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so i have black lab, who if somebody broke in, would probably play with the dude and hope he gave him a biscuit. i don't really mind having a dog that i dont have to worry about biting anybody, but for those who have own multiple dogs, i have a question:

my dog seems to be scared of the little dogs, but will show aggression to dogs his size or bigger. we had taken a road trip a while back to visit some friends back in oklahoma, and when we chilled in the wildlife refuge, he straight up ran up to a longhorn and was trying to play with it.

i say this because is there a reason the bigger dogs seem to run off from smaller dogs? i mean, my dog will straight up act like the smaller dogs are talking mad trash and threatening to bag his mom or something. is more about the breed of the medium-large size dogs?

i know labs typically lack aggression anyway, which again isn't a problem, but it seems kinda strange to me. or maybe its normal and i just didn't know about it?

any dog owners have similar experiences? or can enlighten me about it?

My late dog Duke (who was 120# or so) had a little dog friend that lived next door. She would come to the fence, and jump and try to get over to my yard.

One day she came around my house, and up my driveway, and over to the gate between my driveway and back yard. She came over to the gate, and Duke stuck his nose down, and she just jumped all over his nose and face. (she was a little toy dog) Duke just loved her.

I have had 4 dogs as an adult. All have been big dogs, the smallest being a Border Collie. None of them have been afraid of small dogs. They all loved to try and get over to all the dogs in the vet waiting room when we went. They loved them all, big or small.

did you notice any of your dogs behaving differently based on breed? whether its positive or negative?

I can't answer your question, but....

Our current dog is 20-21 lbs. He absolutely drives our friends 100 lb. Lab crazy. The lab is scared of him. Ours just wants to play, the lab, when we go there you can literally watch him physically think "crap, little dude is here."

I USED to have a lab. Big one. Best thing about her was her bark. Scariest sounding bark, growl. IF someone was outside. If/when they came in, she was probably like your lab - "Hey, pet me pet pet me pet me...."

I get into a lot of home throughout the course of a week, or month..whatever. The small dogs, as a rule, are the ones I worry about. As a rule, the bigger dogs kind of look at me like "eh, if he messes up, I can handle it. I'll just watch him..." The smaller dogs do the sneak attacks, from behind. Maybe smaller dogs have a Napoleon/putin complex?



And like you said, lab's are notorious for being friendly, pleasing dogs - that's been in their blood for ever.

Our current dog - if we're home, will go ballistic with barking if he hears something out of the ordinary - and trust me, dogs know what is "normal" and what is not, i.e. if there's a car in the drive, he barks his fool head off. If it's at a time there is supposed to be a car driving in, he does nothing.

If we AREN'T home? You could walk right in and I promise he'd be sitting on the couch, look at you and think "Eh, no one here to protect."

Nope. Every one of my dogs just loved other dogs, regardless of size.

When I brought home my 2nd dog, what appeared to be a 3 or 4 month old Lab pup, (pretty small at that time) that was wandering around my work. I brought him home and my Border Collie just adopted him on sight. He just taught him everything. One day, my Lab was about to go running down the driveway, and my Border Collie ran after him, and "herded" him onto the back porch and held him between his body and the wall.

How old is your Lab. Do you have a local dog park? Maybe take him and let him small some of the small sogs from outside the fence?

jc

I think it's due to how they were socialized when young, plus their individual personality.

Neither of my dogs are scared of any other dog. But one of mine was abused and she dislikes people. My other one is friendly with everybody. People and dogs.

Also, my dogs are small animal aggressive. I think it's weird that they will try to kill any critter smaller than them, but are ok with small dogs.

Yea I take him to the dog park often. There’s always dogs his size or a bit bigger and they play fine. Now that I think about it, I really haven’t noticed small dogs at the park at all. He’s 4 years old.

Ok that would make since. Even as a pup, any social interaction we’re with dogs his size or bigger. Not many opportunities to interact with small dogs.

Most labs make great family and multiple pet home dogs. Their nature is to get along with other animals. Of course every individual is a bit different. But if you get them out to dog parks or doggy day care or other things where they can socialize, the will be more chill. As for your question, some dogs do get scared or more like confused by smaller dogs, especially when the small dog acts 10 feet tall. Not so sure if it's scared so much as not knowing what to make of this small thing being so aggressive, like I could just swat you but don't want to hurt you… I've owned a couple pet stores, bought and sold many dogs, and owned dogs my entire life. I think I know a thing or two. I prefer German Shepherds. Somewhere around 3 years of age, German Shepherds stop being puppy idiots and become the smartest dogs you will ever know. Loyal and protective to a fault. Highly trainable. And I swear, my last two, including my current one, know English better than half of America.

If you want to get your dog past this, put the muzzle on and get him/her around some puppy or younger small dogs. After you are sure your dog isn't about to snap them, take the muzzle off and let them have some space to interact. Your dog will get over the anxiety as soon as it realizes the little dog is cool, and not a raging dust bunny with teeth.

My 50lb Aussie hates other dogs. When on walks she will sniff and tolerate other dogs, but when at a dog park she wants nothing to do with other dogs. She will stay by my side, almost jumping in my arms to get away from the dogs.

Inside she will bark like crazy at everything outside, cats, squirrels, people, cars, wind blowing the trees. If someone comes in she will bark like crazy at them, but no biting. She’s never bitten anyone, great watchdog, noone is breaking without us knowing.

