There are a number of natural traits-- breed specific or otherwise that I couldn't tolerate in my home. Many of them equate to safety for me as I had large dogs .. and at the time, small nieces and nephews and neighbors. However, what is safe for a child is safe for an adult too.

I don't have a dog now-- but I had two: a yellow lab/golden mix and a rottie/mastiff mix. My yellow lab/golden was easy.. my rottie/mastiff mix came from the streets (and likely a puppy mill before that) and hadn't been socialized to a house. She took a lot of work-- a lot of dedicated training-- but it was an incredible experience and it created an amazing bond between us. She was a wonderful dog-- both were.

NO food aggression. Period. I don't want a hand bitten because someone picks up something on the floor or lingers too long on a food dish.

Self Control. No wild jumping with excitement-- not when food is being prepared, not when a new person comes in the house, not when it's time to walk. Excitement is cool-- but they need to be controlled. This took a lot of focused effort with my rottie… but it was especially important for her (at 118 lb)… and it was important when trying to manage two large dogs at food or walk time.

No pulling on leads. I had two large dogs at one time-- I used to give them a little leeway with pulling-- until I broke both fingers when they both pulled. This took a lot of work with my yellow lab/golden mix. He had a strong prey drive.

I am in charge.. if I say OFF, STAY, LEAVE IT, HUSH, GO LAY DOWN, they are to do it. My rottie was a pretty vocal and expressive dog-- she'd do what I told her but sometimes she'd grumble about it. It amused the heck out of me.

Barking wildly .. I don't mind an alert bark or three-- but that's it. Neither of mine were bad barkers so this wasn't really an issue. Late in my rottie's life .. her adrenal tumor had her on high alert every second of the day. There was more barking then but it was due to the corticosteroids raging in her system.

I am sure there are more-- but this is what I thought of off the top of my head.

What has always been sort of baffling for me is that there are so many people who like dogs and want dogs, but then they get one, they’re too busy to invest the time it takes to teach it good manners and commands that ultimately keep them safe. Training makes such a huge difference and can be so much fun.

It's great to see the comments about your take on dogs' ways. Among the many traits mentioned I forgot about the habit of chewing some dogs have as I haven't had any for quite a few years. Thank you everyone.

Gardengal one of my dogs is a cockapoo. She loves to run like the wind and it took forever to get her to learn to come back right away. Her escape artist ways, digging, poop eating, biting when being groomed and running away was why the previous owners gave her up at 6 years old. We like a challenge, what can I say. We easily trained her out of most of those problems.

She bites anyone but us for grooming though. She will only allow me to cut her belly fur so I do her haircuts and DH clips her nails. The groomer wouldn't have her back due to the biting. We're used to it now.

She loves DH so much so he did the run away training. He worked with her for months and she now stops turns back and comes to us no matter which of us calls and what is ahead. She's a lovely dog 4 years and much training later.

One of our dogs has a very high pitched yelp. She's super smart-knows when we're going to let her outside to go potty and she will start yelping frantically. We've tried just about everything we can think of to have her not do that, but it happens every.single.time. She is not a barker per se-its just that ear piercing yelp when she goes to the door to be let out. Once outside she's quiet as a mouse.

The poop thing-dogs love to eat the most disgusting things you can imagine. To them it's the greatest delicacy of all time. They get so much information from that tidbit. Luckily mine don't eat it when we walk them, and we've trained them to stay away from the cat boxes, but given the opportunity, they'd be all over a nasty little pile.

I so agree, lukki, and also choosing a breed that you know how to make into a happy, healthy friend for life by fulfilling all it's needs.

Good list, funkyart.

Food aggression is an easy one to train out. How I've done it is by putting the dog into sit and stay, and then placing the food on the floor while reinforcing the stay command. The dog has to sit and look at the food until given the release command. After a bit of time, you then put the dog into sit and remove the food. For a short while, the idea isn't to torment the dog. Repeat and repeat and the dog gets the message.

This technique (not original by me, I read about it). leads the dog to believe that the food belongs to the human, not to the dog. So there's nothing to protect nor be territorial about. It makes even a large, hungry dog and its bowl of food completely safe around people and small children.

