Collie behaviour towards my girlfriend

[wolf_and_deer]

Join our free community today.

Connect with other like-minded dog lovers!

Login or Register

Hi everyone.

Background -

We are a couple living together for some years now. My girlfriend moved in with me and my 5 year old collie two years ago. When she moved in he urinated up a wall every night, but after some time and research we stopped this behaviour as it was down to someone new in his life. After a year of living together we now have a 1 year old female Sheltie whom he adores and she adores him.

The issues -

He likes my girlfriend but does show some strange behaviour which we want to try and resolve. I hope someone can shed some light on these as research hasn't come up with any answers for us.

1. He wont stay in the garden with her. we have a 200 ft garden and when he is out there with me and her (and/or the sheltie) everything is fine. He also goes out with the sheltie no problem. But if he's outside first and my girlfriend goes out alone he comes back in. Or if she goes out and calls him out he does go out but then changes his mind virtually straight away.

2. When she tries to do some training with him, he comes over to her slowly, head down and practically crawling. he wont take treats from her and doesn't really respond to her training commands. No matter how much she tries to train him he wont break this cycle.

3. we have been getting her to feed him but when she puts his food down in the kitchen he wont start eating it until she leaves. He used to do that with me years ago but stopped on his own accord.

This may be something worth noting, she states this behaviour is magnified when im away with work for the day/night. I normally work from home and home all day while shes in the office all day.

Admittedly he seems to warm to men more than women. He's not a dog loving collie but more fixated on getting human approval (typical collie), more so mine. I have trained him and competed flyball, so he has a high level of activity. We also walk the dogs together and have taught them that we are both in charge.

She thinks he just doesn't like her as much as me. But i think its something else and we can try fix with the right knowledge.

thanks

simon

 

[gypsysmum2]

Hi Simon

From your description of your dog's body language it sounds as if he is anxious. This can be caused by many things. Lack of early socialisation with lots of different people and a variety of dogs. A bad experience with a person or persons that has stuck in his memory. It does sound as if he has no trust in your girlfriend.

What age did you get him? Did he see many women when he was a puppy? This can have a profound effect on dogs. Mostly it is the opposite, dogs fear men because they are bred by women and handled by women as puppies. It can, however, happen the other way around.

I notice that you say you have taught both dogs who is in charge. Do we take this to mean that you have applied rank reducing techniques? The theory that dogs try to dominate us, and so need to be shown who is boss, has long been disproven. If your girlfriend has used any of the techniques, recommended by the "show them who is boss" school of thought, on your collie then this could well be why he is anxious around her. He will not understand why he is being treated in that way.

Dogs came to live with us, thousands of years ago, because they liked to live in harmony with us. They hunted, and guarded and shepherded in return for a place by the fire and a few scraps. They have no desire to take over the world. Barry Eaton has written a book called "Dominance, Fact or Fiction" which explains how the theory came about and why it is now proven to be so wrong.

Whether the above rings true or there are other reasons for your Collie to be anxious around your girlfriend he needs to learn to trust her. Persuading an anxious animal to trust us is like taming a wild animal. Every time we move into their space, or scare them in any way, all reason goes out the window. The animal wants to just get away or make itself small. In your dog's case he is too anxious to stay outside, he makes himself small by crawling, and his digestion shuts down so he cannot eat.

If you imagine taking a wild fox into your house then you will have some idea of how your girlfriend needs to treat your collie. Give him lots of space. Let him move away when he wants to (it is not disobedient to go indoors, it is his anxiety making him do it). Feed him somewhere quiet and leave him well alone so that his tummy relaxes and he can eat. If he is slinking towards her then she should make herself smaller and not stare at him. If he will take treats, for being brave, then that might help to build trust between them. It will take a lot of time and effort for her to gain his trust and memories will still pop into his head every now and then of an incident when she, perhaps, scared him.

It will be a long hard road for you all but worth it I am sure.

 

[wolf_and_deer]

Thanks for your reply and i will answer your comments in order so not to cause confusion.

From your description of your dog's body language it sounds as if he is anxious. This can be caused by many things. Lack of early socialisation with lots of different people and a variety of dogs. A bad experience with a person or persons that has stuck in his memory. It does sound as if he has no trust in your girlfriend.

What age did you get him? Did he see many women when he was a puppy? This can have a profound effect on dogs. Mostly it is the opposite, dogs fear men because they are bred by women and handled by women as puppies. It can, however, happen the other way around.

