[Dailydrool] Rescued Basset started baying at other dogs

[Dale rutz]

Hello,

We rescued a 5 year old basset hound at our local dog pound 2 months ago.  We've never had one before.  We were looking for a companion for our 6 year old Lab and just fell in love with Snoopy (a red basset) so we took him home.  He is wonderful with our children and (mostly) polite to our Lab.  Initially he was fine with other dogs as well, wagging his tail politely and even fine off lead at the dog park.  However, about 2 weeks after we got him he started barking/howling/lunging at EVERY dog he sees.  He does NOT bite .... but he does lunge and he'll poke other dogs with is nose ... all he does is drool on them but it is quite unnerving and we don't know why or how to get him to stop.  He was neutered at the pound and we're thinking raging hormones could be partly to blame.  He also went through a LOT before we got him.  His owner died a year ago and the family sort of passed him around after that until he door dashed ... at which point they figured they were done.  When animal control picked him up he was skin and bones and when they called the number on the microchip they were told he wasn't welcome back  :-(.  When we took him home and to our vet she found an eye infection, an ear infection, a foot infection, severely underweight, kennel cough, and on and on.  Now 2 months later he is a happy, healthy snuggly, rather HUGE basset hound (not fat, but HUGE) but he's got this other dog thing going.

We're working on it ... we take him to PetCo and PetSmart and practice NOT barking at the other dogs.  We take him to the dog park with the Lab and keep him on lead and we can manage to keep him calm provided no dog comes within about 10 or 15 feet of him.  We remain hopeful that this will pass with time as long as we keep working on it.  

Does anyone have any ideas to help us in helping Snoopy?

Thanks,
Dale