Aggressive behaviors in any dog can be a sign that he is trying to tell you something. It’s dog speak or the way a dog communicates. Other dogs understand it, but we humans usually don’t know why a chihuahua is aggressive. Communication between dogs and their humans generally ends in miscommunications.
But, it doesn’t have to be that way because you and I are not completely left in the dark. What we consider aggressive behavior usually starts as very subtle behaviors.
In the beginning, you might not even notice that your Chihuahua is trying to tell you something. If you asked your dog why did you do that? More often than not he would tell you “my human made me do it!” Your job is to know why your Chihuahua is aggressive.
For instance, say your dog is making a low growling sound. If your Chihuahua is uncomfortable, long before he begins the low growling he will use other behaviors to try to tell you he is uncomfortable. Things such as:
- avoidance
- yawns
- evasion of eye contact
- lowered body posture
- pulling ears back
- rolling on his back
I know, they will roll on their back when they simply want a belly rub too. But you will know the difference between asking for a belly rub and trying to tell you he is uncomfortable. It’s usually while you are petting him and he rolls over on his back that he’s asking for a belly rub.
Reasons for Chihuahua aggression doesn’t have to be a big secret. All these behaviors could be a sign that he is guarding a toy, or he might be afraid and is trying to tell you, “that scares me, go away”. He might be in pain and saying, “that hurts, please stop”.
If none of the more subtle behaviors work, he may feel forced to resort to more aggressive behaviors like growling, snarling (curling his lip), or even biting.
Why Are Chihuahuas Aggressive?
When your Chihuahua growls, what is your first thought? “That’s unacceptable!”, “My Chi is just mean”, or even “oh isn’t that cute, he’s trying to protect me”? But, what should you be thinking?
Look at it from his point of view. Think about this. Dogs are expected to just deal with all the situations they are put in, whether to him they are annoying, terrifying, or intimidating. This without ever expressing annoyance, fear, apprehension, or discomfort using their natural canine communication tools. If you think about it, it’s no wonder your Chihuahua may become aggressive
We love our dogs and give them what they consider valuable resources — delicious food, wonderful toys and chew objects, comfortable furniture to sit or lie on — and then we tell them that they are not to covet these things. They are not to use their natural canine way of guarding these things.
If they do dare to try to communicate using the more subtle body language mentioned above, we, not understanding what he is trying to tell us, ignore those signs until he feels forced to escalate to more aggressive means, such as growling, snarling, or even snapping.
Sure, we can’t know for sure exactly what our dog is trying to say, but we are supposed to be the more intelligent species. It’s our job, not theirs to do our best in understanding dog speak. Scientists have come a long way in this direction and we need to educate ourselves so we can better communicate with our dogs.
We can usually come pretty close to figuring out what he is saying to us and hopefully respond appropriately.
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