I had him from a pup, his mum is my best friends bitch. He still socialises with her and his siblings. He has been socialised with many dogs and people from and early age. He is great with all types of dogs and all ages of people. He hasn't experienced any trauma in his life. He has seen lots of women through his life as my friend is female plus he has lots of attention off all sexes at fly-ball. The issue isn't that he doesn't like my girlfriend as he is always getting petted by her, comes over to get attention off her and talks to her a lot through normal happy dog noises.

I notice that you say you have taught both dogs who is in charge. Do we take this to mean that you have applied rank reducing techniques? The theory that dogs try to dominate us, and so need to be shown who is boss, has long been disproven. If your girlfriend has used any of the techniques, recommended by the "show them who is boss" school of thought, on your collie then this could well be why he is anxious around her. He will not understand why he is being treated in that way.

I dont use nor have never signed up to the rank reducing technique

Dogs came to live with us, thousands of years ago, because they liked to live in harmony with us. They hunted, and guarded and shepherded in return for a place by the fire and a few scraps. They have no desire to take over the world. Barry Eaton has written a book called "Dominance, Fact or Fiction" which explains how the theory came about and why it is now proven to be so wrong.

Whether the above rings true or there are other reasons for your Collie to be anxious around your girlfriend he needs to learn to trust her. Persuading an anxious animal to trust us is like taming a wild animal. Every time we move into their space, or scare them in any way, all reason goes out the window. The animal wants to just get away or make itself small. In your dog's case he is too anxious to stay outside, he makes himself small by crawling, and his digestion shuts down so he cannot eat.

He can eat and tucks into his food with no issues but only does so the second she leaves the room. He doesn't seem anxious around her (or others), hes always getting and wanting attention from her. he only presents this behaviour when its feeding time and shes in the same room or goes into the garden with her.

If you imagine taking a wild fox into your house then you will have some idea of how your girlfriend needs to treat your collie. Give him lots of space. Let him move away when he wants to (it is not disobedient to go indoors, it is his anxiety making him do it). Feed him somewhere quiet and leave him well alone so that his tummy relaxes and he can eat. If he is slinking towards her then she should make herself smaller and not stare at him. If he will take treats, for being brave, then that might help to build trust between them. It will take a lot of time and effort for her to gain his trust and memories will still pop into his head every now and then of an incident when she, perhaps, scared him.

He does get lots of space and we never say anything to him when he goes indoors or doesnt eat in front of her. we just let him do his thing as we do recognise its not naughty behaviour.

We have fed him in another room and he eats immediately , but as stated above he eats as soon as she leaves the room.

This is why its a bit confusing for us. He gets on great with her, loves her and our other dog to bits. He hasn't had any issues in his life, lead a fulfilling, loving, structured life. He has had lots of interaction with all types of people and dogs, but these few behavioural aspects are puzzling to us.

My girlfriend, walk, feeds and trains him as much as I do.

I think we will just try to analyse it a bit more and take it slow with him. it's not affecting his quality of life but we want him and her to get past this aspects.

It will be a long hard road for you all but worth it I am sure.

 

[gypsysmum2]

Thanks for the more detailed update.

Could it be that in the past something traumatic has happened around the issues he has? For instance - something like dropping his food bowl and scaring him when your girlfriend was feedng him? A firework going off when he was alone outside with your girlfriend? Dogs can make associations that bear no resemblance to the actual event but it scars them for life.

Has your girlfriend tried feeding him in a completely different place from usual, with a different bowl and different food? This might block any memory that is causing him to refuse to eat.

Could your girlfriend cast her mind back to an incident in the garden that scared him when she was present? He may have blamed her for the fright when it was just a random scary thing.

A friend's dog refuses to leave the house with her but will go happily out with her son. She was walking the dog when a crop scaring cannon went off nearby. He assumes that the scary noise was something to do with her.

Sometimes changing the environment and all the little reminders around the problem behaviour will give you a breakthrough.

We had a dog on here that refused to drink when the new owners were present. It turned out it was used to a certain kind of drinking bowel when it lived with its foster family.

I am still working on approaching my rescue dog's bed first thing every morning after he has lived with us for two years. Something traumatic has happened to him in the mornings while he was on his bed at some time in his previous life. We have changed the bed, changed the room, changed the approach. Now working on changing the timing as he does seem grumpy in the morning. Some dogs get low blood sugar if there is a long gap between meals.