Alpha Bitch soup

While I spent the last week at a cottage in Canada there was one day when two family's with dogs came together. One of the family's are at the cottage all the time giving their dog the sense of this was her cottage. The others had only visited rarely and were sort of in a "I don't know where we are," zone. Nevertheless, there were two alpha bitches in attendance. Having these dogs come together had always caused problems so before the introduction I was ready with a hose.

When there is any thought of problems you need to leave leashes out of the picture so all the dogs were loose. Leashes can cause a problem all on there own with keeping a dog too close to its guardian and taking away the flee response. So with hose in hand they were set free. Right off the more resident bitch approached the other two girls with tail held high, hair up with very slow and purposeful body language. The young sheltie got the message right away and turning on a dime and walking away. She had no intention of confronting the "owner" of the cottage.

Now the "alpha" of the non resident pack is a very high strung but mature border collie female. And as soon as they locked eyes I knew there was going to be a problem. They locked necks both growling, tails held high and neither willing to back down. I walked towards them with my own "alpha" body posture and defused the situation. But I knew that this was not going to be easy, both bitches were not willing to give in.

Typically when you want to have a smooth introduction you would take the dogs off the property so that no one felt like they own the place but things don't always work out perfectly and you have to wing it. Through the whole introduction I was narrating to both guardians, my sister and brother to what was going on and what they should be doing. I explained how it was very important not to keep the dogs close to them and that should not be in close quarters just as both bitches attempted to do the stairs to the deck and it errupted.

i had given the hose to my sister and yelled to use it which stopped the fight immediately but both bitches were ready to go again. So with more than four families coming together, children and babies involved we put one of the females away for a long afternoon nap. Which in the searing heat was not such a bad thing. This was not going to be resolved quickly and I had no intention of loosing any of my vacation time floating in the water to watching these two girls fight it out.

It was very interesting to see who was thinking what and how things changed in an instance. The reining female had been put in her place but she had no intention of staying there which meant there was going to be ongoing fights. And looking at the size and mental state of both bitches it was going to be a long drawn out battle. At least one of the girls had stepped down out of the competition which was very good for her.

Usually these issues can be solved with time and very strong leadership but in a setting that is very casual with kids everywhere it is much too dangerous to try to settle such a volatile situation. With one female being the reining cottage dog and very protective of her family and the other an independent type who had taken on the job of guarding her Mom and new baby it was a very explosive situation, one best dealt with by management.