I took a couple of dogs to be spayed a couple of days ago, and while I was waiting to pick them up, a lady was sitting nearby holding an elderly chihuahua. A little girl walked up and was wanting to pet it. The dog was growling. No one told the little girl she shouldn't pet the dog. Her mother was busy with the receptionist but did glance her way a couple of times, but said nothing. It made me very uneasy. I was raised to never pet someone else's dog....at least until you have a chance to get to know it. Had it been me, I would have told her no...it was unsafe. She didn't pet the dog, but she stood so near, if the woman hadn't had a death grip on the chihuahua, it could have easily jumped up and bit her.

I don't allow mindless barking. They can bark if someone comes up or at another dog, but no barking at the other animals here. No running the horses or donkeys. No chasing cats. No jumping up on me. And when I say "go to bed" they know to get on their pallets. A well behaved dog is a joy to be around, and like someone said, it is an on going process to train them, but worth the time that you put into it.

I don't like strangers, especially kids randomly coming up to pet my dogs. I don't come up to your kid and pat them on the head. Please teach your kids the same courtesy.

When i used to walk sammy in the park, people would come up and ask "Is he friendly?" With hand outstretched already in his face. He was super friendly. But as he was stolen once before I didn't like people to KNOW that. Leave us alone so we can enjoy the walk. When I took Sebastian,the German shepherd we had at the time,i would tell people, he bites stay back. (He was not a biter. I just wanted to be left alone to enjoy the walk with MY dog)Some people,adults no less, would counter back with "oh dogs LOVE me, he won't bite." So then I had to flip the *itch switch and tell them to back off. I really hate when people FORCE you to be a *itch.

A well trained doggy is one of the great joys in life. Sammy was the greatest. The only trouble I have had is with Muffin. She just will not stop jumping on me and all the techniques that have worked before just dont stick. She doesn't jump on me in the house but when she is outside she does. We are seriously considering getting her professionally trained. There is a k9 academy a few miles from us that trains police dogs. They also train regular dogs,so we are looking into them.

"Food aggression is an easy one to train out. How I've done it is by putting the dog into sit and stay, and then placing the food on the floor while reinforcing the stay command. The dog has to sit and look at the food until given the release command. After a bit of time, you then put the dog into sit and remove the food. For a short while, the idea isn't to torment the dog. Repeat and repeat and the dog gets the message. "

Oh, Elmer, I so wish you lived near me. I have a foster dog - I work with a dog rescue - and my current dog, a 9 year old female - has resource guarding issues. I put her in a sit-stay before the food bowl goes down, and all is well. And I am sure I could take the bowl away while she is sitting. But once her nose is in the bowl, you better stay away.

My rescue, thankfully, works with really good, well-credentialed trainers. The trainer who was working with me (who fixed another major issue with her) said the best thing to do was recognize the resource guarding and deal with it to keep myself safe, because most of the time, it's not something you can fix.

I can't imagine life without a dog but also can't imagine thinking 'dogs will be dogs' and excusing behavior that makes my life unpleasant. Establishing dominance (firm, not abusive) with a 'dog training voice' from the beginning is one way we start. Property boundaries are also a first order of business for us - we don't fence and want our dogs to have the run of our yard unleashed, but understand they don't leave it without us. We have had dogs with strong prey drive and it takes work but can be done. Training a dog to accept food, toys etc being taken away not just by us but by adult and child visitors is so important and other than a pouty face we won't allow any other reaction. Warning barks when the someone comes up the drive are encouraged but once we say hush, she stops. OTOH, our dog is a joy and as empty nesters she's our companion and buddy (not a substitute child) and spoiling her is part of that joy. And my DH firmly believes (tongue in cheek) that our dogs behave because he shares pretty much anything he eats with them so of course they stick around and follow the rules! Begging is not allowed, nor is table surfing if we put snacks on the coffee table but she knows if she behaves she will get a treat.

Which is not to say we haven't had difficult dog issues. In fact we are dealing with one now and not having much success. Certain people and/or situations make our dog a nervous wreck and she will cower. We've always socialized her, take her on walks in town (leashed) and we live in a very dog friendly area so she regularly visits the paint store, Home Depot and other stores or sits with us at outdoor dining venues. She has some kind of radar we don't understand and it has nothing to do with whether people are dog people or not. At times she will gently approach a stranger in a store or happily interact with someone who approaches her as if she knows them, other times she is velcroed to my leg no matter who is near. The heartbreaker is she does not like our oldest son or DIL and when they visit she avoids being in whatever room they are in and they aren't here often enough to work through this. She was nervous with our younger son but he was able to break through to her and get her to trust him. Adopting from a shelter means there is history we will never know.

