Here’s a generic management and training plan for working with a dog who displays resource guarding. This plan focuses on safety, building trust, and gradual behavior change using positive reinforcement.
🛠️ Phase 1: Management (Prevent Escalation & Ensure Safety)
🎯 Goals:
- Prevent rehearsal of guarding behavior
- Keep everyone safe (dog, humans, and other pets)
- Protect the dog’s emotional well-being
✅ Strategies:
- Remove triggers: Don’t allow access to high-value items the dog is known to guard unless in a controlled setting.
- Feed in a quiet area: Use a separate room or crate for meals; no interruptions.
- Avoid reaching for guarded items: Instead, use trades, barriers, or leashes when removal is necessary.
- Separate dogs during high-value activities: Feed separately and provide chews in isolation to prevent competition.
- Educate family members: Everyone should recognize early signs of guarding and follow the same rules.
- Utilize the 2 Layers of Safety (Rule of Thumb): Use a combination of layers to keep your dog safe. Things like space, leashes, crates, door, back-ties, etc. can be combined together to make sure that if 1 layer of safety fails everyone can still stay safe.
🎯 Phase 2: Foundation Skills (Build Communication & Trust)
🧠 Teach Key Cues:
- “Drop it”: Teach using positive trades with low-value items.
- “Leave it”: Teach to prevent picking up potential guarding triggers.
- “Give” or “Out”: Use reward-based exchanges for higher-value items.
- Place/Mat/Settle: Create a safe, calm place for the dog to relax and feel secure.
🐾 Desensitization & Counterconditioning Foundations:
- With the appropriate management and safety plan in place pair the human or dog approach with positive outcomes (e.g., tossing a treat as you walk by when the dog has a toy).
- Start below threshold—work at distances with low-value items and increase difficulty gradually.
🔄 Phase 3: Behavior Modification (Gradual Desensitization and Counterconditioning)
Important: Proceed slowly. Use a journal or tracker to monitor progress and avoid setbacks.
📋 General Protocol:
- Start with a low-value resource (e.g., kibble, non-favorite toy).
- Approach at a distance the dog is comfortable with while it has the item.
- Toss a treat, then walk away. Repeat until the dog anticipates the treat and shows relaxed body language.
- Gradually decrease distance over multiple sessions while continuing to toss treats. Only decrease distance if dog maintains relaxed body language.
- Once the dog remains relaxed at close distance, offer a trade: deliver a treat while calmly picking up the item, then return it.
- Slowly increase the value of the item over time (e.g., from kibble to chew, to bones, etc.).
- Practice with different contexts and people once reliable.
⛔ Avoid:
- Rushing progress or increasing item value too quickly
- Physically forcing the dog to give something up
- Ignoring subtle stress signs (freezing, whale eye, lip curls)
🧘♂️ Phase 4: Generalization & Maintenance
- Practice desensitization in various environments (kitchen, yard, car).
- Introduce other trusted people into training once dog is confident.
- Maintain positive associations by occasionally trading or approaching with treats.
- Reinforce calm behavior around items even outside of training sessions.
📝 Notes:
- Use a force-free professional if the behavior is intense, unpredictable, or if there is a history of biting.
- Every dog is different—go at the dog’s pace.
- Keep a training log to track thresholds and progress.