During resource-guarding, dogs exhibit components of ritualized aggression. That is, they have a fairly explicit hierarchy of warnings – accelerated eating, cessation of eating or “freezing up,” glassy/hard eyes, growling, lip lifting, snapping, biting – that they’ll run through to get a competitor (YOU!) to back away from what they have. They’re nervous that you’re there and don’t want to share.
Trainers and behaviorists take these warnings and apply a rating scale, ranging from reactions that pose no risk to humans to those that are extremely serious. A rough eight-level guide is useful for owners and trainers to assess the situation but some dogs don’t follow such a neat hierarchal scale. A dog can move from a growl to a serious bite in a matter of seconds.
Trainers often hear the cry, “he bit without warning!” More often than not, there was a warning, somewhere, sometime – we just missed it.
For more advice on how to recognize the signs of resource-guarding and ways to reduce, eliminate and prevent it, purchase Whole Dog Journal’s ebook Resource Guarding.
Last week’s blog post was about the Australian Cattle Dog-mix pup I was fostering, and the effect he’s apparently had on Otto, my usually perfectly behaved dog. Otto usually mentors and guides my foster dogs and puppies, and is generally an endless font of patience and good humor. But this puppy – and I use the term loosely, because he’s somewhere between 10 months and a year old, but still possessed of many puppy-like qualities – this puppy had seemingly inspired Otto to misbehave in all sorts of odd ways. He chewed up some shoes, repeatedly dug a trench around a favorite orange tree in my yard, kept getting caught chasing the cats – and on one notable occasion, for the first time in his life, took off after a deer when we were out on a walk in a local wildlife area and didn’t “leave it” or immediately come back when I called him. He’s scared up many a deer or jackrabbit on our hikes (as well as feral cats and one time, a skunk, on our walks along the river that runs through our town), but since his first few months with us as an adolescent youngster himself, hasn’t given chase for more than a few dozen yards before responding to my calls of “Otto,off! Otto, HERE!” Given that we live in a relatively wildlife-rich area, in those early days, we worked on that “emergency recall” several times a day for MONTHS, and I’ve always regarded it as rock-solid. It was, until Diamond the foster-pup arrived.
Right after I wrote that blog post and sent it to our publishing headquarters for the tech guys to post it, I had a cup of coffee and thought again about the whole issue of Otto’s sudden malfeasance. And it hit me like a bolt of lightning: DUH – he’s stressed! This puppy has just really pushed his stress buttons, and all these ways he’s misbehaving are a result of his increased stress levels! Poor Otto!
A number of different authors have written about stress and its effects on dogs for WDJ; I’ve counseled dozens of friends about the signs of stress their dogs exhibited; and I just didn’t recognize it in my own dog. Granted, he hasn’t been walking around yawning or panting or looking in any way different than he usually does. But I should have seen that his misbehaviors were signs of stress in themselves.
What’s so stressful? Mainly, the pup – a teenager, really – has a really annoying way of fawning all over Otto. He constantly jumps up and licks at Otto’s lips like a very young, deferent puppy, and “does the worm” alongside Otto – wriggling wildly along the ground with his tail wagging wildly. A friend of mine used to use the expression “writhing and flopping” – this describes Diamond perfectly, at least, when he’s near Otto. He more or less ignores Tito the Chihuahua.
Now that I’m looking for it, I see that the effect of this exaggerated behavior does seem to wear on Otto. He’s ordinarily very patient with puppies, if not exactly warm and fuzzy with them. But Diamond gets on his nerves, and he frequently growls and snaps at Diamond (albeit with his tail wagging and seemingly without totally losing his temper). He never hurts Diamond, but it seems like he’s saying, “Seriously, dude, get OFF of me! Leave me ALONE!”
My son watched the two dogs together for about five minutes and commented, “Diamond is aggressively submissive.” It’s an apt description. I’m going to have to consult some behaviorists. Is that a thing?
Well, tests have confirmed that the stress of this relationship was definitely responsible for Otto’s misbehaviors. Last Monday, the foster went off to a prospective home for three days. Otto was absolutely his former self. No chewing, no cat-chasing, no digging, perfect recall. I mentally chastised myself for not “getting it” sooner, and apologized to Otto for taking him and his role in my foster-dog program for granted.
Then the puppy got returned (the young, idealistic girl who fell in love with his picture realized she didn’t have as much time as she needed to work on the formerly feral puppy’s many issues). Now I’m taking care to give Otto some time apart from Diamond every day. For at least a few hours, I let him stay home with my husband while I go to the office with Diamond and Tito. I give Otto some indoor time when Diamond is outside and vice versa. And when a friend came to visit with her dog over the weekend, we took Otto and her dog for a long hike without the annoying puppy, twice. On the first walk, I carried super high-value treats and a long line, in case I needed to go back to square one with Otto’s recall. We kept the dogs very close to us on the trail with frequent recalls and bits of heeling, and rewarded them richly for “checking in” (turning around and looking at us when they got more than a few dozen yards ahead on the trail). I relaxed a bit on the second day, letting Otto get farther ahead or behind on the trail — and when he did see and start to chase a rabbit, and I called “Otto, Off! Otto, HERE!”, he *immediately* left the chase and raced back to me, tail high and eyes sparkling, his old self again.
