10 month old BC being aggressive

[Hooper2]

We're all rooting for you in the sense that we all hope you can raise this dog to be a safe reliable companion that you will spend many happy years with.  But that won't happen if your dog continues to bite people and that's what you are setting up to happen by allowing strangers to approach your dog.

In two of the four biting instances you describe, your dog was apparently off leash and had the option of backing away from you if he felt stressed/anxious/fearful.  Instead he chose to bite you, the person he knows best in the world, once hard enough to draw blood.  In the other two instances your dog was apparently on leash, but again he chose to bite two people he knows well (you and your dog walker), and again one of those bites drew blood.  If he has repeatedly chosen to bite people he knows well rather than back away when he felt "anxious", why do you think it is suddenly safe for total strangers to approach him?   Without seeing the dog over a period of time I'm certainly not going to try to predict how "fixable" your pup is based on a brief description on the internet.   I commend you for going to the effort and expense of working with a vet behaviorist, and for being committed to doing what you can to give this pup a normal happy life.  And yes,  he needs to be socialized with other people to build confidence.   But that socialization needs to be done systematically, and given your own inexperience (not a criticism -good judgement comes from experience, and most experience comes from poor judgement), you need more guidance on how to do that than a single visit with a behaviorist. Again, all of us are rooting for you, but part of rooting for you is to make sure you understand that allowing strangers access to a dog who has chosen to bite people he knows well is not going to lead to a happy outcome.  It will lead to a heartbreaking outcome.

 

[jami74]

10 hours ago, CInfinity said:

his daily routine is a 15 minute walk to work, an hour or so playing on the grounds with his toys and us. As the weathers been so nice we’ve enclosed a section off (with shade, water & toys) so he can sit outside -  some customers ask to see him so i go over with them and just ask they put their hand down and if he wishes, he can come greet them. I’ll bring him out on his leash periodically through the day for socialising/training to meet people properly. He has a dog walker that takes him out for an hour during the day. He gets the play when we’ve closed on the grounds and then a 15 minute walk home. Once home we generally try to wind him down, will play a game for a while but he sleeps a lot anyway.

Your dog walker still takes him out even though he bit her? Do you think she is 100% honest about everything that happens when he is with her? (Other dogs/stressors, off leash time, behaviour etc). Does he have to go with her for an hour every day? It sounds like he gets more away-from-home activity and stimulation than our one year old. In fact I've reduced away-from-home activity again very recently and again seen an improvement in behaviour and calmness.

I don't have anything against dog walkers by the way, I just wouldn't trust my dog with one because he has shown some fear aggression type behaviour and I wouldn't want to pass control of his environment over to anyone else. I can't imagine anyone else being as invested in helping him to succeed as I am.

The café sounds lovely. I would love so much to work somewhere I could our boy.

[D'Elle]

If your dog walker is walking him, stop that and take him out yourself. He has already bitten the dog walker....don't take the risk that it will happen again!

You are setting yourself and the dog up for disaster if you continue to put him in a position where he is greeting people. Please stop doing this. His bites so far have been largely unpredictable by you and you have no assurance whatever that he won't do the same thing again. Do not take him on leash to greet people. As Hooper says, introducing him to people will eventually be part of his retraining, but this absolutely must be done in a very controlled and systematic way. What you are doing is dangerous. You are risking your business, your bank account, and your dog's life. There is no good reason to do this and many reasons not to. Please reconsider. As the others have said, I am rooting for you in this and wish you the best in this endeavor, but if you don't go about it the right way you will be unlikely to have success. All of us here are speaking with the voices of a great deal of experience, which you have not had. It is wise to listen to the voice of experience.