I'm mortified. Bessie is 11 months old. I left her with my housesitter for a week. Housesitter has an older (11yo?) mix. Burke and the older dog get along great. In October Bessie met this dog and he stayed here for at least a few days? They were fine. But she was tiny. Bessie has met many, many dogs on neutral turf (obedience class last fall, in town on leashes, at friends' houses), and never shown any sign of aggression toward them. I have a good friend with a small terrier mix who visited often (overnights even). Bessie would kind of relentlessly play with him, but nothing aggressive - just not leave him alone/let him be. She would do this more at our house than at his house. She's also been at his house when totally new-to-her dogs were visiting and was 100% fine with them. She and Burke get along great and play together happily all day. The housesitter reports that she bit the dog repeatedly, to the point that the dog "still has scabs" weeks later. Would not leave him alone, cornered him, wouldn't let him drink water. After the second day (which seems like a long time to me for such an extreme behavior), she took her dog to her house, and dogsat here without him. I'm mortified, horrified, and totally freaked out. What do I do?
That's a really difficult situation for you as you weren't there to see any of it and don't know what started the issue between them. Has she said how the behaviour started? Or if she left them alone at all? There's so many things that could of triggered this behaviour, if it happened. Why did she not intervene after the first bite?
I can't understand why the house sitter let a dog bite another dog. Surely, it was her job to supervise the dogs?
Yes, I'm not sure I understand either. I have a small house with only 2 rooms on the main floor and the dogs aren't allowed upstairs, but there's a gate that can be used to shut a dog or dogs in the bedroom - I'm not sure why she didn't put one of the dogs in there. I wasn't there to see the behavior so I have no idea what she means, except my imagining is that it's an extreme version of what she's done w/my friend's terrier. She kind of follows him around and pushes him into corners with her body. Play-mouths him, that kind of thing. He has gotten to where if they aren't actively playing he wants to lay somewhere out of her way (which we always accommodated of course!). I saw it as just being too much an energetic puppy and not getting the "I don't want to play with you anymore, puppy!" message. And maybe her dog is submissive enough that he wouldn't stand up for himself? But still not sure.
It's a pity you weren't there to see for yourself. For all you know it wasn't aggressive at all, just normal play. But you won't ever know. Now you just need to assess your puppy for who she is today and take it from there. If you think your pup is aggressive based on what you have seen, why not consult a behaviorist? But if you observe your pup to be normal, then perhaps your dog sitter misinterpreted her behavior? Or is blowing it out of proportion? Such a difficult situation for you.
Thanks. I guess that is really my question: given that I have no idea what this really means in terms of how she acted with the dog, what's my next step? I'm extra sensitive since my older guy is reactive to on-leash dogs (but fine with them off-leash, kind of clumsy when he first greets them, comes on too strong/bold out of fear, but nothing aggressive, just socially inept, lol) and also to cars on the road, UPS, visitors until they get through the door, etc. I have taken such care to socialize her to other dogs, so if she's becoming dog-aggressive I am worried it's genetic (she's a mostly-lab rescue, but with all the pit bull around these days, who knows if that's in there). I am definitely going to take care to expose her to more dogs now; it's been a couple of months since she's had interaction with any besides Burke and my friend's terrier. But carefully, of course. I'm worried if it's something just about my house, like territory, that I won't know it's there until someone brings over a dog. Doesn't happen often, either, and my friend has moved away. And then how does one ask someone to volunteer their dog for such an exercise? Ha. I'm sure, though, that I would see very quickly what the issue is. I seem to remember the housesitter thought it was that the dog is HER dog, so Bessie was jealous of the attention he was getting?