I hope to place Diamond in a good home as soon as possible, but in the meantime, I’ll be paying more attention to Otto’s mental health, too. Sorry, Otto, and thanks again.
Counter-conditioning involves changing your dog’s association with a scary or arousing stimulus from negative to positive. Desensitization is starting with a very low-level intensity of aversive stimulus until the dog habituates to (or changes his association with) the aversive, and then gradually increasing the strength until the dog is comfortable with the stimulus at full intensity. The easiest way to give most dogs a positive association and to help them become comfortable with a stimulus is with very high-value, really yummy treats. I like to use chicken – canned, baked, or boiled; most dogs love chicken. Here’s how the CC&D process works.
1. Determine the distance at which your dog can be in the presence of another dog and be alert or wary but not extremely fearful or aroused. This is called the threshold distance.
2. With you holding your dog on leash, have a helper present a neutral dog at threshold distance X. (Alternatively, station yourself and your dog at a location where people pass by with their dogs on leash at threshold distance X.) The instant your dog sees the other dog, start feeding bits of chicken, non-stop.
3. After several seconds, have the helper remove the dog, and stop feeding chicken to your dog.
4. Keep repeating steps 1-3 until the presentation of the dog at that distance consistently causes your dog to look at you with a happy smile and a “Yay! Where’s my chicken?” expression. This is a conditioned emotional response (CER) – your dog’s association with the other dog at threshold distance X is now positive instead of negative.
5. Now you need to increase the intensity of the other-dog stimulus. You can do that by decreasing distance by several inches; by increasing the amount of time the neutral dog stays in sight; by increasing movement of the other dog at distance X; by increasing the number of dogs (two or three dogs, instead of one); or increasing the visual “threat” (a large dog instead of a small one, or allowing the neutral dog to make brief eye contact). I’d suggest decreasing distance first in small increments by moving the reactive dog closer to the location where the neutral dog will appear, achieving the CER at each new distance.
6. Then return to distance X and add intensity of the neutral dog, gradually decreasing distance and attaining CERs along the way, until your dog is delighted to have the neutral dog reasonably close.
7. Now, back to distance X, increase intensity again, by having your helper move more quickly with the neutral dog, have the dog do more vigorous behaviors – roll over, catch a ball, etc.
8. Repeat until you have the CER, then gradually increase the length of time you have your dog in the presence of the increased-intensity neutral dog, until he’s happy (but not aroused) to have it present continuously.
9. Begin decreasing distance in small increments, moving the dog closer to the stimulus, obtaining the CER consistently at each new distance.
10. When your dog is happy to have the higher intensity neutral dog stimulus close to him, you’re ready for the final phase. Return to distance X and obtain your CER there, with a full intensity neutral dog – zigzagging toward him, then approaching head-on. Gradually decrease distance until your dog is happy to be in the presence of other dog, regardless of that dog’s behavior. He now thinks the other dog is a very good thing, as a reliable predictor of very yummy treats.
The more intense the reactive dog’s response, the more challenging the behavior is to modify. A fear response is more challenging to modify than an excitement response. True anxieties and phobias generally require a greater commitment to a longer term and more in-depth modification program than less intense fear-based behaviors (see “How an Intense Behavior Modification Program Saved One Puppy’s Life”).
With your dog sitting at your side, hold her food bowl at chest level, and tell her to “wait.” Move the bowl (with food it in, topped with tasty treats) toward the floor 4 to 6 inches. If your dog stays sitting, click your clicker and feed her a treat from the bowl. If your dog gets up, say “Oops!” and ask her to sit again. If she remains sitting, lower the bowl 4 to 6 inches again, click and treat.
Repeat this step several times until she consistently remains sitting as you lower the bowl. Gradually move the bowl closer to the floor with succeeding repetitions until you can place it on the floor without your dog trying to get up or eat it. Finally, place the bowl on the floor and tell her to eat. After she has had a few bites, lift the bowl up and try again, lowering the bowl a little farther this time. Repeat these steps until you can place the bowl on the floor in one motion and she doesn’t move until you tell her she can.
