When a prize fighter becomes a womble

For those who don't know we have animals. 2 dogs and 6 cats to be precise. They are all well loved and for the most part well behaved. Except for one our lovely Inuit/ corgi cross, he is well the problem child.

Granted like all of our little family he has been through hell before he came to us, so he was always going to take a lot of work. But for the last 2 years we were on an up hill struggle with his behaviour ever since we lost our older westie, he has been a very stressed dog. Even though we have had a new friend for him. In fact in many ways they just lead each other into mischief. People are scared to come to the door for the racket he makes barking and jumping up at the door. He is so unpredictable to the point I insist he is muzzled to go out, purely as a precaution. What is worse is he is such a one person dog he totally over rides every ones instructions until I issue the command.

Now I have been trying every trick in the book to improve him. Including several discussions with the vet and their nurses. Apparently he is a very nervous and he is displaying this as aggression, but it still needs to be resolved. He already has a hormone collar that has to a degree helped but not enough for my liking. We are looking into a thunder jacket which is like a body con jacket for a dog. How it works I am not entirely sure, it is something to do with the constant feeling of being held is reassuring. However this has mixed results so I am still researching the product, mainly as I am not keen on clothes on animals unless medically necessary. Like in the case of little Rosie she needs tee shirts in the winter purely as she feels the cold so badly, but to make any animal wear something that is not necessary is cruel in my eyes especially something like this.

During my research and before that I have always not liked his name. I feel that to give an animal an aggressive name, especially in dogs not only is asking for trouble from the animal, but creates a fear from strangers if they hear the name called. I was all for changing the name Rocky from day one, especially when I heard he was with in a litter where his brother was called Rambo. The look of Rocky is deceiving as well from a distance you think he is an German shepherd cross. But he isn't he is a failure on the wolf back breeding program, so he is a mix of Inuits along with the cousin breed Husky. The only thing that went wrong was his mum preferred a corgi to the offered father. Don't ask I am still working out how that happened. But it did and we have this dog who looks like one type of dog stuck on corgi legs. Saying that the name Rocky has never really suited him within the family life and his natural behaviour. If anything the name has added to the problems especially regarding the postman / dog battle we have going at the moment. Any way I have been debating getting a therapist in for him and that involved even more reading. Well low and behold I found an article about vocal intonation and its effects on an animal. The harsher the vocal range the more aggressive an animal becomes as it frightens them and makes their natural defence mechanism kick in. In an animal that has so much back breeding in him the natural instinct is more prominate than your adverage mongrel breed. We took him on well aware of the fact all dogs are genetically 99% wolf and with Rocky you can add .5% to that, so we were under no illusion it was up to us the owners to get it right. After much experimentation the whole family has found there is no gentle way to call Rocky, it is just one of those harsh sounding words. To be perfectly honest he doesn't really respond to it either, he was playing up in the same way Garfield rejected his birth name Mau, when he arrived.

So for the last few months I have been trying things out with my little trouble maker and today we hit gold. Not only do we have a happier, calmer dog, we also haven't really had to repeat an instruction twice. The postman wasn't threaten through the window and neither were the bin men. It may yet take a while to get him up to proper standards but I think we are on the right track. May I introduce the dog formally known as Rocky.... his name, as agreed by him is Orinoco (Oreo for short)