19/11/2025
Even the most social of multi dog households has a conflict from time to time. When dogs have a disagreement that might mean growling.
One of the biggest mistakes you can make is punishing that growl, intentionally or unintentionally. We'll get to what you should do in a second. First though, I wanted to talk about dogs who act without an easily heard auditory warning like a growl. Sometimes they even give limited other body language, if any at all, making it difficult to deescalate conflict. For these dogs, getting that growl is worthy of the party of all parties. Counterintuitive. I know. But hear me out.
My dog Fish is one of those dogs. If he made a sound at all, it was already in movement to take action about a conflict. Whether that was with my other male dog or an issue with body handling. That was just how he came into the world. Act first, act decisively, no time for thought. Luckily on the scale of things, his actions were pretty inhibited, and the high risk situations were readily identifiable. Sometimes you get none of that either, which is a whole different ball game.
Getting this dog to a place where he growls loudly and audibly and chooses to move away as his first action was a journey. It was a veterinary behaviorist, medical treatment, support from other professionals, safety measures like muzzle training, and a whole lot of responding consistently with space, celebration, and support in reaction to whatever warning/action he did take. Even when that action was 90lbs of muzzled German Shepherd aiming to muzzle punch my face 0-60 while tending to his allergy infected feet. Even when it was growl/move/bite(minor scrape) to my older male dog's face in the pitch black of my bedroom in a split second. That's tough y'all, it's human to have your own reaction to that and it took a lot of self control to breathe, thank him, and support him instead. It was not easy and it was not fast.
But today. Today Fish growls, loud, and long enough to summon help. Because we showed him again and again and again what would happen if he told us something about being uncomfortable or angry. We would ensure that whatever upset him would stop. We would add a food thank you on top. We would show him how to choose space. We would support him with what he needed after, whether that was something social with us or an activity to go recover. Because we supported and celebrated this dog telling us his feelings, he tells us more, he tells us longer and he tells us more softly. He didn't come hardwired for that, but he could learn, and we could build the trust he needed to consider it.
My older dog Zeke has Cognitive Canine Dysfunction. He now creates some really WEIRD social interactions that can freak Fish out. On top of that he's deaf, so he can't even hear Fisher's growl and doesn't really take in the body language that is telling him to back off either. Zeke got weird today. I didn't know. But Fish growled, loud and long, and he got up from the couch to move away. So I got up, and I body blocked Zeke, thanked Fisher in a cheery voice and sent him to his crate. Closed the door, and then used our gates to block Zeke from coming back into the room. Then Fish and I had a party with big treat scatters, happy praise, his favorite head rubs, and some personal play. I made a big deal about it, because it is! Fish kept Zeke safe and my multi dog household harmonious by communicating. Growls are GREAT!!!
Now luckily for most of you, most dogs actually make quite the show of communication during conflict. You don't have to devise a way to help them tell you more, they're already telling you. All you have to do is not break that signal by accident. Having a thriving multi dog household doesn't mean no growling. It means growling that STOPS at growling. It means dogs who either have the social skills/ enough positive feelings toward the other dog to navigate low level conflict reasonably on their own, or who know that their people are coming to help if they raise the alarm. To get the latter, you start consistently supporting the dog who growled by helping them get and maintain space, and just thanking them for telling you, whether that's praise or food, or snuggle, or play. While at the same time, keeping an eye out for trends of why growling is happening and making proactive changes to prevent regular conflict. Those changes could be management, thoughtful bonding activities for the dogs, training skills, or just generally being a better support and guide for them in tough situations. Maybe even all of the above!
So what do you think? Have you ever supported your dog's growl? Maybe an earlier signal (even better!) ?
ID: Image of two cartoon dogs facing each other with one growling "grrr" and a person rushing in to help. A large text banner reads "In this house we celebrate and support the growl!!". The Wise Mind Canine Logo is on the image.
