how to gently retire the nanny dog behavior

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praline
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Oct 15, 2008 7:23 am
Location: new orleans

how to gently retire the nanny dog behavior

Post by praline »

Hi! Loving this forum and have my coffee and am reading a lot!
This post might end up being really long but its a complicated problem and I wanted to give all the information I could for any help or ideas people might have for me.

I have 3 dogs who are well behaved family members...

One issue I am having and thought to post here after some thinking is with my 12 year old corgi. When she was younger she was the perfect nanny dog. I would often joke she was a better mama than I was for my 3 kids!
Think peter pan and "nana" and that WAS my corgi's job from sun up until sundown.

That was several years ago and my children are not little toddlers to be herded. They are aged 14, 11 and 7. As with many families, the family roll has changed for us over the years but our darling corgi doesn't understand this.

Do NOT get me wrong, she is nothing like any of the horror stories I see on the show. She is never mean and loves her 2 legged children with all of her heart and soul and they love her. She doesn't RESPECT them and tends to ignore any commands or attempts to get her to listen to them.
With me she is quick as lightening listening to my commands.
EXAMPLE... if I want her off the couch I will simply say "Pepper down" and she leaps down and wags her "stump" and lays at my feet to get her good dog pat. If I am NOT in the room and one of my children tell her "pepper down" she just lays there and ignores them! They usually end up bodily dragging her off of said couch. I understand that depending on her for many years as a 3rd set of hands with the kids, I am most likely to blame for giving her a nanny type job. She was quick to lick a skinned knee, comfort when they were sad or ill. If a baby cried at night and I was too tired and asleep to hear, she would always jump in my bed and lick me awake HA HA

I can stand over my children and they give the command, she will look at me and usually follow their command IF I AM THERE LOOKING AT HER. The problem comes in when I am NOT in the room. As we are a family, I can't always be in every room my kids are and where she is so I need to teach "this old dog some new tricks" along with helping my children learn how to get more respect from her.

My 11 year old son gets the most frustrated. He is EXTREMELY interested in dog training, loves dogs and is wonderful with them. He reads training books like most kids his age read Harry Potter. He actually taught our 4 month old puppy to jump through a hoola hoop this weekend by himself and was so proud! No matter what he does, our Pepper completely ignores any command he gives! Of course he has trouble understanding Pepper is older than he is and spent many years playing mama dog to him.

How do I teach my children to get the respect and gain the leadership roll when I am not there looking over the shoulder of both kid and dog after years of her playing nanny to them? Is this "dream or wish" too far reaching for such an old dog with years of taking charge with the kids to change her roll in the family?

I know she is in her sunset years and won't be with us forever but I am hoping she can teach my children IN A LOVING AND GENTLE manner one last lesson before she leaves us... that of respect and leadership.
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