Recall – Come When Called

Puppies are great at coming when called.  I have yet to meet a young pup who doesn’t bound along joyously to its owner when called either for a treat, a game or a love.  Why then do so many dogs become hard of hearing as they reach puberty.  The recall and pulling on the leash are two of the most problematic behaviours for pet owners.

Training of the recall starts when our pups are very young.  Steven Lindsay has this to say about early training of the following and recall behaviour in young puppies:

“An area of interest for average dog owners regards active following and coming when called.  Long walks consisting of occasional surprise manoeuvres, exciting changes of pace, unexpected chase and counter-chase episodes, hide-and-seek games, punctuated with occasional opportunities for ball play or stick fetching – all facilitate the learning of appropriate “staying close” skills in puppies. 

Even if you have been careful to do all these things with your puppy, there are certain things that you may inadvertently have done to make your pup’s recall weak or even non-existent.

• Have you ever called your pup to do something your pup doesn’t particularly like such as a bath, nail trim or medication, amongst others?
• Have you called your pup from playing with other pups or dogs in the park and put him in the car to go home, or put him on a leash?
• Have you ever spotted your dog doing something like digging up a precious plant and called him to you to give him a scolding?
• If your pup ignores you do you simply carry on calling him over and over with no response eventually ending up yelling?
• Do you call your dog and when he comes to you ignore him and continue chatting to your friend?

If we are guilty of any of these things we are, in effect, punishing our dog for coming when called.  Punishment does not have to be physically aversive.  Anything that is done to your dog that he doesn’t like such as bathing, going home when he’s having fun, a scolding, ignoring him are all punishment.  Punishment decreases the likelihood that the behaviour that is being punished will be repeated.  So, is it any wonder that now the recall “Fido, come!” predicts something unpleasant happening.

There are many things that we can do to maintain the wonderful recall that we had when our pups were little.  Bear in mind that before 12 or 14 weeks, you were the most interesting thing in your pup’s life.  But then puppy started realising that there were other even more interesting things in his environment such as interesting smells, other dogs, friendly people – the list is endless.

So, how do we make our recall behaviour strong?

• We continue our obedience training no matter where we are so that the pup learns to work through all the distractions around him and focus on you.  And practise “Come” wherever you are, rewarding your pup by letting him go back and do whatever it is he was doing before you called.  (The Premack Principle).
• Teach him to spin towards you whenever he hears you call his name and to respond to the “Come” command so that both these things predict something great is about to happen.
• Make yourself the most interesting thing in your pup’s life.  Vary the rewards for the pup coming to you by feeding him extra special treats, play a game with him such as fetch or chase or tug, or hide and seek, or simply give him an extra special love or tummy rub.

One of the things to avoid is that when the pup is ignoring you and continuing to sniff or dig or play, is to offer a bribe.  Very often offering a bribe causes a resistant or distracted dog to come.  However, the bribe also directly reinforces the refusal behaviour and with repeated bribery, the refusal behaviour may actually become stronger than the dog’s interest in obtaining the offered food bribe.  This of course results in the owner producing an even more enticing bribe the better to gain the dog’s compliance, resulting in even stronger refusal behaviour.  This is known as the “bribe trap”.  Very often the only way to get out of this trap is to start training the recall from scratch, using completely different cues and rewards.

What is Extinction

In behavioural terms, extinction is the lack of any consequence following a behaviour. When a behaviour is inconsequential (i.e., producing neither favourable nor unfavourable consequences) it will occur with less frequency.  When a previously reinforced behaviour is no longer reinforced with either positive or negative reinforcement, it leads to a decline in that behaviour.

In other words, if your dog has been reinforced for a behaviour, and that reinforcement is removed, the behaviour will eventually decline or extinguish.  Reinforcement does not necessarily always come from you but often comes from the environment.  For example, if your dog jumps on the kitchen counter top and finds food there, then jumping on the counter top behaviour will happen again.  Every time this behaviour leads to reinforcement it will become stronger.  You did not play an active part in this scenario.  “Catching the dog in the act” and punishing it will only result in the dog being more careful to indulge in this “counter surfing” when you (the punisher) are not present.  What will work in this case is to remove the reinforcement (food on the counter).  If the counter NEVER provides food for the counter surfer, the behaviour will extinguish.

Bear in mind, however, if a behaviour is either self-rewarding or rewarded by the environment, extinction will fail unless the trainer can consistently offer a better reward. Barking is frequently a self-rewarded behaviour. Waiting for a dog barking at passers-by to simply get bored from “lack of reinforcement” is an exercise in futility.  When dealing with self-rewarding or environmentally-rewarded behaviours, a combination of management, positive reinforcement, and negative punishment is an alternative solution.

