Training aggressive dogs is not always fun, but is certainly necessary, and the hard work will pay off many times over in the end when you have a much more placid and manageable dog that you can really bond with and enjoy your time together with.

All dogs have the ability to be aggressive and although some breeds with be more temperamental than others, it tends to be the environment that they grew up in that dictates how aggressive they will be. Most people miss the warnings signs of aggression when the dog is young and so they are allowed to grow into adults with the set of fears and triggers that they had as harmless pups.

Training aggressive dogs is hard work so it is much better if you can stop it at the source when they are young. They may seem small and innocent when they growl at strangers, but they won't look so innocent when they are fully grown!

Each dog will have certain traits that will trigger their aggressive streak, training aggressive dogs is all about desensitizing them to that trigger. Maybe they hate being alone, or maybe they hate people sitting on the sofa next to them etc. Watch your dog and see what causes the aggression.

If you find that everything does - then you need to get in some special help! Hire a trainer who is qualified in training aggressive dogs as the dog has serious problems that need to be addressed. If you can see just one or two specific things then you can probably take action yourself to solve it.

Say your dog gets aggressive when people sit next to them on the sofa, then sit down and when they start to get aggressive then give them a chew toy to play with, that distracts them and changes the experience. The best chew toys are the ones with treats in that they have to get out.

Repeat this again and again, praising good behavior and ignoring bad, slowly they will start to associate people sitting next to them as being good and the aggression will go. You can use the same sort of technique for training aggressive dogs in other situations too, it all about changing their association to what makes them aggressive.