Generalize the “Wait” to other training scenarios by controlling the delivery of the reinforcer. For example, for “wait at the door,” have your dog sit and wait while you move your hand toward the door a few inches, click and treat. If she gets up, say Oops!” and have her sit again while you move your hand toward the door one inch. Click and treat. Gradually move your hand closer toward the doorknob, then jiggle the doorknob, then open the door a crack, then wider and wider until you can open the door without her getting up. If she gets up while you are opening the door, say “Oops!”, close the door, and try again. When she will wait with the door wide open, you can sometimes release her to go out the door, and sometimes go out the door without her.
This protocol was used with great success to reduce a challenging puppy’s biting and to increase his tolerance for restraint (see the referring article, “How an Intense Behavior Modification Program Saved One Puppy’s Life“). It can be used to help highly fearful or feral dogs learn to accept and enjoy human contact, too.
1. Touch dog’s shoulder with one hand, feed treat with other hand, remove both hands.
2. Repeat multiple times until touch to the shoulder elicits an automatic look for the other hand to arrive with treat.
It’s amazing how quickly high-value treats can transform a frightened dog’s attitude about touch or restraint.
3. Move touch process to various other parts of dog’s head and body until a touch anywhere on the dog elicits an auto-look for the delivery of a treat. Pay extra attention to any body part where your touch seems to elicit a more intense response from the dog.
4. Start over again at the dog’s shoulder, gradually increasing the duration of touch up to five seconds, feeding bits of treat the entire time. Repeat multiple times, gradually reducing the frequency of treat feeding during the five-second touch.
5. Move the five-second touch process to various other parts of the dog’s body, gradually reducing the frequency of treat feeding at each new touch location.
6. Return to dog’s shoulder, gradually increasing restraint pressure during five-second touch, feeding bits of treat the entire time. Repeat multiple times, gradually reducing the frequency of treat feeding during the five-second touch.
Within just a few repetitions of brief touch followed by treats, this recently feral dog is beginning to relax.
7. Continuing at the dog’s shoulder, gradually increase restraint pressure to ten seconds, feeding bits of treats as necessary to maintain positive association with touch and restraint, and to prevent any mouthing behavior.
8. Move the five-second restraint process to various other parts of the dog’s body, gradually reducing treat-feeding frequency at each new touch location.
9. Gradually increase restraint pressure to 10 seconds at various body part locations, feeding bits of treats as necessary.
10. Randomize touch, restraint, and duration, touching various places in succession, gradually increasing maximum duration of restraint, always feeding bits of treats as necessary to maintain positive association with touch and restraint.
The Gold Paw Program was developed by the Humane Society of Washington County, Maryland, (HSWC) to help identify and work with dogs who have the potential to be someone’s beloved companion, but need some help getting there. Gold Paw volunteers undergo extensive training in canine behavior so they are prepared to provide these dogs with the help they need.
–The following no-cost training is required for all Gold Paw volunteers:
–Complete the basic shelter volunteer orientation.
–Complete a one-day training on canine body language presented by shelter staff.
–Attend and complete a second full-day training on dog behavior, offered by certified trainer Pat Miller, CBCC-KA, CPDT-KA. At the end of this training, volunteers are assessed to determine their home environment and dog handling and behavior modification skills, and a designation is made as to which types of behavior problem dogs may be assigned to them.
–When a Gold Paw candidate is identified, program staff contacts volunteers who are designated for that type of behavior. When a potential Gold Paw volunteer is selected, the volunteer meets with Pat Miller and the dog; if it’s a good match, the volunteer then receives individual training specific to that dog.
–The volunteer works with the program protocol provided by Pat Miller, provides weekly check-in reports via Internet, and does in-person check-ins as needed, depending on the individual dog. For some dogs this may be a commitment of several months.
–Gold Paw foster care volunteers must love dogs and want to help them have a better chance of finding their forever homes. Their home environment and schedule must lend themselves to working with dogs who have special behavioral needs. Those needs will vary from dog to dog, and are instrumental in determining which dog is assigned to which volunteer.
HSWC is committed to using dog-friendly handling, training, and behavior modification methods. Studies have determined gentle, non-coercive training/ behavior modification to be the most effective and least likely to give rise to collateral damage. Unwanted side effects of force-based training include fear, anxiety, and aggression.
Volunteers must be willing to use gentle, dog-friendly tools and handling methods with Gold Paw dogs. The program does not use or tolerate the use of choke chains, prong collars, shock collars, or any other form of physical punishment.
–Finally, volunteers need to understand that we cannot save them all, as much as we would like to. While we expect a high success rate with this program, there may be occasions when we reach a sad conclusion that a dog is too damaged to proceed with the program. The truly compassionate heart accepts when it’s time to let go, as painful as that can be. We promise that we make a full commitment to every dog in our Gold Paw program, and will do everything within our power to help them succeed.
Squid (imitating a gargoyle from a New York city skyscraper) and his proud owner, Claudia Husemann.