Valentines day I volunteered @ a mill dog rescue. I walked several. The one was a black & white Australian shepherd. I'd throw his squeaky toy, he'd run....get it...bury it. He did this 6 times! He kept looking up at the chain link....thinking he could climb it any second and be miles away. He'd be a handful.....

I'm a well trained pawn.

A dog can only think like a dog. Period. They can be well-trained, well-behaved and happy. But you will never get blind obedience. There will be incidences where a dog has to make a split second decision. With his dog brain.

Amen Elizabeth. All of you people thinking you could train the average Westie (or Cairn, etc.) to not chase a squirrel off leash are deluding yourselves.

I have friends who are deep into showing, have shown/won breed at Westminster as well as overseas. I also used to have a vet who raised Westies. And in all of those people with all of their decades of experience involving hundreds of dogs, I know of exactly ONE Westie who could be trusted to recall when in "DIE CRITTER" mode.

But if you are all so sure you could do better...hey, whatever gets you through the day. :)

DLM: I can't imagine life without a dog but also can't imagine thinking 'dogs will be dogs' and excusing behavior that makes my life unpleasant.

I agree, though the reason I never got a dog basically runs down to being able to let them out and do their thing while working. I often worked 11 hours a day, no option to get home, and the commute time is not calculated into that hours per day. We can't all do that, and doggie day care is not always a viable/affordable option. PLUS, how do you get to truly bond that way?

So... cats. Right now my two gorgeous felines are 12 and 17 years old respectively, and while I am retired, and I WANT a dog or two... I love my cats and don't want to bring in canines atm. I've gotten, over the years, not able to imagine my life without a cat. (When I do get a dog or two, I will also get a young cat to work and grow with them.)

I do agree with the "excusing" thing. If one is going to have a dog, one needs to be able to have the time and chutzpah and willingness to train them properly.

Patriceny. I will be doing my best to make sure my future dog/dogs do NOT go after my chickens. This may indeed depend on the electronet fencing, but since I do want a herding dog (for sheep), we shall see about him/her.

Sounds like you're being smart Artemis - you're already thinking about breed characteristics. They do matter a lot. :) I have a friend who lives on a farm with free-range chickens, and her dogs are their friends. I love seeing it.

I'm not an expert but the so called "herding" behavior seems like an inherited trait, not unlike the gait of horses like Peruvian Pasos, and I don't think it can be discouraged or able to be turned off and on through training. It would seem that something like "herd these animals, but not those" isn't possible.

graywings, I've had long discussions with my vet relative about dogs that are adopted after some years of life in unfortunate circumstances. It would seem like after these sad experiences "in the 'hood", dogs may develop habits for survival or to find some measure of happiness or comfort that are unwelcome in a more stable environment but are hard to break. People are the same in this regard too, a product of experiences and some habits can be hard to unlearn.

My experience is that people who train their dogs inadequately (so that they continue with dangerous or unwelcome behaviors) or some who train hardly at all can't imagine an obedient or well-behaved dog. They do exist. They're not mindless, just the opposite. They've been encouraged to only act in permitted ways and the other possibilities are eliminated. It takes a lot of time and patience.

Also, why is that larger dogs seem to be better trained and obedient than yappy smaller dogs who seem more out of control and more prone to biting? It can't be that smaller dogs are less intelligent. Or is that one of the problems?

Imagine having a 75 pound dog pulling on a leash when walking down the street (not in a heel position) and jumping out at people and dogs they encounter. What a horrible possibility. Yet people let their little dogs act that way. Weight aside, it's no less dangerous or unwelcome.

Elmer, it's called small dog syndrome.

