Resource guarding - Do I need to re-home her?

[ChristieD]

We have a 5.5 month old puppy Luna we got from shelter at age 12 weeks. Unknown parentage but likely some terrier, some hound, maybe some GSD based on her coloring. She is smallish, about 22 lbs. She is left alone for no more than 4 hours each day and usually much less since I work partly from home. Currently she is in dog daycare 3 days a week for 4 hours, so she might be alone for 2 hours before and 1-2 hours after, then our kids get off the bus. I am usually home by 5PM. She is walked for 30-60 minutes most mornings depending on whether I have time to take her to conservation land. She is fed dry Acada food 3 times/day.We live in a suburban house with a large yard, she can roam about - though we have had to curtail for past 2 weeks due to her mushroom-eating habit! This does drastically reduce one of her favorite activities which is sniffing around the backyard (always on leash as we are on a busy road.) There are 5 of us caring for her - Myself, my husband who is gone at work most of the time; and our three teen boys(ages 13, 15 and 18).She is not big into chew toys or retrieving balls. She is quite agile and loves to jump - does love to play with a flirt pole which is great for rainy days or when I only have 5 minutes, it can totally tire her out. She also loves mental puzzles and figuring out new behaviors/training. She is great at "leave it" (in the training session!), OK at drop it, and great at sit, down, and wait. The boys also love that we have taught her "paw" and roll over", they also have fun with "touch" which she will target to many locations. She sleeps in crate in the kitchen without much fuss at all. She is so eager to get out in the AM and happy to see us, her whole body is usually wagging. Overall though I would say she does not love to be petted except at this time, or at night when she is tired she'll curl up in someone's lap on the floor.
Recently Luna has developed a serious resource guarding problem. For the first 4 weeks there were no signs - just the usual puppy mouthiness and nipping at our clothing , or especially at the kids' ankles as they ran in front of her. None of this ever felt aggressive. Then she growled one day when she had a bone. It then happened with her food dish. We have been working with a positive trainer almost since day 1, so she helped guide us. We immediately got rid of her food bowl (use a different one each time.) I also tried to replace bowl meals with kibble in stuffed frozen Kongs, figuring that would also occupy her mentally based on all the reading I've been doing. (and I've been doing a lot of reading! This is my/our first dog.) However this backfired, she started intensely guarding the Kong and almost bit my fingers one day when I gave her one and tried to close the door to her crate thereafter. So we took away the Kongs. The our trainer suggested we stop using the crate very much as she seemed to be guarding it at dog daycare. We also had to take away her dog bed as she would sometimes growl if we had to reach something on the counter behind her as she laid there.
Wen (mostly I) have been trying to countercondition the RG. I have watched Victoria videos, read Jean Donaldson's book, read Patricia McConnell blog and this one. Based on this and my trainer I was doing some hand feeding in the bowl, small amounts at a time, with good "wait" and "OK" - she seemed relaxed as I stood near. But with my sons trying same technique, she sometimes gets very aggressive - mostly when session ends.
Twice today she barked quite angrily/aggressively when they had taken the bowl away, ? if she was resource guarding the empty bowl, but there seemed a bit of a delay as we took the bowl away every time we added the food - ? if she was just mad b/c no more food coming. She seems more prone to this angry bark with them than with me. One time she air-snapped at my oldest son for same trigger.
I have been having them approach her from across the kitchen while I give her treats and they stand there silently, then I stop treating as they walk away. I also have been throwing high value treats at her when she starts getting settled in to a position chewing on something.
Yesterday the dog walker who works at my trainer's daycare was dropping Luna off in our kitchen and Luna bit her. Apparently the girl was leaning over her a bit and Luna was lying on a towel. ? guarding the whole location in our kitchen, behind the baby gate.
Today my trainer told us we should likely re-home Luna. She is worried about the risk to the boys. I understand her concern, but I also know she doesn't see Luna the 90% of the time when she is fine or even great with them. (OK not usually "great" with our youngest - she still plagues him with a lot more nipping of the ankles and forcing him to say "drop it" due to her biting his clothing - but I always perceive her as annoying, not dangerous except for these RG situations.