Squid almost didn’t make it to the adoption option at the Humane Society of Washington County (HSWC), Maryland. Whole Dog Journal readers who have been with us for a year or more already know part of his story: the eight-week-old Jack Russell Terrier mix was surrendered to our full-service shelter by his owners because they “didn’t have time for him.” (See “Chill Out,” WDJ May 2011.) What that really meant was that the small white-and-tan pup was a heckuva handful: they couldn’t deal with his incredibly high energy level, fierce puppy play-biting, low tolerance for frustration, lack of impulse control, resource guarding, and sudden, intense aggression when restrained. He easily failed his behavior assessment. It’s a good thing he was impossibly cute!
A rare early photo of Squid sitting still. Teaching him to sit in order to “say please” for anything he wanted played a big role in “civilizing” the strong-willed, energetic puppy.
I arrived at the shelter on a Tuesday morning in early spring of 2011 and was met by a shelter staff member, paperwork in hand, a pleading expression on her face.
“This pup failed his assessment,” she said, handing me Squid’s paperwork. “Do you think he’d be a candidate for the Gold Paw program?”
Gold Paw was a newly launched shelter program that I helped create. It was designed to give “marginal” puppies and adult dogs a chance for lifelong loving homes. The program encouraged staff and volunteers to identify canines with adoption potential but who had one or more behavioral challenges that might make them ineligible for adoption, or significantly decrease the likelihood of success in a new home.
If a dog was accepted into the program, he was then placed in a capable foster home for behavior modification. The foster parents would work closely with me to implement a program custom-designed for each dog.
Staff described Squid’s difficult behaviors, and I took a quick look at him. As a young, too-cute-for-words, otherwise highly desirable adoption prospect, Squid was an ideal candidate for the program. Only problem was, the program was so new we hadn’t yet recruited any Gold Paw foster homes. So Squid came home with me to Peaceable Paws for his behavior modification. Between me, my husband Paul, Peaceable Paws staff and apprentices, and our upcoming trainer academies, surely we could fix this pup!
Miller’s other dogs, including Lucy (seen here), helped to tire the relentless pup.
We started by identifying all Squid’s inappropriate behaviors and creating a modification plan for each. Some of the pieces overlapped, so it wasn’t quite as daunting as it might appear – but it was still plenty to work on!
Structure and Consistency We put some rules in place to ensure that no one would reinforce Squid’s inappropriate behaviors, to give him lots of reinforcement for making appropriate behavior choices, and to provide him an environment with clear structure and consistency.
Everyone who interacted with him was to implement the “say please” program to reinforce self-control; Squid needed to sit to get his kennel door opened, to have his leash put on, and to gain access to toys, treats, and attention. An inappropriate puppy nip triggered an “Oops!” and removal of human attention. Because he was so inclined to puppy biting, touching was kept to a minimum unless the handler was actively working on his touch- and restraint-protocol.
The other dogs also helped him learn a little something about modifying the pressure of his bites. Lucy bloodied Squid’s ear after he bit her too hard; Squid was careful to be gentler after that.
Squid would live in a stall in the barn and in one of the kennels adjoining the training center. His energy and intensity were too much to add to the Miller household of five dogs and three cats – particularly too much for Scooter, our Pomeranian. Their one encounter traumatized Scooter badly enough that he suffered a life-threatening bout of hemorrhagic gastroenteritis; it took him several weeks to fully recover.
Exercise was a critical part of Squid’s program. All that energy had to go somewhere – and the best place for it was on the fields and in the woods of our 80-acre campus. Every day, weather permitting, I took Squid for at least two, preferably three long hikes; sometimes with Missy, our Australian Shepherd, and Lucy, our Cardigan Corgi, and sometimes by himself. On days we couldn’t hike, we ran him in circles with a flirt pole and encouraged him to chase toys in the barn until he was tired.
The hikes with the other dogs were good for his dog-dog socialization as well as energy draining. Lucy was particularly good at letting him know when his puppy biting was inappropriately painful – even to the point, early on, that on one occasion she snagged his ear and drew blood with a bite of her own. His bites to Lucy were noticeably less intense after that! He also joined the Miller dogs (Scooter excepted) helping with barn chores morning and night.
Time for Good Manners Of course, basic good manners training was on Squid’s to-do list. A conveniently scheduled Level 1 Trainer Academy was the perfect venue to get him started. He was assigned to a pair of trainers who worked with him every day for a week, teaching him sit, down, come, leave it, trade, targeting, and wait. He tested the patience of his trainers with his sharp puppy teeth, but they discovered the value of using a camping food-squeeze tube for treat-delivery to a hard-mouthed pup, and did an excellent job providing him with a solid foundation for his future training.
A Peaceable Paws Academy student works with Squid on good manners behaviors. We were fortunate to have people available to work with him in a consistent way.
