My dog kills animals. Can high prey drive be corrected or managed?

Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! These behaviors can sometimes be changed or modified and improved. However, this usually requires in person training. I highly recommend that you consider contacting a local dog trainer who can help you in person. This can improve but does require a profesional to help you in person. Good luck and have a great day!

Unfortunately changing a dog's prey drive is very difficult. Even the best of dogs still have instinct take over at times and there isn't much you can do other than make sure the bird and Ptolemy are monitored at all times. You can also find a local trainer and see if they have any advice but in my experience this is very hard to prevent. I'm sorry about your budgie. I hope that helps and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach.

Bringing a kitten into a home with a dog that has high prey drive, especially if that dog has a history of killing small animals like squirrels, etc. can be very dangerous - because of this, I would strongly recommend making an appointment with a veterinary behaviorist who can evaluate your dog in person and help you do this as safely as possible. You will likely need to keep your dog on-leash at all times around the kitten for quite a while, so that you can prevent any chasing and reward calm behavior with treats and praise. The kitten and dog should never be loose together when you aren't home, or when you aren't able to supervise. You can search for a board-certified veterinary behaviorist who can help you in person here: www.dacvb.org

It sounds like Cece has serious aggression issues, and I would not recommend bringing another animal into the house if she killed your last cat. She will need professional behavioral training if there is to be any hope for having another animal in those, and I highly recommend hiring a behavioral expert to work with her. You can ask your vet for a recommendation, but please keep in mind that aggression is a very difficult behavior to work with, and even training may not be successful. I would not bring another animal into the house unless the behavioral expert says it is ok to do so. Otherwise, you may have to accept you cannot have other animals around Cece.

Hi there. Chasing and killing chickens is an extremely self-rewarding behavior for dogs, so punishing her afterwards will not be effective at fixing the problem. In many dogs, this behavior can be significantly improved by teaching her to voluntarily look away from the chickens to get a treat - you have to start with lots of distance, and go very slowly in order for this to work. Even then, she may never be able to be trusted around them off-leash. If this is something you want to work on, I would recommend getting in touch with a good reward-based trainer who can help you in person. You can search for one in your area here: www.ccpdt.org In the meantime, Penny should be kept completey separated from the chickens using a secure fence, a leash, etc. to prevent any further problems.

Sadly, this is nearly impossible to train away. It's a situation where nature trumps nurture. If you want to try, I'd recommend working with her instead of sit, laydown, and watch me commands. Once she's amazing at them inside, take her to an indoor public place to get good there, then an outdoor place with no animals, and then out in to the general world. Once she's really really solid with those basic commands you can use them to try to get her attention before she sees the chicken or cat. In the mean time, don't let her practice this behavior (ie keep her on leash at all times and calmly but quickly remove her from the chickens or cats if she starts to go crazy). It's a very uphill battle, so good luck!

Good morning. I hate to say this but, this type of behavior will be difficult to correct as long as the cat continues to run from Luna. If she didn't run it wouldn't be "fun" to chase her. The cat running away brings out the prey drive in dogs. My honest suggestion is that you get the help of a professional dog trainer. You need to have a trainer come to your house to assess the situation and then make training recommendations/modifications. This will give you the quickest resolution. I suggest you contact Bark Busters. They have a trainer in your area. http://www.barkbusters.com/dog-training-sanfrancisco I am fairly certain they do a free in-home consult and then you go from there and cost is determined by how much work needs to be done. Of course you can contact any trainer you wish just be sure they do in-home training. Hope this helps.