Extinction Burst

Just before behaviour extinguishes it undergoes an “extinction burst”.  This means that the behaviour will become more and more intense just before it goes away.  If your dog barks incessantly to be let in and you decide to use extinction as a way of stopping the behaviour, be prepared for it to increase in intensity, duration and volume just before it extinguishes.  If you open the door at this point, you have reinforced the behaviour at its worst and this is what you will get next time.  The only way to deal with this is to carry on ignoring it.  Fit ear plugs, retreat to the furthest part of the house, and warn your neighbours.

Savvy trainers use this extinction burst as a tool when raising criteria in certain behaviours.  For example, say we are working on latency (speed) of the sit.  We ignore all the slow sits and only reward the fastest sits.  What will happen is that in response to the absence of reinforcement the sits will become faster as the dog’s sitting behaviour starts to undergo an extinction burst.  Because these more intense sits are the only ones that are being reinforced, the slower sits will extinguish and the better ones will increase.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_%28psychology%29

http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2003/extinction.htm

Understanding Your Dog’s Signals Could Avert Tragedy

I’m not sure if the media is just more aware of dogs that are biting humans, or because dog bites on humans are increasing.  Just recently here in South Africa, a “service” dog bit a child quite badly, and even more recently a dog in the US bit a young anchorwoman.  This video has been aired quite extensively.  Jennifer Shryock, who does a lot of work in the United States with dogs and kids and has studied dog body language has commented on the video of the dog bite to the anchor woman in terms of the signals that the dog was sending and that were being ignored by all present, including the owner.

Have a look…

What is extremely important for anyone who approaches a dog, particularly a strange dog, and particularly if you are teaching your child about dogs, is to become familiar with how dogs communicate their anxiety and discomfort.  This video clip quite clearly illustrates many of the more obvious ways a dog will communicate it’s state of mind.

Try to REALLY look at dogs and try and understand what they are saying.  The really sad thing is that so many dog bites can be avoided if we just learned to read what our dogs were trying to tell us.

Focus, Attention Paying and Impulse Control

 

Before you read this article, I would like you to answer the following questions:

• Is your dog easily distracted?
• Is he more interested in other dogs and people than in working with you?
• Does he get overly excited in certain situations?
• Does he spend time sniffing the floor when you want to train?

If the answer to any of these questions is “Yes” then working on focus, attention-paying and impulse control will help.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that everything else you try to train is much more difficult than it needs to be.  Spending some time and effort on these exercises will pay off by making all your future training easier.  Even dogs with lots of training experience would still benefit from improved focus and impulse control.  The exercises are appropriate for dogs in various dog sports such as agility, obedience and field trials as well as helping your dog become a more responsive and focused household companion.

Offered Focus:

Step 1:  First of all decide what your criteria is.  If you haven’t done this exercise before, you will probably be rewarding a momentary glance in your direction.  Start by attracting the dog’s attention with a kissy noise or a click of the tongue.  Or, just stand still and wait for the dog to look at you.  As the dog looks at you, CLICK! And feed 5 or 6 treats in quick succession, one at a time..  Then, toss the 7^th treat on to the ground so that he has to unfocus to get it.  We are doing this so as to give the dog an opportunity to re-focus on you – or find your face.  As soon as he looks at you again, reinforce with the click and treat, treat, treat, 6 times.  Again, toss the 7^th treat on the ground.  Repeat this exercise 2 or 3 times. It is very important that no coercion is used for this exercise – no leash jerks or calling the dog’s name.  As the dog’s focus improves, gradually increase the length of time between reinforcements.

This behaviour must be a default behaviour – in other words, no cue. Practise this two or three times a day for two or three minutes at a stretch.  One of the times could be before you give him his dinner.  Leave the bowl on a table, and wait for him to focus on you before giving him his dinner.

Step 2:  When your dog is able to sustain the looking at you for 5 seconds, you can raise your criteria again by only clicking for eye contact.  You will probably have noticed that in the previous step the dog did make eye contact every now and again.  In Step 2, you will only be clicking and treating the glances where your dog made eye contact.

Step 3:  Show the dog you have some really nice treat (a Beeno) or a favourite toy in your hand, then hold the toy or treat out to the side at shoulder height.  If your dog starts jumping towards your hand, simply put it behind your back.  As soon as your dog stops jumping, bring the toy out again and hold it at shoulder height.  If your dog is sitting calmly, simply wait for him to glance in your direction.  Click and give him a treat from the other hand.  The toy goes away behind your back.  The point of this game is that the more your dog ignores the toy or treat in your hand, the more likely it is that he will get a click and a treat.  Repeat this a couple of times, and for the final successful attempt, let him have the treat or toy in your hand.

