Aggressive/hyper shepherd

by Joanny
(SC)

I have a female german shepherd I've had since she was 12 weeks old. At first she was very gentle, almost fearful. Her previous owner had always kept her and her mother & siblings outside. My husband and I have had to constantly change and adjust things to try to control her behavior problems from the very beginning and it's getting ridiculous.

At first, she wanted to hide under the deck and house, tearing trim off of both. Mind you she spends nights in the house in a crate as well as other times during the evening out of the crate when we are home and does not have a potty problem indoors, so that's a plus. We built her a fabulous dog house and put her on a tie out during the day when we are home to keep her from destroying the house, deck, garden, etc. So she started digging holes, and I mean big holes. Fine we fill them in and left her one which she seems satisfied with. She would bark and bark to the point my neighbors called and complained. We had to buy a bark collar.

The worst of her problem is putting her on/taking her off the tie out. It's been the same routine for months and no matter what we try she will not stop biting our feet, jumping, acting crazy and making it very difficult to get a leash on or off. She has scratched us both up pretty badly as well as jumped at my grandchildren when she's been off the tie out and scratched/knocked them down as well. Nothing works. The word "no" has no effect whatsoever, she really seems to enjoy misbehaving and I am at my wits end. I simply cannot handle her, she will not comply. She does not bite and can be very sweet at times but gets carried away (0 to 60) very suddenly. She will lay in wait outside when I go to bring her in and pounce when I get near. I am ready to surrender her because I really think she may be recalcitrant. She knows commands and will comply except with the leash thing at which time nothing gets through. She also gets walks and plenty of exercise so that's not it either. I've had big dogs, even Dobermans my whole life and I've never had a dog act like this. If you tell me she'll grow out of this I'll stick it out but I'm getting really frustrated.