see you as the pack leader in the household, and he is asserting his dominance over you.

The older boxer is attacking the younger one to assert his dominance.  You did not state what triggers the situation, which is key.  Is it when  you show attention to the children, is it when one dog gets more attention then the other.  Knowing what triggers the attack is important in preventing it in the future.  Your need to work with your older boxer, starting with basic obedience training up to more advanced, to show him that he is not boss.  Make him work for everything, he has to sit, stay..etc, every time he wants to be pet, wants a toy, is being leashed.

Once you begin to get a handle on him inside the household then you can start to bring that training outside.  Teach him to focus most importantly.  Try clicker training with him and every time he looks at you click and treat, he will learn to look at you for what to do, this is what you want as it will be very useful in directing his attention back at you instead of on other dogs, children, or even the neighbors.