Apprentices continued his training, dropping in on our regular good manners classes as time and space allowed, as did I, on our one-on-one hikes around the farm. During classes he began to demonstrate some reactivity to other dogs; his desire to interact with them, combined with his low tolerance for frustration, manifested as excited barking when he was restrained on leash in their presence. Another behavior to add to his modification list!
Modification Protocols I started Squid’s behavior modification program the day I brought him home, with a protocol designed to reduce his puppy biting and increase his tolerance for restraint (see sidebar, “Touch/Restraint Desensitization Protocol“). We practiced this protocol for only brief periods at first, gradually increasing the duration of our sessions as he grew to enjoy touch and restraint. I also made it a point to always carry a soft toy with me, so I could occupy his teeth with the toy to forestall inappropriate grabs to skin, clothing, and leash.
We practiced this protocol for only brief periods at first, gradually increasing the duration of our sessions as he grew to enjoy touch and restraint. I also made it a point to always carry a soft toy with me, so I could occupy his teeth with the toy to forestall inappropriate grabs to skin, clothing, and leash.
In order to reinforce self-control behaviors, Squid learned “sit” as his default behavior, and we began practicing “wait.” We taught “wait for your food bowl” as a training exercise, and then had Squid wait for everything we could think of: he waited for kennel and stall doors to open; he waited for his food bowl; he waited to go in and out of the training center; he waited to take his toy; and he waited to have his leash attached.
As Squid began to develop some ability to control his biting, we worked on teaching him to take treats gently. If the bite was unbearably hard, I would say “Ouch” in a calm tone of voice and remove my hand. If it was less hard, I would hold the treat in a closed fist and wait for his bite to soften almost imperceptibly before releasing it to him. Over time, we shaped a softer and softer bite, although as often is common with hard-biting dogs, the intensity of his bite would quickly increase again if he was excited.
Squid was clearly making good progress, but we were still concerned about his level of arousal in the presence of other dogs. He wasn’t aggressively reactive, just excited, but it was reactivity all the same, and excitement-based reactivity can easily develop into aggression as the dog matures and arousal increases, if the behavior isn’t modified. An upcoming Behavior Modification Academy was the perfect venue to address this behavior.
Trainer Bob Ryder, of Pawsitive Transformations, uses counter-conditioning and desensitization to modify Squid’s budding dog-reactive behavior.
Trainer Bob Ryder of Pawsitive Transformations in Normal, Illinois, was assigned to work with Squid for the week. He continued to work with the touch desensitization protocol, wait, and basic good manners behaviors, but was also instructed to make a reactivity counter-conditioning and desensitization program a high priority. Bob set to work giving Squid a strong “Where’s my chicken?” response to the presence of other dogs, and by the end of the week the bright little dog was happily and politely controlling his “go see the other dog” impulse in the presence of his academy canine companions.
Squid Goes Home Squid had been at Peaceable Paws for six weeks of intensive training and behavior modification by now, and it showed – he had become quite civilized. My husband Paul and I had grown very attached to the little guy. If it weren’t for Scooter’s intense dislike of him, he might have stayed. But we knew it would be impossible to integrate him into our household. It was time to find him a forever home.
But how? Even given his excellent progress, he needed to go to an above-average owner who would be able to continue his lessons and keep him on the straight and narrow path to adult canine civility. It would have to be an exceptional placement to meet with the high standards of the Miller Adoption Agency! I emailed his information to Jack Russell Terrier Rescue and the organizers posted information about him on their website. I also posted information about Squid on Facebook.
I received a number of applications, but none of the potential adopters were perfect for a dog with Squid’s energy and issues. Then I received a response from positive reinforcement trainer Lydia DesRosche, in New York City. She had a client, she said, who would be perfect for Squid. Claudia Husemann had just recently lost her well-loved Doberman to old age, and was looking for a smaller “apartment-sized” dog to fill the empty place in her heart and her home.
“New York City?” Paul protested. “But Squid’s a country dog!” Nevertheless, Claudia traveled the 275 miles from New York to Fairplay, Maryland to meet Squid, and immediately fell in love. Of course! Yes, she wanted to adopt him. Her application was impeccable, and she had the added credential of already having a relationship with a committed positive trainer.
Claudia returned to the Big Apple to await the shelter’s background check and adoption decision, already making plans to move Squid into her life. Several days later, adoption approved and neutering done, Claudia drove the nine-hour round-trip again, to pick up her new boy. Squid was moving on. With tears in our eyes we bade him a sad farewell, knowing we would miss the big presence of this little dog, and knowing he was in good hands. In mid-May 2011, Squid became “New York Squiddy,” and traded the fields of Fairplay for the haunts of Central Park.
Happily, Claudia has stayed in close contact and has provided the perfect home for Squid. She keeps us posted on his exploits in Central Park. We treasure the videos that Claudia and Lydia post on Youtube and Facebook, allowing us to watch as Squid learns to ring a bell, ride a skateboard, use the Manners Minder, play with a flying disc, and more. The behaviors that caused him to fail his shelter assessment are long forgotten. Live long and prosper, little Squid!
