Cavalier King Charles - Help!

Wicky84

Hi

We have a 7 month old cavalier king charles who has always been a lovely, friendly puppy. However over the past few weeks he's started to growl and snap at my partner when he's tried to take something from him. We don't make a habit of taking things from him but often its something he thinks is tasty but we're worried could harm him or cause him to choke, eg a chicken carcass he found in next doors garden (when he snook through the gap in the fence!)or a piece of plastic. He doesnt snap at me but it worries us that he does this with my partner as we often have children in the house (kids of friends and family) and we wouldn't want him to do the same to them. As I say 99.9% of the time he is very soft and loving and even when he does snap he's instantly cuddly again and wants to sit with us and be petted.
Can anyone recommend any training methods that would stop him being so territorial when it comes to 'treats'? We've had him from 9 weeks old so I don't think this behaviour is related to any experiences he's had before coming to us.
I'd really appreciate any help anyone can offer
xx

sarabe

He is simply saying "this is mine, I found it, don't take it from me".

The best way to avoid a dog guarding his finds is to teach him to give them to you.

Start with his toys. Will he fetch a toy if you throw it for him?

Every time he picks up a toy, tell him 'good boy' and encourage him to come to you with it. Take the toy, maybe give him a food reward as you do and then give him the toy back again.

Then use lots of different items, always praising him for picking them up, until he will bring to you anything and everything that he finds.

Sometimes he gets it back and sometimes he doesn't but always thank him for bringing it.


Meanwhile deny him the opportunity to pick up things you don't want him to have but if he does, telling him he's a good boy will be less likely to cause a bad reaction than telling him off will.

Sagz_2

Trained my pup with the method described by sarabe and now have a dog that will clear up for me!

I point to something on the floor, she picks it up and brings it to me when I ask 'what-you-got'?

Sometimes it's her toy so a game follows, but sometimes it's something that shouldn't be on the floor and that she shouldn't have .... worked a treat with the wrapping paper on Christmas day

sarabe

I have always made a point of praising my dogs for picking up stuff. When the children were younger I found it much easier to train the dog to collect the dirty washing than it was to get the children to do it.

One of my dogs will collect Quality Street or Roses from the tin and give them out to visitors. You don't get to choose your sweet though, you get what you're given.

viktory

I got round this by teaching the leave it command. Both of my dogs obey this one.

CFC

I have a mutt who won't fetch so this never worked for me. What did work for me though was taking the item off poochie while proffering a very high value treat in the other hand with the command 'swap'. Once we had got that ironed out (with a few unpleasant episodes along the way, I'm afraid, although he never broke the skin) we progressed to 'give'.

My advice would be to do this training very regularly with all kinds of things, this de-escalates the situation and he will willingly swap when he has nothing interesting. It then becomes a habit which makes it easier when the thing he has got hold of is high value to him. I also recommend that you make very slow movements, again this means dog has to actually think about whether he is really going to bite or not, sudden movements meant my mutt was much more likely to have an unpleasant episode as he was just going on immediate instinct 'you are taking my stuff'

Wicky84

Thanks so much guys, we actually tried a similar thing with his toys last night and he didn't hit out at all so will stick with it and hope he learns that biting isn't acceptable.

I'll just stock up on plasters for my partner in the meantime!:)

pulliptears

My Westie won't hand something over until you say thank you, lol. Polite little thing he is.

When I was a kid we had a Yorkie, a more miserable little dog you will never meet. As he got older he became impossible to take anything from and I clearly recall being sent to ring the front doorbell so he would leave whatever it was he was eating

Wicky84

Ah how did you teach him the thank you trick? I'd love for him to be able to do that.
Archie is getting good at other tricks, sit, lie down, wait etc so hopefully it won't take too long to get him out of this 'nipping' phase.

pulliptears

Wicky84 wrote: »

Ah how did you teach him the thank you trick? I'd love for him to be able to do that.
Archie is getting good at other tricks, sit, lie down, wait etc so hopefully it won't take too long to get him out of this 'nipping' phase.

I used to take things off him all the time when he was a pup, emphasizing "Thank You" as I did it and then praising

He also wont move off the sofa unless you say excuse me, but thats purely coincidence lol

sarabe

pulliptears wrote: »

I used to take things off him all the time when he was a pup, emphasizing "Thank You" as I did it and then praising

He also wont move off the sofa unless you say excuse me, but thats purely coincidence lol

However, if you have a dog that resource guards it is not a good idea to just take things away from them.

You could of course introduce the word 'thankyou' when the dog gives up the item thus creating a link between the word and the action.