I hate to go against an experienced trainer; but I also hate to give up on Luna. Frankly it would break my heart. We all fell in love with her on Day 1 and she remains the sweet dog she was then, except for this (obviously serious) exception. Still, I am not sure if we got another dog some day if this issue wouldn't arise then. Part of me feels like "gosh I read so much and studied so much and I still couldn't cure this - it just is too hard to raise a dog"; another part of me thinks that if I didn't try to be so scientific about it, and maybe just left her alone when she ate, it never would have escalated to this degree. I am wondering that in my attempts to counter-condition and make it better, I have made things worse?
So my question: What is the prognosis? She is so young. We will modify our life as much as possible (eg when family with young children come to stay at our house we could potentially have Luna board elsewhere.) Do you think there is value to just letting her alone when she eats and seeing if that calms down some of the behavior? Then maybe, do the meat-throwing while she lies on whatever spot she typically guards? I am leaning toward this rather than giving her back to the shelter. But if the trainer is right and she bites one of us, then no one will want her. I really don't want to mess up her chance at a life in another "better fit" family. Is the margin of error really that slim? She really is a generally great dog.
Thanks for your time and sorry for the long post. My sons are eager to hear you back me up, I am questioning myself so much on this one.

[JudyN]

I only have time for a quick reply now, but I fully believe that you can keep her, and that you are the best home for her. You are committed, you are doing so many things right, and your children are old enough that they can understand what they have to do. If you rehomed her, the issue would inevitably arise again and the new owners might not be as ready to deal with it.

I do think you may have been pushing the training a little too hard, putting her in situations where she's feeling anxious about her food. But that's good, it means that a change in your approach may well work better

For starters, have a read on this post on guarding: viewtopic.php?f=20&t=18074 You might also like to read my first post on this forum and the advice I had for my guardy boy: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12352&p=83054#p83054 Then if you have any questions, ask away

[Nettle]

You are a wonderful committed intelligent dog owner! Of course you can keep your dog.

She is at the threshold of adolescence and if the breed mix has been correctly guessed, a mixture of highly reactive breeds. This is FINE but requires different expectations and creates different boundaries. I hope she hasn't been spayed because female dogs mature practically in front of your eyes after the first season, and if you can hang on through a second season, you will get an even better dog. If of course she has already been spayed, then that can't be undone. She can still be managed but it won't be as easy.

For now, listen to her. If she feels she doesn't have to guard her resources, she will gradually cease to do so. Have extra beds, extra water bowls, leave her alone to eat, and when you need to take up the food bowl, get a son to lure her into another room with a treat or a game first.
there's more but I don't want to overwhelm you with information all at once.

Hang on in there!

[Erica]

I have to wonder if the daycare might be setting things back - while I personally know one place I might take my dog for daycare, it's a positive reinforcement training center first and only takes 7 dogs at a time! Not the usual way things work. We had a dog in our puppy classes who was aggressive towards other dogs. The daycare she went to said she did fine, but after they stopped taking her to daycare she improved dramatically (alongside training of course!). Sadly most doggy daycares dont know the first thing about behavior or training. It could be you've found a good one; I don't know as I don't know where you take her. But it might be something to consider.

[Suzette]

I hope she hasn't been spayed because female dogs mature practically in front of your eyes after the first season, and if you can hang on through a second season, you will get an even better dog.

I took this same advice when I got my puppy over five years ago and I am so glad I did. I let my dog go through three seasons before I spayed her and after each one (especially after the first one) there was a measurable difference in her mental maturity level. Definitely one of the best decisions I made for my dog along the way.

