Dog & chinchilla stare down

Okay well, we just brought our dog inside the house, because he used to be an outside dog but he got lonely, but the problem is that we have a chinchilla thats been here longer and the dog constantly stares at the chinchilla to no end, we thought it...

would stop after a week , but now we have to use an electric fence. What should we do !?

First...remember a dog is a prey animal...so all you're seeing is his instincts coming forward...Chinchilla's move fast, have that rodenty look...and in a dog's eyes, he sees dinner.

What I'd do (and I did do this with our cat aggressive Rot/Pit cross)...start out with the Chinchilla in a cage on the floor, your dog on a leash. You can tell the difference in a dog who's looking at dinner and one who is simply curious. Intense STARING, or FIXATING equals dinner...the second he moves from curiosity to fixation...say SHHT or HEY!, and jerk his collar...this breaks his thought process. You're going to have to stay right there, and work with him, to let him know that the hunter part of him is going to have to take second place to YOUR wishes.

Say in a couple of days of doing this exercise over and over...like 3 or 4 times a day, have someone hold the chinchilla, to protect it, and let him sniff it...a dog who's sniffing is curious...and curiosity is ok...don't be tense, just vigilent to the dogs eyes...if his nose stops moving correct him with the leash and collar.

This doesn't mean that the Chin and the dog should be left to run the house together alone, but it could mean an easier coexistance while you are there...there did come a time in our Rot/Pit's life that she and the cat finally got to be great buddies...but we made sure first, thru lots of time spent watching their interactions, before we ever let the cat be unprotected or alone with Ruby.

phrannie

hmmm, big problem

no @*(!(!(! , really? thanks for the help