Just wanted to expand on what was said about inherent traits in dog. It is important to know and respect the breed of the dog you have. We have two dogs. One is a Great Pyrenese. She is a magnificent dog--great on leash, amazing with children and has the energy level (think couch) that works with our lifestyle. Her breed is a guard dog and when she is "on duty " ( in her mind, in our fenced-in yard,) she barks. She would bark all day if we let her. She barks as soon as she steps paw into the backyard to announce her presence (its a deterrent), she barks if a leaf falls (intruder!) and she barks if another dog responds. We tell her firmly "no bark" and if she continues, she comes in. She also has to sleep in our bedroom because otherwise she would patrol the house, and, yes, bark. I love her to death, but I will not get another Pyr due to the barking. Some genetic call of the wild is at work there and is much stronger than you can imagine. Prys are also not off-leash dogs on walks. The instinct to scout ahead for dangers is too strong in them. They are called "Disa-Pyrs" for a reason. Our other dog could be easily walked off leash. She would stick like glue to us.

I would imagine that a Great Pyr would be an amazing chicken guard dog. They protect their herd at all costs. But with protective instincts comes barking. It's often the first line of defense. I'm not sure a herding dog (border collie, etc) would be up for the chicken guard job. They tend to keep order in the ranks vs protect the ranks. I have to admit it though, I'd love to see a border collie at work with chickens. I have a hunch though it would drive both species nuts.

It's all totally in the breed. I have a 9 lb. Havanese. She is not a barker in general. When in the house she will give a small growl when she sees someone outside. She stops when I tell her to. This breed is called a "velcro" dog. I can let her outside with me and she stays right with me. But she doesn't have a high prey drive so I wouldn't expect her to see a squirrel and take off after it. She also doesn't run right up to people nor does she jump on people. She is much more standoffish and I prefer than to being overly friendly. She doesn't bark at anyone outside when we are walking. She does keep her distance from other dogs mainly because of a bad experience with a big dog when she was a puppy. But if a friendly dog comes up to her (that I know personally) she will stay and allow the dog to sniff her. This breed is bred to be a companion dog. No herding, no guarding, no job necessary except to keep me company. It's just so important to research any breed you may be interested in having.

I agree on the inherent characteristics of a breed, and should be taken into consideration when choosing a dog. I had a terrier mix, and while she got on well with cats, even sleeping with them, she would kill a little kitten. Once a kitten was 6 or 8 weeks old, she was okay, but before then, it was like her job to find them and kill them, and the only way to dissuade her, was to make sure she couldn't get to them.

My dogs now are mostly mutts. I have a couple of half Jack Russells.

murraysmom, of course different breeds have different characteristics.

But for a particular animal, whatever those typical traits are or aren't, a poorly trained or relatively untrained dog will always have undesirable behaviors that were/are avoidable with more and better training. If you want to see easy examples, plant yourself somewhere where many dogs are walked - in a park, a residential street - and watch how dogs obediently and properly (or not obediently and improperly) they behave while on leash. What you should see is dogs walking in the heel position and not pulling. By that, you'll be able to guess pretty accurately which have and which haven't had enough training.

My dog has some issue no matter what I do to train her. She was a chained dog during her young crucial months of her life and was likely attacked by another dog judging by her scares and her behavior when she's on a leash. She can be leash aggressive so she's not allowed to have any contact with other dogs on her leash. However, we have had strange dogs that were loose, luckily none were aggressive other than a very small dog, and she was perfectly fine with them...it seems her problem is with other leashed dogs...strange, I know. Lord only knows what is going on in that little brain of hers. This leash aggression is something that's never going to go away because she's afraid and also being protective. So I just don't take her walking at the park where others are walking their dogs.

One of her hangups that I don't believe could be trained from her is that she has to stop and smell every twenty feet. Of course, I don't let her stop every 20 feet but it's a constant battle our entire walk. I will stop occasionally and let her sniff because she loves it so much, I'd feel bad if she couldn't stop and smell the roses from time to time. But, if I let her stop every time she begins to start to sniff something, we would never get any walking done. At one time, I could only walk her with a head collar but she's graduated to a regular collar which is progress I think. She hated that head collar but it absolutely worked like a charm. She would try to rub it off though if we stopped on the grass.

I don't believe it's as easy as Elmer is making it out to seem when it comes to training a dog, especially if you are rescuing a dog that's already grown and bad things have happened to them. I have had puppies and I have gotten grown dogs and I will say that the dogs that I got as puppies were well trained by me, the grown dogs that I adopted were hard to train and had issues that I could not train out of them.

