Resource guarding is behaviour learned by our dogs at an early age or situation where the dog has lost its food, or high value toy to a competitor either human or dog. He has become convinced that he has to protect his possession in fear of losing it, so the dog growls or snarls bares his teeth, and we back off reinforcing the dog with the fact that his offensive behaviour has paid off “yes works for me” The behaviour will be repeated every time with the possibility of bites!.
BACKGROUND OF THE BEHAVIOUR
Often the behaviour is created by owners who think they can master the dog by taking away food. This is an old myth taken from the dominance theory, In fact In the wolf packs each canine is entitled to take his fill from the kill, when he is full he will move away and abandon the food. This is the signal for a subordinate member to take the remaining food. If another member tried to take the food out of turn, It would be met with a high degree of aggression. By taking the dogs food away we are creating a conflict, the dog must be allowed to eat his food in peace. To avoid resource guarding we do not try to remove food from the dog unless he has stolen it from the kitchen table, and then it is really down to our management to avoid the food from being stolen because food left unattended is in fact abandoned food that nobody else wants, how often does the dog steal food when we are in attendance, mostly never.
MANAGEMENT OF THE BEHAVIOUR
The best way to deal with growling or snarling is to not put ourselves in the situation in the first place give the dog some space in a nice quiet corner away from children, If we do need to move the dog away then find a higher value object and tempt the dog away from the source by rolling the object along the floor, when the dog chases we retrieve the source. It helps greatly if we have great recall, disengaging powers and impulse control and being the one true leader of the dog.
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