Dog bites owner - opinions?

owner was out walking recently with a springer spaniel 3 year old.
dog caught a hare in rough ground (ditch/gulley) and had killed it by time owner saw it. dog would not leave hare from its grip or respond to commands.
dog bit owner (pretty badly) when owner was trying to get down to leave the hare.
dog is used for game bird shooting and there have been no issues previously with dog retrieving shot snipe/ woodcock without mauling them.
what should be done about dog?
Dog is of willful disposition in general. gotten as pup but a couple months old.
very well cared for dog. is powerful for the breed for its size (fed on quality dog nuts since a pup).
has been known to be aggressive (growling etc) when food is involved before (when feeding will growl or even nip if approached).

coffee_cake

Bring the dog to a good trainer who'll help identify what's going on and work with you on it

Dial Hard

Resource guarding doesn't necessarily indicate an aggressive dog.

The owner needs to get a good trainer/behaviourist in.

VonVix

Sounds like resource guarding. A pretty natural, though undesirable behaviour for a dog. A dog resorting to biting is on the more 'extreme' end of the scale. On top of getting a good trainer involved ( http://apdt.ie/ would be my first port of call to find one in Ireland) the owner having a read of the book Mine! by Jean Donaldson would also be worthwhile, so the owner can get a better understanding of resource guarding behaviour.

before the incident

<snip>

Mod note... No need for photos of that nature in this forum, especially as it brings nothing to the discussion.
Thanks,
DBB

that's reality.
not sure what is so bad about that pic tbh.

borderlinemeath

As the owner was aware that the dog was a food guarder who had previous history (nip), I'd be interested to know how he tried to get the dog away from the hare. TBH, if I had a dog that was a known guarder, I'd be wary of taking any kind of possession (such as a caught hare) without offering something far more attractive/tastier as an alternative.

sillysmiles

has been known to be aggressive (growling etc) when food is involved before (when feeding will growl or even nip if approached).

Why did he try to take it off him? Knowing that the dog is possesive of food, why take something so valuable to the dog?
It sounds like the owner could do with some help with training.

My dog is only a resource guarder for bones. But if I give him a bone, I give him space and let him enjoy it!

owner has a long experience of having dogs for shooting - probably 20 different dogs over 50 years.
and he trains the dogs. for example this dog will wait for command to be allowed to eat food, has introduced additional food while dog eating - standard things like that to treat this sort of behaviour.
when mentioned nip before it was not a bite.
light was fading and there was time pressure on heading home.
owner accepts that he misjudged the animal at the time.
tried to distract the dog by getting dog to bite a stick.
stick broke and owner bitten at that point as stick was not long enough.
as was out in car owner didn't have sirloin steak or other attractive items to distract dog in this unexpected situation.

sillysmiles

So you asked for opinions on the situation.
My opinion is that the owner misjudged the situation and made a mistake and needs to work more on training the dog. No big deal.

sillysmiles

sillysmiles wrote: »

So you asked for opinions on the situation.
My opinion is that the owner misjudged the situation and made a mistake and needs to work more on training the dog. No big deal.

I provided more information as requested by another poster.
no big deal except for the injuries!

sillysmiles

TBH, I'm not sure what reponse are you expecting/lookiing for? Injuries can occur when you are working with animals are as the human, you need to risk assess the situation to ensure your safety. The owner made a bad decision and got injured.

sillysmiles

sillysmiles wrote: »

TBH, I'm not sure what reponse are you expecting/lookiing for? Injuries can occur when you are working with animals are as the human, you need to risk assess the situation to ensure your safety. The owner made a bad decision and got injured.

I expressed that the owner accepts this in retrospect. But it's not no big deal as you said tbh.
I was soliciting opinions on what this indicates a propos the dog's temperament, of which received, some were informative.

borderlinemeath

TBH, I was worried when you said in the OP "what should be done about the dog", a fairly open ended statement that could mean anything from training to rehoming or even PTS. I know some hunters who have zero tolerance for any aggression, food guarding or otherwise and would literally take a gun to the dog if it bit them irrespective of who's fault it was.

As you say, the owner has accepted that he misjudged the situation, so by this I would hope he would look to get some formal behavioural training for the dogs resource guarding. Whatever of 50 years experience, sometimes the people who are most experienced and set in their ways with their training, are the ones that need the most help.

DBB

glasso wrote: »

that's reality.
not sure what is so bad about that pic tbh.