I think there is a big difference between a dog that will instictively chase a critter because that’s what it’s bred to do and a dog that just runs. That’s why it‘s so important to choose a dog that will be a good fit for the environment you live in. More times than not when people don’t consider the breed, it’s the animal that suffers and that’s not fair to the dog. Lab’s require a lot of space, a lot of interaction and stimulation. I wanted one for years but couldn’t have one until I had the yard she needed and the time to devote to her training.

Also what a lot of people don’t understand is that the dog that looks like it will be a handful is just a dog that requires more exercise and/or mental stimulation then it’s getting, which is sad when its homeless and looking for that forever home. When a dog is bored out of it’s gourd and isn’t given a release for that pent up energy, it will find one on it’s own by insistantly barking or chewing the corner off of the sofa. If you have a dog that you just can’t seem to train, before you start working with it, take it to the dog park so it can run off that excess energy first, then try working with it.

Once you start training, be consistant. Don’t change methods mid way through or go back and forth on the rules you’ve set for it. Train with a purpose. If you don’t want your dog on the furniture, then don’t let it on the furniture EVER. If you allow for exceptions, you just confuse the dog and will spoil it’s training.

I have to agree with other’s that say none of the behaviors described by the OP are acceptable behaviors. If a dog is behaving poorly (and it’s not as they are bred to do) this is a symptom of a problem that can usually be resolved with proper exercise and training. There are a couple of really easy methods, you just need to find which method will work best for your dog.

Arkansas Girl, I’m curious, is your dog food driven? And do you know with any certainty what kind of breed mix it is?

a-girl, what specific exercises or situations have you tried to use to desensitize or discourage the dog's leash habit? How about the stop and smell habit?

Poop eating dogs -- I don't think this is a natural trait; Blame it on dog food! This is what a Veterinarian told a friend of mine. Dog food makers put flavor enhancers in their product to insure your pet smells and woofs down their product, and It makes for a good show in TV ads. You may not notice the smell, but it has been thoroughly tested on dogs. The problem is this: This chemical does not break down in the dog's digestive track; It comes out the back end of the dog mostly intact making their poop delicious smelling (to a dog).

The feces of dogs that are feed table scraps and natural foods do not entice other dogs to eat it.

lukki, she is kind of food driven. I do train with small training treats but she's not crazy excited about treats, even pieces of meat. Yeah she likes it but not to the point that it over powers other things/distractions. I think that she's a mixture of a bunch of breeds, I can see german shepherd in her and I'm pretty sure lab, she has a lab shaped body, she's stocky and short. Standing next to a full breed lab, her body and tail are almost identical.

Yeah, that's kind of what I thought. Getting no answer is a "no" answer.

You can't blame the student for what they haven't been taught.

Luk, I had success with the no furniture but on my terms.

On the furniture with me only and it worked beautifully for many years. Then I got a different dog. After snuggling on a sheet covered sofa, I was stunned to find her up there the next day without me! With no sheet. But we worked on it and now it's only when I'm there too.

Ark, I’ll be honest, I’ve had lots of dogs, but none of them had those kinds of issues, but the behaviors you describe are reactive in nature. I would bet that with some strong handling and consistent training, you could turn it around. By strong handling I mean confident, as in the dog KNOWs you own the room and control everything in it. Not in a mean way, but in a way that lets the dog be a dog and trust that as the lead, you know what’s best; good strong handling really does put a dog in it’s happy place. Most dogs behave the way you describe because they’ve never been properly socialized; their owners don’t own the room and the dog feels he has to take control of it instead. That’s not a healthy or happy situation for you or the dog. While it’s hard not to feel empathy and sadness for the way the your dog was treated before, dogs don’t live in the past, they live in the present. That’s how they can be so forgiving.

Because he’s aggressive and not socialized, I would urge you to consider lessons with a private trainer. The trainer will help you get his behaviors under control and teach you the tools you need to handle him successfully moving forward. Leaving things as status quo isn’t good for you or the dog and it ultimately puts the dog and others at risk. I realize private lessons can be expensive, but it’s no where near as costly as a law suit would be should he ever hurt someone; and the rewards for good training really are priceless.

Bumble, that’s a cute story! Our dog has her own covered spot on the sofa too. Even though she knows that’s her spot, she doesn’t come up until she’s invited.

Elmer, I'd have to write a book on all the training I've used with her. She is 7 years old, so we've been at this a while.

