very aggressive yorkie

[yorkietalkjilly]

Here are just some general rules about some biting dogs which could fit your situation:

Dogs bite and nip for many reasons, but I'll state the most obvious ones. If you are trying to stop one from protecting himself in a fight or keep him from a female in heat, he will sometimes turn and bite you without even thinking. They bite from pain or fearful reactions and from habit when they are continually anxious. They bite and nip to try to take control and keep their owner in his/her place. Too much affection without enough training, activity and discipline in some insecure, anxious or dominant dog's lives will cause them to bite/nip out of plain old insecurity, sensing that the affection-giver has no ultimate authority over them - in their minds. They almost always feel insecure around that person and nip or bite to make a statement to the person that they are just as powerful and in control as that person is - a vain attempt to try to bring some order where they don't see much. They need some sense of boundaries and leadership in order not to feel anxious around weaker type owners. Dogs are used to a hierarchy in the wild in their pack dynamic with at least one very strong pack leader they know is taking care of them and the pack and around a person they don't see as a strong leader, will often try to continually take control and remind that person that they are just as powerful.

Most insecure/anxious/dominant dogs only want a strong pack leader to take care of them and make them feel secure by requiring respect from them and until they have that, some dogs will behave in an unstable fashion. They do not really want to rule - honestly - but when they don't see strong leadership in their pack, they attempt to take control from that weak leader by whatever means they think will keep that person off-kilter and cautious of them. It's really a kind of self-defense in the dog's mind.

All of their lives, some insecure/anxious/dominant dogs are like kids going through the "terrible two's", toddlers with no parental boundaries at all, allowed to do any and everything they want, they escalate their bad behavior until serious problems erupt and they usually wind up in real trouble, when all they needed was loving guidance in order to learn how to conduct themselves.

Secure, calm, submissive dogs usually have none of these issues and require little in the way of guidance or boundaries to get them back into normal behavior if they trip up and find a bad habit or two but all the rest of dogs usually need strong leadership and boundaries - all tempered by love and patience and realizing the dog is only reacting to his basic nature and not deliberately trying to be bad.

Dogs rarely bite or nip people they highly respect or strong leader except as described above in the fight/mating situation. If your dog doesn't ever bite your husband, it's because he's perceived as a strong pack leader in your dog's mind.

Only establishing a strong sense of leadership and taking back respect with the training programs suggested, together with re-training the dog how to respond properly to you when it awakens, will usually reshape an insecure, anxious or dominant dog's bad behavior. The Nothing In Life Is Free program together with the obedience training are your best bets for obtaining the respect you need from you dog in this particular instance and it will be lots of fun when you see your dog begin to respond and enjoy the work with you.

And taking back respect is not done with militant voice tones, rough-house ways or alpha-rolling or swatting, it is done by always requiring the dog to respectfully obey you in order to get its needs met ala the NILIF-type program, setting boundaries it cannot cross without you standing it down and backing it off with your stern eye-lock and walking into his space until he gives in and turns away and reshaping its behavior through fun obedience training with lots of positive reinforcement and happy rewards for learning. You can totally change a "bad" dog to a "good" dog using those gentle but firm ways of dealing with him. And he will learn to respect and love you in the process.