A Unruly Basset Hound

[DogAndCat36]

I really hope that I put this in the right place.
My uncle is planning on getting chickens and he has an unruly basset hound. Just so you know, the dog's name is Gus. Anyway, he brought Gus to my house and didn't leash him, the next moment he is chasing my rooster and tried to maul him. After a minute or so, my uncle tackels Gus and holds his collar but then Gus broke out of his collar and chased a hen, also almost killing her. After some more time, he is finally leashed, good thing is that none of the chickens died. How do I train Gus to not chase chickens?

 

[chickenlittle21]

How old is Gus?

 

[DogAndCat36]

How old is Gus?

I'm not sure. I'll ask my uncle. Gus is definitely an adult thought.

 

[Folly's place]

You won't be training Gus, you won't have him at your house again, right?!
Bassets are tough and 'self right', and not easy to train to do anything they don't want to do, whenever. It's going to be about having excellent fencing, and a very safe coop and run for the chickens. Electric fencing would be good to consider!
Mary

 

[DogAndCat36]

You won't be training Gus, you won't have him at your house again, right?!
Bassets are tough and 'self right', and not easy to train to do anything they don't want to do, whenever. It's going to be about having excellent fencing, and a very safe coop and run for the chickens. Electric fencing would be good to consider!
Mary

I will tell my uncle to not bring Gus here again. I was hoping that I could help my uncle train Gus into not chasing chickens, but if what you are saying is true, I will tell my uncle to make his chickens not free ranged, anyway, he lives in the wood so free-range is not good. He can't use electric fencing thought because a lot of little kids and toddlers are at his house. Thanks.

 

[TonkaTrucker]

We adopted a stray dog who was guessed to be 5 years old with some herding breed in him. He went after our sheep, 100% instinctually trying to get them all in once place, and killed 3 of our chickens.

I spent a lot of time with him on a leash, first with letting one chicken out at a time and correcting him every time he started to ‘lock in’ on the chicken, and ended with him standing in the coop, doing the same thing, until he would just focus on me and completely ignore the chickens.

We’re on year three with him, and haven’t had an incident since *knock on wood*

In fact, I had him beside me on the couch yesterday when I had one of the chicks on my lap. They’re in the wing test stage, and she flapped right up and into his face! I thought that would be too much for any dog, but he just squinted his eyes and looked at me with the big “See mum! I didn’t do nothing!” puppy dog eyes I was very proud of him.

My whole long story is more so to point out that you can teach an old dog new tricks. Basset Hounds are supposed to hunt and flush out the animal. I don’t think they’re bred to kill. Because of his breed, he might be harder to train to listen to you over his instinct, but you *might* get lucky

Photo of my once-bird-killer pleading for my attention

 

[Pixielily]

I will tell my uncle to not bring Gus here again. I was hoping that I could help my uncle train Gus into not chasing chickens, but if what you are saying is true, I will tell my uncle to make his chickens not free ranged, anyway, he lives in the wood so free-range is not good. He can't use electric fencing thought because a lot of little kids and toddlers are at his house. Thanks.

I have 2 dogs. I added chickens recently. Before I let my young pullets into their new yard, I plan to run hot wires 12 inches and 36 inches around the pen. My dogs are already contained in the bigger fenced area with electric fencing, so they will respect the additional "boundaries". It can be very hard to train a dog like Gus to leave livestock alone. Not all dogs are good farm dogs. Mine have watched the growing biddies, but have shown no excitement, just curiosity. However, I m not going to risk my biddies to find out if they would hurt them.

 

[DogAndCat36]

We adopted a stray dog who was guessed to be 5 years old with some herding breed in him. He went after our sheep, 100% instinctually trying to get them all in once place, and killed 3 of our chickens.

I spent a lot of time with him on a leash, first with letting one chicken out at a time and correcting him every time he started to ‘lock in’ on the chicken, and ended with him standing in the coop, doing the same thing, until he would just focus on me and completely ignore the chickens.

We’re on year three with him, and haven’t had an incident since *knock on wood*

In fact, I had him beside me on the couch yesterday when I had one of the chicks on my lap. They’re in the wing test stage, and she flapped right up and into his face! I thought that would be too much for any dog, but he just squinted his eyes and looked at me with the big “See mum! I didn’t do nothing!” puppy dog eyes I was very proud of him.

My whole long story is more so to point out that you can teach an old dog new tricks. Basset Hounds are supposed to hunt and flush out the animal. I don’t think they’re bred to kill. Because of his breed, he might be harder to train to listen to you over his instinct, but you *might* get lucky

Photo of my once-bird-killer pleading for my attention

Well, that's the thing, breeds are breeds, and some times they are a magnet with both sides north or south polarity or north and south polarity. It is best not to risk it, he is always excited and loves to wander.
Also thank you for telling me about your dog, your dogo looks so cute! He reminds me of my old chocolate lab, Moose, sadly he passed away last year. He would always chase the chickens and one day I got so sick of it that I put a baby chick in front of his face while holding him back. He started to sniff the chick like crazy and the chick pecked him in the eye. Moose never bothered them again. Now, Gus, that's a whole new story. Maybe I should tell my uncle to get him fixed.

 

[gimmie birdies]

We have an 8 year old shepherd, and when he was a pup, he would always eat mice, and he would not listen to his training, we saw someone had a class on rattle snakes for dogs, and they used a shock collar, and the dogs were cured of wanting to mess with snakes. We used the collar to train him to not mess with snakes, (using a dead rattle snake, with no head we found on the road) and to teach him to not eat mice. After that we hardly needed to use the collar.

 

[DogAndCat36]

We have an 8 year old shepherd, and when he was a pup, he would always eat mice, and he would not listen to his training, we saw someone had a class on rattle snakes for dogs, and they used a shock collar, and the dogs were cured of wanting to mess with snakes. We used the collar to train him to not mess with snakes, (using a dead rattle snake, with no head we found on the road) and to teach him to not eat mice. After that we hardly needed to use the collar.

My family never uses the shocking method, our rule is that we never use it. If we really need to then we have to shock ourselves to know the pain. No offense.