Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi everyone.

Well I just found this board, and cool! I love animals and I have a golden retriever who is a year and a bit, his birthday is January 7th and he will be 2 years old! His name is Zac and hes very mischevious!

I have a couple of behavioral questions I was hoping someone might have some advice for me!

Ok the first one: I have 9 cats too, and most of then are scared of him.
I got him as a 3 month old puppy, and the adult cats I already had hated him! I tried not to let him chase them but, it did happen sometimes.
We also got a kitten around the same time as him, and they are kinda friends, but Zac chews on his head and drags him around, they don't cuddle or act cute! Angel (the cat) is just very submissive with Zac and I don't know why! He basically trys to chew all the chats, not hurt them but I am afraid he might accidently.

Any advice on that?

The second problem: On walks, he LUNGES if he sees anyone or anything, especially little kids and other dogs, but pretty much anyone.
If is not because he is trying to attack, he is just REALLY overly friendly!
He wants to run and meet and greet and lick and jump and just go nuts.

He gets extremely excited and he is a big dog compared to me, as you can see in the pic below. He has pulled me off my feet a lot of times I can barely control him! If there is no one else around, he is awesome.
I used a haltie for about 6 months and he is a good walker without it, just went other dogs/people are around he freaks out.

The weirdest part is, he goes to doggie daycare where the owner has small kids and tons of dogs and plays there all day! He gets 4 walks with the other dogs a day, playing, kids, so i don't understand what his problem is. He has been going there all year and never a problem! He is just so hyper and excitable when he sees people on a walk. He LOVES meeting new people and he just goes crazy he jumps and like shakes becase he wants to be pet so much. It used to be cute but not so much now that he can knock you over!

I dont' want to put a haltie on him again, because he really doesn't like it, and honestly all that happens with the haltie is he lunges anyways and he crys because his mouth is shut. It doesn't even hold him back, and he rubs his head on the ground every 3 econds to get it off. He is a good walker besides this lunging problem, so I don't think its fair to make him wear it.. ?

Does anyone else have this problem? I am 99% sure it is not aggression, he has never bit anyone and the only time he has ever nipped was out of playing excitment and he totally didn't mean too.
I hate yelling at him and getting embarassed every time we see someone else outside, and look like a idiot trying to hold him back!

I want to walk him but hes so freaky when he does that, yesterday he lunged at a pregnant woman and tried to jump on her! He doesn't know she was pregnant but ack! so freaky.

ok, sorry ths is so long but one last problem:

Whenever anyone comes over, he jumps and jumps and wont stop it. He doesn't jump on me because I ignore him and turn away, and he knows that he wont get anything from me for it. but (GRR) everyone else
when he jumps they touch him, squeal, or they let him, and so he thinks its ok to jump on anyone but me, including my mother who just had a surgery. How can I get him to stop jumping on other people? My boyfriend thinks i should knee him in the chest but he doesn't do it to me and I think that could hurt his sternum? I don't want to hurt him!

Anyways, if anyone knows.. oh one more thing he seems to have a rash on his groin, just above his privates, on his belly a bit, it looks a bit scabby like a bunch of little red dots. Has anyone seen this before?

Sorry for the long emails, I will post some photos so you can see the bad boy!

Thanks a lot everyone!

oops my photo didn't work, here it is again.

This is me and him when he was a baby puppy at 4 months!

this is my favorite puppy photo of my boy, he was so cute! (4 months)

This is Zac this morning, being his big handsome self! It was taken on my camera phone so not the best quality but he still rocks!

In response to your Golden jumping on people. I have had 2 Goldens. First it sounds like obedience training is in order. Goldens are sweet by nature but can be very hyper and headstrong!! My second Golden Maxine was the sweetest girl but once she set her mind to something, watch out!! Three training sessions and periodic work at home afterwards did the trick. We could tell her to sit and wait to greet friends. She was not allowed to say hi until we said it was ok. Jumping was NOT ok and in the beginning all greetings were done with Maxine on a leash. Yes! Even in the house. It's also ok to say to visitors that if your dog jumps on them to knee him in the chest. It won't hurt him! If your dog persists in jumping, then he has to go in his crate. If he cries in protest about being in the crate, ignore him and he will settle down. Once he does settle down then take the leash, go to the crate and let him out to say hi but make sure he is on the leash. Praise him for not jumping but don't let him loose. Have him go back into the crate. After a while, he will get the message that if he wants to be out of the crate to greet people then he has to be polite and not jump.

Good luck!

Leslie

You need an obediance(sp?) class for him. Also the halti isn't hurting him. I have two dogs, a lab/pointer and a german shepherd. I walk them both at the same time with halti's on. Some times they try to get them off, but it's better for them and me.

Hello

I'm Sara (also known as Purball ) I'm 16 and I own 2 goldens myself. Macintosh is our 5 year old, and Gallagher is our 3 month old- both boys.

We also have a cat, Casey- but he loves the dogs so I can't really help you with the cat problem.

Lunging, though, can easily be stoped by a halti , or 'gentle leader' Macintosh wears his all the time and he is a perfect angel with it on
(example)

That is mac with his halti on.... (here is the link just in case the img doesn't work - www.geocities.com/goldengallagher/dandilionmac.jpg) it doesn't hurt him at all, in fact, i don't have to correct him barely at all when he wears it because he knows I am in control.

We are slowly working on the transition to just a choker & lead- but it is much easier on both of us to just use the halti.

Good luck!!!!
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