As a background, we have a 2+ yr old lab/shepherd mix who we found as a stray when he was 4 months old. He is healthy and neutered. He is a loving, happy, very docile and quite submissive guy who has been well socialized and trained since the day we got him. He loves all dogs, and people and he socializes with both a lot.
I work from home so he is with me all day, every day. I go out of course for errands, gym etc but we are together a lot and I imagine he sees me as the pack leader in the house. My wife works and comes home at the end of a normal work day. He is very close to her as well and probably shows more "affection" towards her than he does me. Typically, if one of us is not here when we normally are, he will hang out by the door rather than in the family room waiting for that person to come home.
Yesterday due to a family illness, I had to leave the house at 1:00 in the afternoon. My wife got home at 5, took Bailey for a walk, played with him, fed him, the usual. Afterwards he spent the rest of the night waiting for me, by the front door.
While she was watching tv, she noticed he was chewing on a piece of paper or something that he'd taken out of the trash can in my office. She went over to him to try and take it and he growled at her and snapped. She did what I thought was the right thing and corrected him with a loud "no". She moved to take the paper away again and the same thing happened. She then backed off into the other room and called him to come. He did, she praised him for that and then went and got the piece of paper with no further incident.
She was very upset when I got home, one reason being that she got scared but more so because her feelings were hurt that he did it.
After some research online last night and this morning I think we came to the conclusion that he was already stressed out about me not being there all day and into the evening and that the growl was his attempt to vent some of his stress.
My questions are: Does anyone agree on why he might have done this and if it were to ever happen again, what is the correct course of action to take?
Sorry for the length of my first post here!
I work from home so he is with me all day, every day. I go out of course for errands, gym etc but we are together a lot and I imagine he sees me as the pack leader in the house. My wife works and comes home at the end of a normal work day. He is very close to her as well and probably shows more "affection" towards her than he does me. Typically, if one of us is not here when we normally are, he will hang out by the door rather than in the family room waiting for that person to come home.
Yesterday due to a family illness, I had to leave the house at 1:00 in the afternoon. My wife got home at 5, took Bailey for a walk, played with him, fed him, the usual. Afterwards he spent the rest of the night waiting for me, by the front door.
While she was watching tv, she noticed he was chewing on a piece of paper or something that he'd taken out of the trash can in my office. She went over to him to try and take it and he growled at her and snapped. She did what I thought was the right thing and corrected him with a loud "no". She moved to take the paper away again and the same thing happened. She then backed off into the other room and called him to come. He did, she praised him for that and then went and got the piece of paper with no further incident.
She was very upset when I got home, one reason being that she got scared but more so because her feelings were hurt that he did it.
After some research online last night and this morning I think we came to the conclusion that he was already stressed out about me not being there all day and into the evening and that the growl was his attempt to vent some of his stress.
My questions are: Does anyone agree on why he might have done this and if it were to ever happen again, what is the correct course of action to take?
Sorry for the length of my first post here!