A dog fight that goes beyond a brief scuffle and doesn’t resolve quickly is frightening to behold. In fact, it’s one of the behavior scenarios most likely to result in significant injury to humans, not to mention the dogs. The first, most important thing to remember is keep yourself safe. After that, here are five things to do to try to end the conflict as quickly as possible, with minimal bloodshed.
1. Spray me a river. Blast the dogs with water from a nearby hose – assuming a nearby hose with a powerful enough spray. An easily portable aversive such as lemon juice in a spray bottle can be an effective alternative. In a pinch, even a fire extinguisher makes a handy and effective fight-stopping tool.
2. Sound strategies. Depending on the intensity of the fight, a loud yell might put it to rest. Try dropping one (or several) metal pans on the floor. A lit match held under a smoke detector alarm might also do the trick. Available at boating supply stores, a marine air horn can be effective at breaking up a fight. Warning: they are loud!
3. An object lesson. Keep your hands out of the danger zone by using a physical object to break up a fight. (You have to plan in advance.) Attach two handles to a sheet of plywood. When a fight happens, lower the board between the sparring dogs. The board will push them apart and provide a physical barrier between them to prevent a new grab.
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Dogfighters – and some bully breed owners who don’t fight their dogs but know their dogs’ potential – always carry a “parting stick” or “breaking stick” with them. This is often a carved hammer or axe handle, tapered to a rounded point at one end. When dogs are locked in combat, the parting stick is forced between a dog’s teeth and turned sideways to pry open the jaws. Caution: Parting sticks can break teeth, and a dog whose jaws have just been “parted” may turn on the person doing the parting.
Tossed over fighters, one over each, blankets muffle outside stimuli, reducing arousal. This also allows humans to physically separate the combatants by picking up the dogs and pulling them apart with less risk of a serious bite; the blanket will cushion the effect of teeth on skin if the dog does whirl and bite.
4. Air supply. When life and limb are at stake, extreme measures may be called for. Wrap a leash round the aggressor’s neck or twist his collar to cut off his airflow. When he lets go for a breath of air, pull the dogs apart. You can also cover the dog’s nose with a plastic bag to cut off the air supply. These are more challenging than they sound. It’s difficult to get a leash around the neck of a dog who is “attached” by mouth to another dog; grabbing a collar to twist puts you at risk of being bitten and your fingers at risk of getting caught in the collar; and the nose is a moving target.
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5. Let’s get physical. I heard about (never tried) a rather drastic technique observed at a dog show decades ago. The elderly judge was a tiny woman. When two dogs got combative in her ring she had the handlers both grab their dogs and hold on tight. Then she took the dog on top by the tail and jammed her thumb up his rectum. He let go in an instant and whirled around to see what was happening. The judge excused the two dogs, calmly washed her hands, and continued her classes. Note: A client of mine tried this recently. It didn’t work for her.
Here’s another approach for smallish dogs in a one-on-one fight; it is not recommended for a multi-dog brawl. Lift the rear of the clearly identified aggressor so he’s suspended with forefeet barely touching the ground. The dog lets go, and the target can scoot free. Supposedly, in this position the dog is not able to turn on the human suspending him, although I’m not giving any guarantees.
There are no guarantees for any of these methods; the best answer is management and modification. If you have dogs who fight, keep them apart, unless and until they learn to get along. The best of management plans can fail, however. If and when that fight happens, take a deep breath, resist your instincts to leap into the fray, quickly review your available options, and choose the one (or ones) that are most likely to work in that place and time. When the fight is over and no one is being rushed to the hospital in an ambulance, remember to take a moment to relax and breathe, and then congratulate yourself for your quick thinking.
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I’ve fostered a dog or puppy from the shelter six or seven times since I’ve had Otto – and he’s been a huge help in the fostering process. He models good behavior. He responds immediately to cues and in the process, shows the other dogs how to earn rewards. He comes immediately when called, in such an enthusiastic manner, that the other dog comes running toward me, too, just to see what the excitement is all about (and then of course everyone gets treats, which helps install the roots of a nice recall in the foster dog, too). Otto puts up with their playful behavior, plays a bit with them himself, but also enforces polite canine behavior. He won’t, for example, tolerate a puppy climbing all over him, jumping on him – or even picking on Tito the Chihuahua. He steps in with authority and firmness and says (with an audible growl and some impressive snarling), “No way, Jose. Not on my watch.” And yet, he’s never hurt a single errant pup.