Lukki, she IS socialized, we go to the dog park pretty much every single day. At the dog park, she's awesome! I'm not afraid of her attacking because she doesn't bite, she just makes this awful loud growl that scares the crud out of people. I don't believe the idea that dogs do not remember! I've seen it first hand and at the dog park we laugh and joke about this idea seeing it in our dogs almost on a daily basis. As an example, there is this one dog that is a daily regular there, he's very playful and loves to have fun. Well, one day one of the other regular dogs ran into him and I think kind of hurt his leg a bit. That's been probably a year ago and ever since that happened, happy dog is scared of the dog that ran into him. When he comes in, happy dog hides behind his owner and runs to the back of the dog park to play as far away from the other dog is he can get. Before the collision, they were perfectly happy being close together! My dog, no matter how many times I put my hand toward her, she always blinks her eyes and lowers her head, this tells me that she was hit in the face by some human before we got her. There are examples of this with every single dog that comes to our dog park.

For the most part, our dog is a delight to be around. She just has her "quirks"...HA!

Yes, yes, yes to knowing a dog's inherent traits and working with them. Nature vs. nurture. When we got our current dog about 10 years ago as a puppy, I socialized her with the dogs and children she'd be coming across in our neighborhood. Upon meeting the youngest child on our block, the child bent down to play with the puppy, and after a few minutes, the puppy began mounting her on her back. The girl thought it was funny but I interrupted it and asked the girl to only play with the puppy in her lap, etc. Her mom understood what I was getting at, and we were dealing with it in our household, too, so I could tell what was going on. I had to train my kids to not let her do that to them when playing with her.

Funny story about poop-eating. I had no idea that was a thing... my previous dogs weren't poop-eaters. But one day when I was walking this new dog, she walked over to poop and took a bite. I was so horrified and disgusted that I screamed "ACK! GROSS! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!" And my reaction startled my dog so much that she stopped. In the few weeks following, whenever she would approach poop, I'd yell "ACK!" and she'd leave it alone. She may eat poop when I'm not watching but at least when I'm around, her thought process seems to be, "Should I? Nah... it really sets off the human..."

Great story Feathers! ACK! I like that! Ha !

One way to avoid/stop food aggression is to start putting something yummy into their bowl as they eat-just something little, but they will associate the reaching hand with a positive. If I (or anyone else) reach toward any of our dogs' bowls, there is absolutely no reaction.

Fine, cyn, the dog thinks YOUR hand has a treat and leaves your hand alone. What happens if you try to take away the bowl (like little kids can often do)? Or, if someone else tries makes a move the dog thinks is going to take the bowl away while the dog is eating?

I'm sure there's more than one way to do it, but the approach I've used with 4 dogs (sit, stay, put the dish down, release to eat, then sit stay, pick it up, put it down, release to eat, repeat for weeks), spanning many decades (as I never had more than one at a time), makes the dog's dish safe for everyone, children and other visitors alike.

I have only had one dog with food aggression. When we first got Katie she was around 6-8 weeks old. We would feed her and sammy(both pit bulls) at the same time in the same pan.

It was kinda cute to see them both go for the food, then to see Sammy,who was at least 70 pounds bigger, back off,sit and wait for little Katie to finish when she would growl at him. She never had any sort of food guarding behavior towards people,just other dogs.

However, knowing that she was going to get bigger,we put a stop to that. We did the whole sit stay thing before we put the food down.If she growled when Sammy approached the food(she ALWAYS did), I poked her on the butt to disrupt the behavior and took the food away and started over. It took about a week for her to get it.

I once had an 80 lb dog that was leash aggressive. It took me quite some time to find a way to stop this. Something like that you have to work on every day. It was hard work, but what a difference. A little less than a year ago we adopted an older dog. I was fully prepared to invest a ton of time fixing any issues she might have had. We visited the shelter several times and observed every dog. I had no particular type in mind, just one that would hopefully get along with the cat. Even though we know she wasn’t taken care of properly-picked up running loose, previous tendon injury, I can see she had stitches in her ear at some point, her ‘ owner was informed she had heart worm and he did not treat it. They when she was picked up as a stray again he left her at the shelter, cannot he crated-has an absolute meltdown-we suspect she was left in a crate for way too long periods of time ( we actually didn’t need a crate. She is cat friendly), same if she was put in a room with the door closed. Anyway-she’s the easiest dog we’ve ever had-does not bark , beg, eat trash, walks great on a leash, doesn’t jump,likes all animals but rabbits, housebroken-not one accident, doesn’t climb on furniture, doesn’t eat poop , loves the cat!!! Oddly enough she had never been taught any commands, not even Sit. She’s one of those dogs that one can take anywhere with confidence. It’s been such a great experience. I think I’m always going to adopt older dogs.

