Sorry it took soooo long to give yall an update to Mr. Tater's breed. A lot of people, including myself were guessing some rhodeisan ridgeback mix, boxer, and blackmouth cur.
Taters results are in, and he is a SUPERMUTT. 39% pitbull, 27% lab, 11% Great Dane, 9% boxer, and the rest is supermutt with hints of bullmastiff and German shepherd. Hes a year old now and 85 pounds. Here's my original post.
Hey y'all,
I’m looking for advice because I’m starting to feel genuinely anxious walking my dog, and I want to get ahead of this before it gets worse.
My dog, Tater, is 11 months old and about 82 lbs. I found him as a stray 7 months ago, he had parvo but recovered. Since I’ve had him, he’s been very sweet and had no signs of aggression until about a month ago.
Up until recently, he was extremely social. I live in a very dog-friendly apartment complex (no breed restrictions, two dog parks), and he used to play with every dog he met.
As he got bigger, his play became pretty rough, so I stopped letting him play in the dog park with other dogs over the past couple months. Not long after that, I started noticing reactivity.
Now I’m struggling to tell if it’s frustration, overstimulation, or aggression, or all of them... At the dog park fence, sometimes he does high-pitched, whiny barks that seem like he wants to play. Other times, the barking is deeper and more intense, and he lunges at the fence in a way that feels scary.
On walks, it’s worse. He reacts to most dogs, barking, lunging, pulling, and it’s strong enough that it’s scaring people we pass. This past week, it’s escalated to include kids on scooters and people pushing baby strollers.
Because of his size, I’m honestly starting to feel unsafe because i almost have no control over him. I’m currently using an EasyWalk harness (front clip), which helps some, but I’m worried about him pulling me down or getting loose.
For context, I’m the one who handles all of his walks and daily outings due to mine and my husbands schedules, so I’m dealing with this behavior consistently.
I’ve considered a professional trainer, but right now my husband is our only source of income and he doesn’t feel that a trainer is necessary at this point. That’s part of why I’m trying to learn as much as I can and handle this correctly on my own.
I’d really appreciate any guidance on whether this sounds more like frustration-based reactivity vs aggression..or both! Why it might be escalating and turning into to new triggers. What I can start doing immediately to manage this safely.
He really is a sweet dog, and I want to do right by him—I just don’t feel confident right now.