However, something’s gone wrong with my currant foster, a formerly feral pup, an Australian Cattle Dog-mix about 10 to 12 months old. He was brought into my local shelter by county animal control officers on the end of a catch pole, writhing and snapping like the scared-to-death wild animal that he was, along with a human-friendly mother (he looks just like her) and a pup who looked to be about 4 months old who was just as wild as the older pup but still young enough to more quickly accept a human touch. All three had been left abandoned on a ranch owned by a senior gentleman who had passed away. Neighbors called animal control because they saw that no one was feeding the animals; an investigation revealed that the deceased had no relatives.
Consensus at the shelter was that the friendly mom and the young pup were good candidates for adoption. This guy was not, so I took him on as a project. Another volunteer and I spent time with him in a kennel at the shelter every day for a week, until we were able to get a collar on him and get him to accept treats. Then I brought him home, and started socializing him in earnest. He attached himself like glue to Otto’s side, which was pretty much the only way I was able to catch him and put a leash on him every day to pet him and bring him in the house, get him in and out of my car, walk around the neighborhood, and introduce him to friends. The relationship was all good for him, but it’s weird: it’s had the opposite effect on Otto. He’s started doing some naughty things he hasn’t done for years.
For example: Otto doesn’t chase my cats. The foster dog does. When I’m outside with all the animals, I’m able to say, Hey! – interrupting the behavior and diverting his attention with something else (Look! Here’s a ball!) Same thing with my chickens – although it took a squirt of a hose when he was rushing the fence and barking at them in their pen to get him to break off the behavior and “hear” me when I was saying Hey! No! But when I’m in the house, he’ll still take a run at one of the cats; I can see him doing it through the kitchen windows. And here’s the thing: Otto is joining in! I saw the two of them merrily chase one of the cats across the yard (she ran under a shed), and Otto was in the lead.
In the past few days, Otto has also dug a huge hole under one of our orange trees (pup was in the house at the time, he has an alibi!). It used to be that Otto would dig in hot weather, to find a cool place to take a nap, but it’s cold and wet and muddy right now! I also caught Otto chewing one of my shoes out on the deck! He may not have been the one that dragged it outside, but it was in his teeth when I spotted him – and when he saw me, he immediately let it fall out of his mouth like he had just been told it was poison.
My husband’s explanation: “Otto has let having a minion go to his head. It’s turned him evil!”
The good news is, someone who saw a picture of the pup on the shelter website came to meet him yesterday, and is going to the shelter today to apply to adopt him. I think it’s a good home, and he will be leaving my house in a day or so. I’m happy for him – but am curious to see how Otto will respond without his “minion.” Will he go back to being Mr. Perfect? Or will I be taking him back to behavior reform school?
Have you ever had a canine “bad influence” in your home? What happened? What did you do?
On the first day of the Crufts dog show in early March, the Kennel Club in England confirmed that business as usual wasn’t so usual anymore. This year marked the start of reforms put into place after the game-changing BBC documentary – Jemima Harrison’s “Pedigreed Dogs Exposed” – shocked the country with images of dogs so structurally unsound that the normal life of a dog was impossible.
The result? Independent veterinary review of the judges’ selections for Best of Breed Bulldog and Pekingese deemed the dogs too unhealthy to be granted their awards. And this was just on day 1. What’s next?!
I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall in the private rooms at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, where the massive four-day show is held every year. But thanks to the Internet, I didn’t have to be present to get the outrage:
“Please look at what has happened . . . most people have no idea what goes into creating a sound and healthy example of this breed,” someone who follows me on Facebook posted to my wall. And then she linked to a blog post on a dog-show website. “The supposed injuries could not be deemed genetic in origin and in the case of Ch Mellowmood One In A Million, she had passed her health clearances in December of 2011,” she added. “She has also garnered 20 cc’s [top breed honors] as well as the coveted Bulldog of the Year title in 2011 and the Best In Show title in the Bulldog Inc show. Bulldoggers worldwide are united against this ruling!”
Except, well, not. Because while the breed-ring diehards are outraged, the ruling was indeed met with shock among dog-lovers worldwide – shock that at last the dog-show world appears poised to start doing something about the suffering of dogs bred to fashionable extremes.
The fast-dwindling ranks of True Believers see a conspiracy here. From the post on the dog show site:
“Now here is the real rub. It is the vet, who may or may not have ever bred a litter in his/her life, who makes the determination as to whether the Breed winner is worthy of the award, not the judge. . . . [M]any of you have already run across vets who are not sympathetic to our hobby.”
Count me in as another who is not sympathetic to the “hobby.” I have attended two world-class veterinary conferences where veterinary surgeons and internists argued that these extreme structural malformations have produced dogs whose respiratory systems are so brutally compromised that they need to have corrective surgery in adolescence to have a chance at a dog’s normal life. If breeding for these traits isn’t animal cruelty, it’s hard to imagine what is.