Glasso,
If you wish to discuss any mod actions, please do so by pm. Discussing mod actions on thread is not on.
You might see nothing wrong with the pic you posted, but many people did and your post was reported more than once. This is a pets forum, not the hunting forum, people do not necessarily want to look at pictures of animals that have been killed... It's not what this forum is about, so you'd have been wiser to add the picture as a link with a warning.
That said, I don't understand what you thought posting the picture would bring to the discussion.
As per the site-wide rules, do not reply to this post on thread.
Thanks,
DBB

borderlinemeath

borderlinemeath wrote: »

TBH, I was worried when you said in the OP "what should be done about the dog", a fairly open ended statement that could mean anything from training to rehoming or even PTS. I know some hunters who have zero tolerance for any aggression, food guarding or otherwise and would literally take a gun to the dog if it bit them irrespective of who's fault it was.

to be honest, he was considering that ultimate solution at the time - particularly after ending up in A&E for fairly extensive treatment that took a few hours to deal with. not being considered at this point.

ganmo

There's these great things called muzzles, this dog sounds like an ideal candidate for one on his next walk.

Springwell

Go with the standard gundog practice. Don't want to give it up? Great, dog you can carry the 2kg bird/hare/rabbit at heel until you really don't want to carry it anymore... No conflict, the dog makes the decision to put it down himself and any decent gundog should heel on command

GreenFolder2

It is very important to know when not to get in the middle of something and how to read your pets / companion animals' body language.

I had a similar (on different scale with different species) incident last week.

A visitor to the house (relative) was playing with the cat. He kept fluffing up the cat's fur and trying to tickle his tummy. I warned him the cat does not like being manhandled and isn't a dog so thinks that behaviour is really annoying / threatening.

He stopped then went "aaaww cute kitty" and lunged for the cat, flipping him over and tickled the cat's belly. The cat got very very angry and bit his hand and scratched him all over the arm (blood, ripped T-shirt etc etc).

Suddenly "your cat is an evil monster!!" "You should get him put down". "He'd be dangerous to children".

I had to explain ... No, I warned you... The cat also warned you.. You cornered him and turned him upside down so he defended himself.

People need to learn animals aren't toys and do things to their own agenda, not yours.

You don't try to remove hunting prey from any dog unless you want to partake in a fight. There are ways and means of negotiating that properly!

tk123

My bribe of choice at the moment is cheese strings lol! They seem to last forever in the pack - i've been carrying one around in my walking belt a few months now

Springwell

Springwell wrote: »

Go with the standard gundog practice. Don't want to give it up? Great, dog you can carry the 2kg bird/hare/rabbit at heel until you really don't want to carry it anymore... No conflict, the dog makes the decision to put it down himself and any decent gundog should heel on command

the dog subsequently ate the hare.
as said the dog has no problem retrieving and "giving" shot birds without being possessive and without damaging them (only "mouthing" them for carrying). for some reason in this case, maybe because the dog caught and killed the hare itself and was in such a state of excitement, things were different. some say that the taste of blood does things to animals - not sure if there is any truth in that.

tk123

tk123 wrote: »

My bribe of choice at the moment is cheese strings lol! They seem to last forever in the pack - i've been carrying one around in my walking belt a few months now

will suggest this as an option.

Springwell

glasso wrote: »

the dog subsequently ate the hare.
as said the dog has no problem retrieving and "giving" shot birds without being possessive and without damaging them (only "mouthing" them for carrying). for some reason in this case, maybe because the dog caught and killed the hare itself and was in such a state of excitement, things were different. some say that the taste of blood does things to animals - not sure if there is any truth in that.

I'm surprised it chased at all to be honest, has it never been taught stop to flush on rabbits? It's where most spaniels start!

Springwell

Springwell wrote: »

I'm surprised it chased at all to be honest, has it never been taught stop to flush on rabbits? It's where most spaniels start!

it's not used to shoot rabbits, only game birds. and this was also a hare, not a rabbit.

Springwell

glasso wrote: »

it's not used to shoot rabbits, only game birds. and this was also a hare, not a rabbit.

Steady to hare is steady to rabbit (I trial and shoot over my own spaniels!). Might be worth training in a rabbit pen if he's access to one

Springwell

Springwell wrote: »

Steady to hare is steady to rabbit (I trial and shoot over my own spaniels!). Might be worth training in a rabbit pen if he's access to one

fair enough. I think that it was an isolated case hopefully - hare would usually outrun a dog but this dog at 3 is in her prime and is bloody fast - has caught cats and birds in the garden in the past.
owner will leave dog to it if it happened again I would say if dog is warning not to mess with its prize. will do some training on the resource guarding element also. I just think that the dog got into a state of excitement in this case - on the extreme end of things.