My 11 month old westie called Buddy, is coming along fine after some difficult times since we got him in May last year. He's always been quite snappy, jumping up etc but he's calming down now. A real problem we have with him though is whenever he's with me in the lounge, and one of my daughters come in the room, he'll growl and then basically he goes for them. He'll then sit with them and jump on their laps, after being told off of course. The other day I was in the kitchen with a couple of friends and he was fine with them, being fussed etc, then my daughter came in and he did the same thing but a lot worse. It really shook us up to the point I thought about re-homing him, but I love him to bits and as I say, most of the time he's fine. It's awful as I desperately want to do this right and eventually have a lovely, well behaved dog. Any advice as to why he's doing this and what I should do would be much appreciated.
Linda

have you considered clicker training?

Does he actually bite or is it just all noise?

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He did actually bit my daughter but didn't break her skin, it was on her ankle. How do I clicker train? Thanks for replying
Linda

Jeez, thanks everyone for all your excellent advice. What a super friendly site this is!

I didn't reply as I don't have any experience of this sort of situation and also think that to offer advice on aggression is not safe on the internet really. If it were my dog I would get in touch with a behaviorist to see what is happening first hand. Especially with a dog that has bitten a child.

What would you prefer - advice that may turn out to be wrong and make the problem worse, or no advice?

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