So my fiancé had a dog before we got together, he’s almost a two year old Rottweiler mix who hasn’t been fixed (he’s getting neutered July 23rd). Two days ago I got a puppy (4 month old husky mix) for my fiancés birthday and since then the older dog (Sam) has been acting very aggressive, guarded, possessive and jealous. Sam has been around other dogs before, he was never really socialized so I have been working with him on that. He has recently shown increased aggression towards humans, this was before the puppy. He has never shown aggression towards us but if they’re not someone in the family, including children, he growls and flashes his teeth at them. I have been working with him on that behavior and he has been slowly improving.
My problem now is that he has been increasingly aggressive towards the puppy and tries to start an altercation at any chance he can get. If the puppy is walking around he is following closely behind and gets in his face, the puppy is very submissive to him and tries to avoid him but Sam is constantly trying to get in his face and stare him down which I take as him trying to intimidate the puppy and start a fight. Yesterday when the puppy was walking around and tried to move around him Sam snapped and bit the puppy in the face, no blood was shed as I immediately stepped and punished Sam for inappropriately trying to correct the puppy when he was doing nothing wrong. When both of them are outside though Sam tries to play with the puppy and acts very friendly but as soon as the both of them are inside he becomes very obsessive and goes back to trying to start a fight by staring the puppy down and following him everywhere.
I do positive reinforcement where I do training time with both of them and give them treats when they’re both being calm and good in each other’s presence. They both go outside together and I play fetch with Sam to get it across that the puppy also brings positive things and shouldn’t be something to be jealous about. I know it’s only been two days but I feel like I’m doing everything wrong. I have never had a dog act like this before especially with one that has been around other dogs and was raised around them. We’re hoping getting him fixed will calm his testosterone levels so he’ll be more calm and stop being so obsessive. Any tips would be extremely helpful.
