QuestionI have a 13 year old yorkie female that has always been the alpha dog. When I bought my little boy yorkie, who is tiny and totally submissive, she has bullied him. Even with telling her no and putting her in time out, it has not stopped. Within the past couple of months, she has become aggressive to both the little boy and my other female yorkie, both of whom are totally submissive and never instigate it. The attacks are to the point that I now have to keep her separate from the other two while I am at work. Could you please give me some suggestions as to how to put a stop to this behavior? We have witnessed her go after both of them unprovoked. Help!?
AnswerCarol,
I'm afraid I have bad news. What you are experiencing is not uncommon when you mix males and females. If you have just one female and one male there is usually not a problem but when you add another one of either sex that's when the problems start.
I had a female that was very small and I got a puppy. They slept in the same baby crib for almost a year with no problems. Then my son came to stay with us and he brought his male yorkie. To make a long story short the youngest female (who was about ten pounds) attacked my tiny yorkie and almost killed her. I was shocked but I had heard of it happening to other people.
We bought a shock collar for the aggressive female and after the tiny yorkie came home from the vet hospital (she was there a week) I would say no and shock the aggressive yorkie if she even came close to the tiny one. It worked really well and I didn't have to shock her after the first two times. The problem was that we had to be very vigilant. Even with the shock collar if we weren't paying attention the female would try to attack the tiny yorkie.
We were then faced with a very difficult decision. Should we let the tiny yorkie live in fear all the time? Did we really want to have to be super vigilant and our nerves be on edge every hour of every day? In the end we decided that we had to separate them. Luckily I had a friend who had just lost her yorkie and she adored the tiny female that I had. She is now living with my friend and being spoiled rotten. It was a hard decision because I loved both of them, but I did what was best for my yorkie.
You will probably end up having to make a hard decision like I did. You can try obedience classes, shock collars, and being vigilant all the time but in my experience it is a waste of time and money. I am glad you are keeping them separate because it can happen in an instant and the reality of the situation is that she could potentially kill one of the other yorkies.
The one that was being aggressive was and still is a sweet natured, loveable dog and we will probably never understand the dynamics of why she became aggressive. She has been around other dogs since this happened and there is no aggression.
I wish I could have been more helpful but I believe in telling people what I believe to be true. Good luck with your decision.
