About 3 weeks ago we finally got a dog. He's a rescued 1 1/2 year old German Shepherd. He's a really nice, good dog, but he's still a puppy and has his hyper moments and doesn't have any awareness of where he's putting his paws. As a rescue, he has a few issues, namely lack of training and separation anxiety. Because of this, we've been neglecting our birdies!

 

My husband said to me this morning that I should post here asking for advice on how to have dogs and birds co-exist safely. I had to laugh because how many other people have asked the same question here and I've answered? I wanted to post right away when we got the dog, but I knew it would just have to be a matter of following my own advice.

 

Don't let them out of the cage around the dog until he has a very strong 'leave it' command. It works better with well socialized puppies as opposed to older dogs without experience with other animals. Etc etc

 

So in short, the birds can't be out unless the dog isn't around. And even if he was on a good solid down stay, we can't trust that the birds wouldn't fly over to him. Sure, Baby is flighted and technically could fly away from him, but he's so big that he could just jump up and get her. We would never ever forgive ourselves (or the dog) if anything happened to Baby while she was out, so she hasn't gotten any out of cage time for a long time. The poor girl! We feel so guilty.

 

So put the dog in another room (or the birds) while they're out. The whole separation anxiety thing makes this a rather noisy and annoying thing. So far it hasn't been a destructive thing thankgoodness, but god only knows how long that will last. He HAS to be right by us or he throws a fit.

 

We feel so bad the birds haven't gotten the out of cage time they've been used to. Actually, since we moved, we haven't let them out much at all. Baby was good once she learned the new space, but we haven't had Cupid or Psyche out at all. I fear they're becoming more like aviary birds than companion pets very quickly. *sigh*

The first thing and the best thing you can do is have your new dog enrolled in basic obdience training. Cabela is our 5yr old rescue mini pin whom we adopted in Jan and he started basic training.

 

Shephards are very smart, willing to please dogs but they also need structure by enrolling in him training just basic will do you will find a big improvement.

 

The issue isn't how to get them to co-exist together the issue is the dog knows you are the alpha or top dog and he must respect you, the family and whatever you ask him to (within reason).

 

I hope that helps.

Would it be possible to take the dog out side or take your budgies out in one room like your bedrom when you might just be relaxing on your bed or reading or something like that instead of the whole house.

You'll have to get him over his seperation anxiety. Try putting him an another room from you for a very short time, as soon as he stops whimpering, open the door and reward and and cuddle him and tell him what a good doggy he is for being so quiet. Repeat this a few time a day, making sure to only ever open the door, when he is quiet and when he is quiet reward him instantly. Over time, you can increase the length of leaving in a seperate room, by waiting just that little bit longer after he has been quiet before you reward him. If he goes quiet and then makes noise, do not reward him, or he will think you are rewarding him for making noise and he will get confused. Just continue this and lengthen the time each day.

In general only pay attention to him when he is behaving and when he is quiet and calm, then he will learn to be calm.

Hope that helps.

Cabela had bad separation anxiety and the one thing about rescuse is you simply don't know what happened. Who abused him or why etc... Cabela was a puppymill stud rescue and he is frightens easily with fast movement and men.

 

For his separation anxiety whenever I saw him laying on his own outside or by himself in the house I let him be or would say good boy and continue what I was doing.

 

How bad is the separation anxiety? Going to basic training they will give you the support you need to help you through the trials and trubulations so to speak.

 

Rescuing any animal is a wonderful thing to do but comes with baggage on the animals part. These animals need our patience and complete understanding. .

My suggestions:

 

Step 1 STOP FEELING GUILTY! The dog is a new addition to your family and will need adjusting to. You are doing what is best for the birds safety at this point.

 

Step 2 Work on the dog now as a young one to stop the separation anxiety. Read up on techniques and such to stop this. One of the most important is not making a big fuss of the dog when you first come home/ into the room. Once 10 mins or the dog has settled down give him a hello pat/cuddle. Also no big goodbyes pat,talks,kisses, makes so it is not a big deal when you come and go.

 

Also you may not realize but you go though a routine when you are getting to go out. Think about your steps and re-inact the routine but then don't leave, some dogs with separation anxiety get really worked up seeing this routine and mixing it up if the pattern retults in your leaving or not makes it meaningless to the dog.

 

Once this has been deal with (and it may take a while) you can start to work in the dog and birds together idea.

