How to Handle a Dog Fight: Prevention, Intervention, and Safety
Dog fights are a stressful and potentially dangerous situation. Here’s a breakdown of what to know, including preventative measures, how to break up a fight, and ensuring your own safety.
Understanding Why Dogs Fight
- Territory: Dogs can be fiercely protective of their perceived space.
- Possessions: Food, toys, or other valued items can trigger possessive aggression.
- Overstimulation: Playful interactions can escalate into fights.
- Dislike: Some dogs simply don’t get along and may clash.
- Fear: A fearful dog may lash out aggressively in self-defense.
How to Break Up a Dog Fight (Safely)
- Stay Calm: Panicking can make the dogs more agitated.
- Distraction: Loud noises (clapping, air horn, etc.), water from a hose, or citronella spray can disrupt the fight.
- Barriers: Objects like a board, chair, or blanket can separate the dogs.
- The Wheelbarrow Method: Requires two people. Each grabs a dog’s back legs, lifting them up and backward while turning away from the other dog.
- Avoid Direct Contact: Do NOT try to grab dogs by their collars or put yourself between them.
Important: Assess the seriousness of the fight before intervening. If the situation is too dangerous, prioritize your own safety.
Preventing Dog Fights
- Know Your Dog: Understand their triggers and reactions. Avoid putting them in tense situations.
- Training: Teach your dog strong obedience commands and socialize them properly.
- Read Body Language: Learn to recognize signs of tension in your dog and others.
- Supervision: Don’t leave your dog unsupervised around unfamiliar dogs.
After a Fight
- Separate the Dogs: Take them away from each other and allow them to calm down.
- Check for Injuries: Even seemingly minor wounds can be serious. Take your dog to the vet immediately.
- Address the Cause: Work with a trainer or behaviorist to prevent future fights.
Key Takeaways
- Prevention is better than intervention. Understanding your dog’s behavior and triggers is crucial.
- If a fight breaks out, try to stay calm and use distraction methods first.
- Never put yourself in danger. If a fight is too intense, call for professional help.
- Seek veterinary care for your dog after a fight, even for minor injuries.
Remember, safety is paramount for both you and the dogs involved. By understanding the reasons for aggression and learning safe intervention techniques, you can better handle these challenging situations.
Reasons Behind Dogs Fighting
Dogs don’t start fighting without any reason. It has been studied that many reasons trigger dogs to begin fighting with each other.
Fight Over Territory
Dogs are like humans in many ways. Like humans can’t bear it when someone enters their territory without permission, dogs also get furious when they see some unknown dog enter their territory. So, yes, fighting over territory is one of the most common reasons for fighting among dogs.
Fight Over the Protection of Their Possession
A fight starts between them when a strange dog comes near or wants to take other dogs’ food, treats, and any other possession. Dogs don’t like to share their food or any other possession with anyone else.
Friendly Fight Turns into a Scary One
The friendly fight between dogs is regular. That’s how they play with each other. But sometimes, because of overstimulation, these close fights turn into scary and dangerous fights.
Not Liking or Getting Along with Each Other
A dog doesn’t like other dogs for many reasons. Sometimes, a dog doesn’t like how the other dog behaves or how it smells. And these not enjoying and get along with each other ofter results into a fight between the dogs.
Fight Over the Sense of Fear
Some dogs start barking at other dogs over their sense of fear. This barking gets aggressive if the other dog doesn’t get away, which sometimes leads to a fight between the two dogs.
How to Stop a Dog Fight?
Being a dog owner, it’s your responsibility to keep your dog safe. Many times, you will see your dogfighting with other dogs, and you should know things beforehand to bring your dog out of the fight at that time. Here are a few ways in which you can stop your dog fight.
Spray the Fighting Dogs Down
If the dogs are fighting in a garden, you can spray water from a garden hose on dogs, especially on their eyes and head, to distract them from the fight.
Also, dog owners are advised to carry citronella sprays like vinegar spray with them. Dogs don’t like the smell of citronella spray, and it will be beneficial in distracting them from the fight.