This blowback is not coming from animal-rights extremists. It’s coming from people who have purebred dogs and love them, people inside the dog-show world as well those who just love a particular breed. And yes, it’s coming from veterinarians who are no longer as willing to shrug sadly and look away from the problems.
Enough. As for those of you who continue to support this dead-end “sport” as it is, well, good luck to you, because you see, common sense, time, and public opinion are all on the other side.
Gina Spadafori is a syndicated pet-care columnist and the author of more than dozen books on animals and their care. She is also the writing partner of “Good Morning America” veterinarian Dr. Marty Becker. After her champion Flat-Coated Retriever was recently diagnosed with a rare cancer that kills up to half of all Flatcoats before the age of 8, she started The McKenzie Project to challenge the closed-registry system that perpetuates health problems in purebred dogs.
It’s a ton of fun to see an athletic, healthy dog sprinting across a sprawling lawn of thick green grass – but could this practice be dangerous to the dog’s health? A study presented in the January 2012 issue of the journal Environmental Research concluded that exposure to professionally applied lawn pesticides was associated with a significantly (70 percent) higher risk of canine malignant lymphoma (CML).
It’s a broad conclusion and light on specifics. The case-control study, conducted between January 2000 and December 2006 at the Foster Hospital for Small Animals at Tufts University’s Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, was structured around a 10-page questionnaire that was mailed to dog owners who were having their pets treated at the Foster Hospital; the resulting data came from the owners of 266 dogs with confirmed cases of CML and 478 dogs in two control groups (non-CML cases).
The questionnaire was not included in the article; a summary stated that it covered a wide variety of data considerations, including breed, weight, medical history, and the types of chemicals used in the home. The characteristics of the CML cases did not vary much from the controls, other than in the weight category (the CML dogs tended to weigh more than 50 pounds). Exposure to types of flea and tick products and frequency of administration was similar among the groups, as was overall exposure to lawn care products.
What did show cause for concern was that the CML cases were more likely to live in homes that reported professionally applied pesticides and herbicides, though the results were only marginally significant for the herbicides. Exposure to other types of professionally applied lawn care products was not associated with increased risk. There was an increased risk, however, for dogs who live in homes where owners applied lawn-care products containing insect growth regulators – substances that inhibit the development of insect eggs and larvae.
One disappointment: specific lawn care chemicals or insect-growth regulators were not identified. Instead, the umbrella categories of herbicide, pesticide, insect growth regulators, fungicide, rodenticide, and fertilizer were used. It could be that some of these chemicals are already designated as known carcinogenics. The article notes that studies evaluating frequency of exposure and exposure dose are needed; thus it appears that the researchers did not determine which chemicals the dogs were exposed to, in what quantities, or for how long.
Also disappointing was the fact that genetic factors were apparently not considered as part of the study. Three-fourths of the CML dogs were classified as purebred, as was the control group. The incidence rate of CML is not the same for all breeds; increased risk has been reported for several breeds including Basset Hounds, Boxers, Airedales, Golden Retrievers, Saint Bernards, Bulldogs, Bullmastiffs, and Scottish Terriers. This predisposition could indicate an inherited characteristic.
Like the canary in the mineshaft, dogs can serve as sentinels for human disease because they are our close companions and are subjected to many of the same environmental influences. Canine cancers have the same biology and behavior as human cancers, and in some cases have identical histology and response rates to treatment. The goal of this study was to identify risk factors for CML from exposure to environmental chemicals in an effort to provide insight to risk factors for humans in developing non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Keep in mind that exposure to lawn care products is different for canines than it is for humans. People can know if a lawn has been recently treated with chemicals and thus avoid it and take precautions when handling such chemicals. Our pets have no such option; their uncovered and unprotected bodies come in direct contact with the environment. They see an enticing outdoor carpet, perfect for rolling around on, running across, playing fetch and wrestling with playmates on, and even ingesting. Dogs have their mouths on everything: themselves (grooming), their playmates, their toys and sticks lying in the grass, and yes, the grass itself. And those mouths can be the conduit from external to internal exposure.
Though more study is needed, the preliminary findings of this study suggest that you can reduce your dog’s risk through the following:
–Don’t use pesticides on your own lawns, or allow lawn-service providers to use them on your property.
–Don’t use lawn care products that contain insect growth regulators.
–Prevent your dog from walking on (or rolling on, eating, etc.) any lawns, unless you are able to determine that absolutely no pesticides are used to maintain them. (Most municipalities are required to make their chemical lawn-care regimens available to the public. It says something about these chemicals that their use is prohibited on most public school grounds.)
I recently fostered a dog who first greeted me at the shelter that I sprung her from by jumping up on me. I spent the first two days with her almost exclusively working on preventing her from jumping. When I introduced her to a friend, my friend immediately held her arms out and greeted the dog’s enthusiastic jump up with a big hug, petting, and cooing