Edited July 6, 200717 yr by Nerwen

A beautiful dobermann rescue dog I once owned had separation anxiety. He looked for signs I was going out too, like Nerwen said. If he saw me sitting to put on shoes, he would come and sit on my feet so I couldnt and he was without a doubt, the largest Dobermann I have ever had...so sitting on my feet was a big deal. In the end I kept work shoes and socks in the car, drove to work barefoot and put them on when I got there.

I also adopted the approach of not greeting the minute I got home, so excitable and loud behaviour was NOT rewarded and once he got quiet and gave him special time.

Shane started training this past Monday, so that's already started and it has helped a bit too. If nothing else, its helping teach my husband how to deal with him. I've had a lot of experience with dog training and behavioral issues, so I know all about how to desensitize them to separation anxiety and our comings and goings. He does well at times, and not so good at other times. He's learning that we can go to the bathroom and he doesn't ahve to be *RIGHT* with us. He's learning who's in charge and that the birds are off limits rather well too.

 

The first night we had him, Baby made some noise and he put his paws up by her cage to investigate. He got a very stern talking to about it. A few days later we were playing fetch with him and the toy went over by the birdcage. We have boxes stacked along the wall from moving still and the cage is on top of them. He started nosing around them and kind of climbing up looking for the toy. He got to the area where Baby is and he paused and looked over at Jared to see if he was going to get in trouble before he put all 4 paws back on the floor and left her alone. It was VERY impressive!

 

I've let him sniff Baby while she was encased in my hands and he was fine. I'm just worried that he'll think she's a squeak toy if she's out by herself. Thank you for enforcing that we're doing the right thing by keeping them safe over having more freedom. I'm feeling bad because I haven't been doing simple things like working with Cupid and Psyche in their cage or changing their toys and furniture around though. That's just something I'll have to make a committment to do if I'm that bothered by it.

 

And yeah, I could take Baby downstairs with me while I'm doing laundry and keep the dog upstairs. Or a million other things. I think talking about it might help keep it in the front of my mind so I'm more likely to do it. Things are just so different now, with a house and a yard and a dog to take care of in addition to the birds (and the reptiles!) that I really am going to have to make an effort to do the right things.

 

Thank you for your support and suggestions!!

Well you have a good handle on it. As you know shephards are very protective and their are bred to be with their human. So a lot of this is already in the breed. Yes they have to be independent but you have look at the bred. My husky a very independent breed could care less about our coming and going but Cabela does care he is a companion dog. So when I talk to people about dogs I always say remember what they were bred to do that helps understanding that individual dog.

Shane is quite the shepherd in his actions. Once I've gotten used to him pacing and stuff, I can let him do his thing and it makes me smile. Sometimes it drives me crazy though. I wish he'd just lay down and relax! *L* It would be nice if he could learn how to see the birds as part of his herd to protect too. *L*

 

I took Baby into my room while I was putting away laundry and made Shane stay out. He whined for about a minute and then I remembered to praise him. I opened the door expecting him to be right there, but he wasn't! I called out that he was a good dog anyway. Then he came back and whined again. *L* But as soon as he quieted down I praised him again and he remained quiet for the rest of the time. I poked my head out and told him he was a good boy a few more times.

 

I made it a point to spend some time with all the birds this afternoon and I rearranged and cleaned all the cages and put up some new toys. I discovered that Baby LOVES jingle balls! So a fun in-cage activity we can do is play catch with her. I really should make it a point to spend more time with Cupid and Psyche because they didn't seem as nervous as they usually have been when I change their cage around. Maybe they liked the attention.*L*

 

A few good things that have come of moving to the house is that they can make noise all they want and it feel SOOOO much less annoying than it used to in the apt. Also, we have a great deck that we're able to take them outside on. They really seem to like hearing their voices outside and they just eat up the fresh air and sunshine. They don't get out every day, but it would be another simple thing I can do most days if I just put my mind to it.

how wonderful, it is a relief to know you don't have to worry about the noise your birds make for sure :budgiedance:.

 

Time will settle him down, he will get used to the birds and will either ignore them or protect them.

 

My girlfriend has a shephard and they also have a rabbit. They have co-existed together with no issues but she of course is always in the room and watchful. Me on the other hand would never let my husky and a rabbit together that would be diaster on the rabbits part.

 

Keep us updated, by the way if you have pics of him I would love to see him in off-topic. Shephards are one of my favorite breeds.