[ChristieD]

Thanks so much to all of you - because you all took the time to write I am feeling better about this and my family's ability to handle Luna. I read JudyN's post on RG and it was really helpful, in that it sounds a bit more real life (for us) than some of the approaches I've heard. One podcast that I love, Canine Campus, stated "I feel that I should be able to take anything from my dog, any time" - She told great stories about how challenging her RG-dog was for her and how much training she had to do but how she did "cure" the habit. I would mentally scoff at extended family members who told me they never tried to change this habit - they just left their dogs alone when they ate. Weaklings! I thought - they just aren't committed enough. Truly I was trying to aspire to cure, but realistically I am not a dog trainer, I am not always home and I have many others who interact with Luna daily. I really feel in my bones that JudyN's ideas on management and not proceeding too fast are crucial right now. Other things I read (and our trainer) have said that too but I guess I never thought it was too fast & I was eager to make sure she tolerated other family members besides me - I guess I have to let her reactions tell me when something is too fast.
That is a great thought about spaying but unfortunately it's too late - it was done at age ~9 weeks apparently at shelter down in KY (we live in MA - she was shipped up to our shelter.) The dog daycare uses positive reinforcement and is owned by our trainer. They don't have many pups there right now and they send photos of her playing there with them, and she does seem excited to get into the car when they pick her up. Though you are right, even if she seems to be getting along maybe there is some stress for her there? I will keep that on my radar. I think bigger stresses for her have been my schedule - it is quite variable so although big picture I am at home a good deal, there are times I travel or work very long days so am not around for a few days; also we've had houseguests with small children a few times since we got her. Luckily she was always OK with them. But we did have a visitor whose 3yo went to pet her while she had a Kong, and Luna air-snapped. I knew that was bad before it happened, this was before we had a no-Kong policy. Luna has an annoying habit of wanting to be near us I'd tried giving her the Kong behind the gate but with me in the kitchen that was just causing stress, barking - so she came in to lie near my feet - but as she starts chewing and getting into it then she feels the need to guard it too. (Reminds me of my kids when toddlers - they'd think they want something but they also want something else diametrically opposed and then they get mad at the world for not being able to have it all!)
Today she did growl at my 13yo when he took her out of the crate but when I dissected the story I think I know why. A few kibble had fallen behind the crate and she found them. He went to pet her while she was eating them & she stiffened and growled, then lunged a bit with aggressive bark. At first he said "but didn't you tell me it is good to pet her while I give treats so she associates me touching her with good things?" (!) See it is hard to keep all these nuances straight especially when you're a goofy teen boy who just wants to run around and pet the dog. Which he still gets to do in other circumstances but it has to be on her terms. . But when I explained her perspective - Owen wasn't giving her treats, she had found them and thought he was a competitor - he understood.
It is hard b/c we don't perceive these little actions as stressful, and hopefully if we get her through this some day she won't either. We are now switching from "puppy socialization" mode where we want to expose her to potentially stressful/ scary things, to avoiding stress - but only this particular stress obviously. Again your notes have given me hope that it may not always be this bad, and that extreme "management" may be just what she needs for a while to chill out and let her brain go down different avenues.

[Nettle]

One thing that might help with your sons' understanding - they are now at the age where they don't want Mommy or random old ladies to kiss and hug and generally muss them about unless they are in the mood.

It's EXACTLY the same with the dog - any dog.

Let the dog come and ask for a fuss. Don't take the fuss to the dog. Because, you know, most people fuss dogs for their pleasure, not the dog's. And the dog has few ways of saying I don't like this.

Especially enforce this with little children. It's a bad message to let them think they can fuss any dog any time.

[JudyN]

One podcast that I love, Canine Campus, stated "I feel that I should be able to take anything from my dog, any time" - She told great stories about how challenging her RG-dog was for her and how much training she had to do but how she did "cure" the habit.

You'll get a lot of that: 'I make sure I can take anything off my dog' (implying that your dog is in control and you are weak if you can't). I'm not sure what the best response is, but it's probably 'I do what it takes to make my dog safe in all situations.' After all, if a dog will reluctantly let you take food off her, what will she do when someone else approaches her when she's eating? It's much safer that she assumes that no one is going to take her food so she doesn't need to worry.