The Wheelbarrow Method
Many surveys suggest that The Wheelbarrow Method is one of the best methods to stop a fight between doggies. In this method, two people are required.
These two people will grab the back leg of their respective dogs and will pull the dogs away from one another. When dogs get separated from each other, the two people will turn into a circle while continuing to back each other from the other dog.
In this way, the fight between the dogs will stop, and even the people carrying the dogs will not get hurt.
Create a Lot of Noise
When fights between dogs are not very intense, sounds like horns from the car will be enough to bring distraction in the fight. Make sure not to shout or scream around the fighting dogs; otherwise, this shouting and screams will intensify the fight between doggies.
Strategically Using Objects
When it looks like you can’t get the dogs away by yourself, you can use some objects to stop the fight. For example, try to place chairs or laundry baskets on top of them to separate the dogs. You can also strategically throw a blanket over a dog to bring distraction in the fight. And it will give you a chance to separate the dogs safely.
How to Tell if a Dog Fight is Serious?
Dogs are dangerous when they fight. One can hurt or even kill the other dog if the fight gets much more severe. The attacker’s dog doesn’t bark or scream much in serious fights, while the victim’s doggy will scream a lot.
You can tell the fight between dogs is getting severe when dogs have started biting and hitting each other badly, and the fight has become a scary one even to watch.
How to Prevent Fighting Between Dogs?
Dogs are friendly social animals. Humans very much love them. But sometimes dogs don’t behave, and they start fighting with each other. But there is always a solution. And hence here are a few ways in which you can prevent fighting between dogs.
Know Your Dog and its Reaction
Every dog is different, so you need to know how your doggy responds to different situations. If your dog doesn’t like to socialize, try not to bring him in contact with other dogs. Try to avoid outing if your dog is aggressive. Or you can try to improve their behavior by giving them proper training.
Behavioral Training and Therapies
Just like you train your dog how to come when the command is given, you can also provide your dog behavioral training, which will stop him from getting into contact with other dogs.
With the help of a dog trainer, you can teach and train your dog to listen to your commands in any situation. So, when your dog gets into a fight, you can stop him by giving commands. Though such type of training takes a lot of time and patience, it is worth taking your time.
Read the Body Language of Your Dog
Reading the body language of a dog is a tough thing to do. If you see your dog anything like Cowering, Licking lips, Exaggerated yawning, Turning away, Tail tucking, standing straight out, flickering, flattened ears, your dog might get aggressive and start a fight.
So, it is essential to take your dog away as soon as you notice such things done by your dog.
What Steps are to Be Taken after Breaking Up the Fight Between Dogs?
Knowing what steps to take once your dog has stopped fighting is essential. Here are a few steps you should take once the fight between dogs has stopped.
Take the Dog Away from the Fighting Area
After the fight between dogs has been broken down, the first thing you have to do is take the dogs away from each other and give them time to calm down. After they get calm, don’t release them near each other again. Taking each dog to their house is the best thing to do.
Take Your Dog to the Veterinarian Immediately
Take your dog immediately to the vet and contact a vet directly, even if some minor injury has been done to your dog. Many times dog bites are not noticeable, so it is imperative to take your dog immediately to the vet.
Learn About Your Dog’s Nature and Behavior
Prevention is always better. Try to know what triggers your dog to fight and try not to put your dog in that situation in the future to avoid any fighting.
What if You are Unable to Stop Fighting between Dogs?
Some dog fights are terrifying and dangerous, and if you try to break the battle, you will end up hurting yourself badly. Sometimes even your dog might attack you. So, the best thing in that condition will be your judges.
Take judgment on which is best for you and your dog. Remember, dogs can be turned into hazardous animals sometimes. So always know your physical limitations and don’t do anything to put yourself at risk.
Owning a dog is not as easy as it seems. There will be many difficulties you have to face, and fighting between your dog and others is one of them. So, you need to know how to stop a dog fight. And always be prepared. Don’t think you will learn to break up the fight between dogs when that happens. Learn it beforehand and be ready for any circumstance.
