[Help, our greyhound is broken!]

Haha, emergency application of cheese definitely set him right way up  Yes, he loves his jimjams! 

[Help, our greyhound is broken!]

Found our Merl like this when I came down this afternoon. Maybe the gloomy winter has taken its toll 🤣

[Greyhound food aggression]

 

Just now, EllenEveBaz said:

Congrats to you and Merl!

Just out of curiosity, what treat does he like better than dead pigeon?   

My hand by the looks of it 😂 but my hand did contain some toast chicken 🐓

[Greyhound food aggression]

Had a small victory today! Merl managed to grab hold of a dead pigeon while out in the park and I had already resigned myself to the fact that he was going to eat it. But, he surprised me by dropping the pigeon and taking the treat from my hand (nearly bit my hand off though!). Definitely a step up from before! 

Also, we've started using the muzzle for his evening walk on the streets because of the fast food problem, but we thought, "the park is pretty clean, he should be fine to walk without his muzzle in the morning!". That was until today haha! 

[Greyhound food aggression]

Thanks everyone for taking the time to write down such extensive suggestions. All the reading and learning about retired greyhound/dog behavior can't match up to actually hearing real life experiences and reassurances from other people like you all. I feel much more at ease as a result, so I really appreciate it. 

We've tried muzzle feeding him in many ways but every time the treat seems to end up getting stuck at the bottom of the muzzle. I'll try some of the suggestions from here to see if they work. Meanwhile, we will stay consistent with the leave it and trade up training. Hopefully, he will get more comfortable about it all in the future.

I'll keep you all updated on how it goes!

Cheers!

 

 

 

[Greyhound food aggression]

5 hours ago, DocsDoctor said:

Just quickly to say don't worry too much - the barking and growling must have felt scary at the time, but actually I think you both ultimately did really well in those difficult circumstances.

Food possessiveness is not an unusual trait and when you think of how greyhounds are reared in kennels rather than in homes, with food being delivered in a more 'hands-off' way and high-value treats maybe having to be guarded from other dogs, you can see why.  And scavenging on walks is irresistible to a lot of dogs, not just greyhounds: "look, free food! What's not to like? I saw it first! MINE MINE MINE! "

With time and kind consistent training he should get better about giving stuff up, as your bond grows. Meanwhile if abandoned fast food is a problem in your area (as it seems to be in most places these days) up your management skills by 1) learning to spot it before he does, and steering him away 2) having some high value treats to hand just in case, so you can "trade up" as you were able to do yesterday or 3) walking him in a basket muzzle so he can't grab the stuff.

Thank you so much for your prompt response. I think it is the first time I've been so scared of him and I didn't know whether I was doing anything wrong, especially in this situation. So, I really appreciate the reassurance and also the tips. We were already considering getting him back to his muzzle on walks but the only annoying bit is that he can't seem to eat treats through the basket muzzle, which makes training and reinforcement quite difficult on walks. Would you recommend trying to find another basket muzzle that he can eat from or would all muzzles be pretty much the same? 

[Greyhound food aggression]

Hi, 

So we got our greyhound Merl around 8 months ago and he's been great. We have worked through multiple issues and built a lot of trust over the last few months. He is comfortable with us and sleeps with us on the floor sometimes (he isn't let on to the bed/sofa). 

However, he had a tendency to resource guard a lot. He allows us to touch his food bowl without any problem but any high value treat is out of the question. He's getting better with trading up training but it's a slow process understandably. Yesterday, we were out on our walk and he managed to get hold of a raw meat container in his mouth. I tried to get him to drop it(with treats and without by telling him to leave it) and he became really aggressive towards me. Barking, growling, baring his teeth, but never lunging at me. Finally, after I stayed calm and threw a few treats on the floor as well, he came over to me and took a treat from my hand. He has behaved fine afterwards and even fell asleep in my arms once we got home(both of us did in fact after all the stress). 

I know this behavior can be explained by the high value of the food, but should I be worried? Will this have destroyed a lot of the trust that we've built up over the last few months? Is there anything I can specifically do to help him understand that I'm not a threat to him so that he isn't as aggressive? Thanks.