Indoor: well-behaved, outdoors: territorial

United States
February 20, 2007 8:06am CST
Has anyone else seen this problem in their dog? My dog is fine indoors, minds me very well, knows to stay down and not jump or nip, etc. But outdoors, she thinks it is her domain and completely misbehaves, to the point where I hate being outside with her? Suggestions?
3 people like this
4 responses
@Joey322 (272)
• United States
20 Feb 07
please don't take this the wrong way, but it sounds like you need to be outside with her more often! take her outside on leash and practice commands with her. make sure you are giving off your alpha dog energy to her and make her listen. if you do this enough she will figure it out and you will notice a difference. take care
• United States
20 Feb 07
LOL, I won't take offense, it is true, but as it is freezing and I would have to take my toddler out with us, it's not an option... at least it wasn't till today. It's 60 today, and we were all out this morning.
@nowment (1757)
• United States
20 Feb 07
She needs some outdoor training. It is fine that she has some level of being territorial, she will then protect her area. But she still needs to know that you are in charge. I have two dogs, one listens better than the other, yet the one that doesn't listen as well is behaves better on a leash. His leash training is better than the other dogs. I know that the other dog needs more leash training, but more often that not she is just allowed in the yard to run free. The only way to modify this behavior in her is for me to take the time of putting her on a leash regularlly with proper ground rules and training and eventually she will learn to behave better.
2 people like this
@Jshean20 (14349)
• Canada
24 Feb 07
My dog is the same way! I think if dogs spend a lot of time indoors, they just get too excited upon stepping outside and decide that it's totally OK to misbehave. I know that a lot of dogs need more exercise than others (labs and pitbulls are two that I know of) and so all the running around and jumping could just be a release of energy. Also I've heard that upon getting fixed, dogs become less territorial (that's if you think this is a territorial issue).
• Philippines
20 Feb 07
my dog was like that before, then a friend told me that i try to make my baby get used going out, so i always walk her out, then there comes the changes. she's used at the outdoors that she's not that territorial and she's also well behaved in front of the public eyes. and i was so happy about it. why don't you try what i did, it just might work. dogs do get territiorial and that's a natural thing, but once they get used og getting outdoors, they'd quit doing it because they will be familiarized already with the place.