We also have a cat, and she wants to play with it but the cat is so skittish and it never happens.

My cat recently died. I miss him so, so much.


As for dogs barking when things aren't "normal"? That's a great thing, in my opinion. Unless you want to spend thousands on a true, trained 'guard dog' that will attack on command, etc - a barking dog is a big deterrent to criminals, usually.

Even our little 20 lb dog - their hearing is so, so good. His barking alerts us/me that "something isn't normal". That's all you can ask of a dog.

My brother used to live in DC - not a great area. At a block watch meeting the local police said the best deterrent to common burglars was a dog that would bark. The bigger the better, but a dog that barked.

My brother-in-law had a lab that would gather apples from under the apple tree and set a pile of them between her paws while laying on her belly in the grass. She would then wait and watch, sometimes for hours, until the bees came around the apples. Then she snapped and ate the bees. Crazy to see.

I don't know. Probably just a individual dog deal.

When they are young it's good to take them to dog parks to socialize. It's also good to take them to petsmart. So they can learn how to be well behaved on a leash around other dogs and people. My friendly dog loves petsmart. Everybody wants to pet her because she is very pretty and furry. (husky). She eats it up. I've had little kids barely taller than her walk up to her and she would sit down and let them pet her. and hug her Then sometimes other people let their dogs come up and sniff noses. Sometimes it was spastic puppies or little dogs coming up to her and she would tolerate it. She doesn't have an aggressive bone in her body so it was always a good experience. I probably would approach it different if my dog showed any aggression.

There's also a large park in ATL that has a farmers market. It's trendy to take your dog to the farmer's market. So I used to do that with her, and she would meet the other dogs and people. That was a good experience also.

The main bad experience I had with her is when she got loose and would run up to people in the neighborhood and it would scare them. Because nobody wants an unknown loose dog running up to them. They don't know if she is aggressive or not.

So we make a point of going on walks and getting to know the neighbors.

Just my opinion.

Not exactly same situation... but I have two dogs, one a black lab that's about 5 and one a jack Russel that's 8. My lab is similar to yours.. He's very large and can look intimidating but he's not saving me from an intruder... he likely would defend my wife, but if a bugler has food it's over...

the jack is our guard dog... that dude barks at everything and hates everyone except our family... he's gotten used to other people if they come around enough... but he HATES big dogs... thought he'd get use to our lab but hasn't yet...

the lab isn't necessarily scared of him, but he does avoid him. My lab LOVES my wife and follows her every where, has to lay right next to her etc.... if the jack is by my wife the lab will sit about 3 feet away and just stare and my wife and typically wine until we move the jack so the lab can lay next to my wife...

Good point on the Jack.

If a person wants a great watch dog, a terrier breed beats all hands down. They know when to sound the alarm and don't fear anything, not to mention they are tough little suckers.

Don't misunderstand, a watch dog isn't a guard dog. Unless you get an Airedale or Giant Schnauzer, which can match up to any foe, a watch dog is all you really need. I just want the heads up so I have a chance to guard myself unsurprised.

As for attack dogs, nobody really needs those except maybe the police and military.

We have 2 Miniature Schnauzers. Mozart and Maxwell(Moe-n-Max).

Moe......19lbs. Max......21lbs

Aside from when they're at the groomers they don't mingle with other dogs. Then again, they're in separate pens at the groomers as well.

They bark at anything and everything. They were originally bred to be "ratters". Watch/guard dogs? To an extent. Watch more than guard.

I might add, they're as spoiled as spoiled gets.

Yes - while it gets annoying at times that he barks at everything, I appreciate that he barks at everything . it will be very loud in my house if someone tries to break in

For mini's they are pretty stout, but then Schnauzers are stout dogs. Those are watch dogs. As I said, the only real guard dogs in the terrier group are probably the Giant Schnauzer and Airdale.

We had a couple of standard Schnauzers when I was a kid. I'd guess they were in the 25+ lb range. And as most terriers, they weren't crazy about other dogs either.

I've heard of that before, but never experienced it. So if nothing else, it isn't something specific to your dog. Definitely is a dog 'thing'.

My current dog loves everyone. I had a mini-Aussie who pretty much despised all other dogs. There was a dog in the middle who we really never got a read on.

well... apparently my 7 year old decided to feed my lab multiple times today... then when we were over at grandma's celebrating her 75th birthday, the lab broke out of his cage because he needed to throw up... which he did... all over the house... thankfully only had to throw away a few blankets and spent about an hour carpet cleaning... gotta love dogs...

Nope.




"gotta love kids," is more accurate in this case.

j/c:

'Very impressive, german shepherd…'

https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/doggo-gets-very-confused/

That is great! It is amazing what dogs can learn. I have joked that dogs are smarter than some people .... but it might just be true.

Pit Bulls are terriers as well. I've had three of them over the course of my lifetime. They all made for very good watch dogs. The trick behind it all is that someone trying to break into your house had no idea of their intent. I taught all of them to love people. As a result they would all bark any time they knew someone was outside or at the door. What strangers didn't know is the reason they were barking is because they all wanted me to open the door so they could greet, meet and play with the people. Even when coming through the door the dogs would block the people until they would pet them.

Now if you were a friend or regular visitor you knew that. If not you had no idea.

My dog was outside last night having a conversation with a barred owl. It kept hooting. She kept barking. It was cute.