My Dumb Dog

You can pretty much count on every breed of dog to have its own types of behavioral issues that need to be addressed. Luckily for you the German Shepherd is an extremely intelligent breed of dog that would much prefer making its human family happy than almost anything else in the world. Many German Shepherd problem behaviors can be avoided by simply spending time with your German Shepherd and helping it to learn new behaviors to override its instincts.

One instinct that can become a problem later in life is the herding instinct that German Shepherds are born with. They can become protective of their human family with this instinct but it can also make them increasingly aggressive and difficult to control. To offset this you need to socialize your German Shepherd as soon as possible. Get it used to other animals and other people so that when it grows it does not feel threatened by the presence of other animals or other people even near its family.
A German Shepherd needs a lot of attention and if you want to avoid German Shepherd problem behaviors in the future then you need to always keep your German Shepherd active and involved in family things. A bored German Shepherd will probably start to resort to it’s hunting instinct and chase cars, other animals, and people and that can turn into a bad thing. So show your German Shepherd plenty of attention and you should be able to avoid this German Shepherd problem behavior before it can develop into a real problem.

A German Shepherd, by nature, is a working dog and if it does not have some sort of assigned task then it starts to get antsy. Always make your German Shepherd feel like it has important work to do even if that important work is just being the family dog. Left to its own devices it will resort to herding activities and that can escalate quickly to more aggressive behavior so be sure to keep your dog busy.
As protective as German Shepherds can be, and as great a family dog as they can be, it is not a good idea to leave small children alone for any amount of time with a German Shepherd. You will soon learn that one of the main German Shepherd problem behaviors is herding and wandering children could cause the German Shepherd to resort to that instinct. So until you have your Shepherd completely trained to accept the actions of other people avoid having it around the kids too much right away and never leave the German Shepherd alone with small children.

A German Shepherd is intelligent and loyal but just like any other breed it has natural instincts that can sometimes cause problems. A German Shepherd is not a dog you can just tie up in the yard and leave it alone, it will get bored and lonely fast and that can result in bad things. Just be ready to show your dog a lot of love and attention and you should have a happy life with your pet.

You can find helpful German Shepherd training informationby reading article like this one. You can use this article along with dog training books to help train your German Shepherd.