Awwww, she's a cutie pie!!!!!

Most of the dogs we've had never required extensive training...maybe there's something to be said for simply having expectations? They just sort of adapted to how we lived...

Jojoco your post made me laugh as we also had a rescue Pyr...she was found on the street at a year old so there was no history to give us. Yes...they bark. We found a no-bark collar invaluable (just sprays air or lavender or I think citronella toward their nose area. when they bark) That helped. Of course she tested it but it stopped the incessant barking.

Also they're guarding area is a 2 mile radius. So when she got out, (once) she was gone. It took four of us to fetch her back...

Now we have a wonderful laid back Old English Bulldog. We never actively trained her repeatedly...she just fits in with our expectations...

We also have a deaf dog. We have learned from each other. She knows some signs and she has learned facial expressions. It is, undoubtedly, the funniest thing ever when I sign to her that we're going for a walk. I'll upload a video some day...

Luckily never had a dog that wanted to eat poop.

Lisa, what a cutie! Reminds me of our dog, she loves to carry toys around too.

My old dog, Emily, has peed in the living room floor for the second time today. I've let her out probably 5 times today so it's not like they aren't being let out for hours. I work long hours and she usually waits until I get home to go outside, even on my long work days. I don't know why she is doing it, senility? The other day my daughter mentioned possibly going into the Air Force and asked if I would take her dogs in. One is a puppy that has chewed everything she can, including my daughter's passport! I'm not taking in another dog. I told her and she looked at me horrified. Made a comment about me taking them if something ever happened to her and I told her no. They would find another home. I spent a lot of money a few years ago putting new flooring down and it is destroyed in the living room now. Door frames have been chewed up, doors scratched up. I'm so tired of it. When these two are gone, no more for me. I love dogs but I'm tired of fixing the house only to have it destroyed. I've replaced doors, door frames, screens in the sunroom...now will have to replace the flooring and I'm sure my house probably smells because it has probably seeped into the cracks of the flooring.

Kathsgarden could you for now keep Emily in a crate? I don't know why either, it could be senility, or a uti or just behavioral. I totally understand not wanting to take on any more pets.

Kath, I dont want to alarm you but peeing in the house,even right in front of me was one of the first symptoms of Sammy's brain tumor.

Then again,maybe she has a UTI. Katie had a couple of those and just couldn't hold it and would pee in her crate even after being let out 20 minutes before. Definitely get her to your vet.

Kathgrdn, your post actually breaks my heart a little.

kath, peeing can be a sign of a medical problem. A visit to the vet might be indicated.

In advance, let me tell you that middle aged and older female dogs (Emily) can develop chronic incontinence from diminished sphincter control. The good news is that there is a drug that is extremely effective to treat this, it's called Proin. People in the vet world sometimes refer to it as PPA. It may be worth a try. It's been 100% effective for our older female dog and because it's a chewable, liver flavored tablet, she likes taking it.

Like other drugs, it can be expensive when purchased from a vet but much, much cheaper if bought from one of the internet/mail order pharmacies, like 1-800-PetMeds. Your vet should agree to provide you with several days worth of tables to start and then agree to send one of these other sources (as you choose) a prescription. It's worth trying if other causes seem to not be present.

Good luck to both you and to Emily.

She's had this issue on and off for a year or more. She sometimes will poop in the house also, sometimes right after going outside. I've talked to the vet about it, no uti, no other issues. She has had pancreatitis a couple times but I've gotten her meds both times for that and it cleared up. I think she is just getting old and possibly just incontinent like some of you said. The vet didn't recommend anything at the time I brought it up. Maybe I will call him. She is also a garbage eater, but hard to get mad at her when I am the one forgetting to take the garbage out of her reach when I leave the house. Sometimes I come home to an awful mess.