Stopping a Golden Retriever from Resource Guarding Food and Bones

By: David Codr

Published Date: July 10, 2018

Walter - Stopping a Golden Retriever from Resource Guarding Food and Bones

For this Omaha dog training session we taught 3 year-old Golden Retriever Walter to respect personal space and stop resource guarding bones and food.

Walter started things off by showing me several unwanted behaviors before we even got a chance to sit down. He was all in my business, literally nosing into my crotch, butt and bag as he bounced around us.

Since the family will be welcoming their first baby in a few months, I spent some time showing the guardians how to claim their personal space as well as to stop petting him when he climbed on top of them or nudged them for attention.

Next I made several suggestions regarding exercise and structure. Walter clearly saw himself as having the same rank and status as the humans and its not hard to see why; no rules, being petted so much he didn’t have to ask for it and when he did, attention on demand.

By petting Walter with a purpose the guardians can start to transition him into more of a followers mindset. This is one of my favorite positive dog training approaches as its so darn easy and impressively effective if the humans get into a habit of doing it. This will also help Walter practice not getting attention on demand which will help once baby comes.

I promised the guardians to include a link to a dog behavior column I did on welcoming a new baby into a home with dogs as well as how to teach a dog to stay until released.

The guardians may also want to check out this free dog training video on how to teach a dog to stop invading personal space.

Next I handed my camera over to the guardians so I could show them how to stop resource guarding in dogs.

Stopping a dog from resource guarding is all about positive reinforcement, practice at a distance where the dog doesn’t feel a threat and repping it until the dog is comfortable with your presence at closer and closer distances.

If the guardians practice this technique to stop dogs from resource guarding a few times a day every day, they should be able to stop Walter’s resource guarding behavior for good in a month or so.

Later we discussed the importance of structure when petting and feeding, how important consistency is, creative ways to increase his exercise and the value of keeping an exercise journal for a month.

To help the guardians remember all the positive dog training tips we covered in this at home dog training session, we shot a roadmap to success video that you can check out below.

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This post was written by: David Codr