You need to use up at least 10 to 15 treats with each session and you should try and have at least two or three sessions a day.

 

Leave – an Exercise in Self-Control

This exercise, apart from teaching your dog the cue “Leave” (that dead frog on the ground – or the cake on the table – or the food in a toddler’s hand) also teaches him about self-control.

Step 1:  Show the dog a treat, then fold the treat into your hand so it’s totally protected. There must be no part of the treat available to a questing tongue or prying teeth. Put your hand down in front of her at mouth height. Note that your hand protecting the treat is a fist. This fist will be the dog’s first CUE. The fist cue says “Keep away from my hand.” Later you can change the cue if you want to by associating a word like “Leave” with the presentation of the fist.

Trying to protect the treat by holding it up above the dog’s head, or jerking it out of her reach as she approaches it, are common mistakes. Holding it up high will only encourage her to jump up to get it, and jerking it away from her will force her to grab at it to try to get it away from you. You’re already protecting it by holding it in your closed fist. Let the dog figure out how to get that treat out of your quiet hand.  The minute she gets tired trying to get the treat from your fist and moves her nose away, you click and open your hand so that the treat drops on to the floor.  As she takes the dropped treat, you can say “Take It”.  You can also feed her with the other hand, but don’t confuse her by feeding her with the hand that’s protecting the treat.  You’ll know that she’s grasped the concept when she pointedly ignores your fist when you put it in front of her nose.

Adding the Cue:  Once she’s realised that ignoring the treat makes you click you can start associating the word “Leave” with the presentation of your fist.  You can also at this stage move on to the next step.

 Step 2:  As you present your fist, say “Leave” and open your hand so that the treat is visible.  If your dog doesn’t grab the treat, click and drop the treat on to the ground.  If she does make as though she’s going to grab it, quickly protect it by closing your fist over it.  Say “Leave” once more and open your fist.  In all likelihood she will ignore the food, in which case you can drop it on the floor and cue “Take It”.
Step 3:  What you’ll probably find is that with each repetition her “staying away” is getting harder, faster, longer.  You can now start raising criteria by either gradually increasing time or distance.  Be careful not to start raising criteria until you get at least 8 successes out of 10 trials.

Step 4:  When you’ve got some decent time and some decent distance, find a convenient coffee table.  Show the treat to the dog, put the treat on the coffee table, and cover it with your hand.  If you think this is going to be easy, think again.  Staying away from your hand is NOT the same thing as staying away from the coffee table.  You might have to go back to the beginning or on the other hand, she will catch on immediately.  Both are normal.

Once she’s decided that this is the same exercise as the one she did with your fist, she will move her nose away from your hand.  Click and flick the treat onto the floor, saying “Take It”.  When she’s made the connection move your hand away from the treat. Of course, when you move your hand off it, she’s going to grab for it, so be ready to cover it again.  Click and flick it off the table when she’s staying away from it.  When you can lean back and leave the treat alone, with the dog holding back waiting for you to click and flick it off the table, add your cue as you’re placing the treat on the table.  There’s no need to bellow “LEAVE!” simply use a normal quiet tone.

Self Control at Threshholds:

This is a useful exercise to teach your dog whenever you are going through a doorway or gate or exiting your car in a strange place.  In a nutshell, what you are going to teach your dog is to stay put until you are given permission to go, and when out or through, reorient to you until you release him.

This is NOT a rank reduction exercise.  I honestly don’t care if the dog goes through a doorway before me or not, but what I’m trying to guard against is for the dog to leap out of my car when the door is open directly into oncoming traffic, or to charge out of my gate and leap onto a passerby to say “Hi”!   I also do not want to constantly be telling my dog to sit and stay, stay, STAY while I concentrate on getting my parcels out of the car before he runs amok.  Any gateway or doorway will do for the purpose of this exercise.

Step 1:  The door does not open until the dog is sitting.  The “sit” must be a default.  A default behavior is a behavior that has been rewarded many times in the past, and is the behavior a dog falls back on when it’s not sure what you as the owner want it to do.  You have just arrived at some place that the dog enjoys and that is safe – either home at dinnertime, or the dog park or some other safe area.  He is dying to get out of the car so is standing on the seat tail wagging furiously.  You, on the other hand, are just standing calmly – waiting.  Because something good usually happens when your dog sits down, he will try this.  You immediately put your hand on the car door handle.   Your dog’s rear end immediately comes off the seat – poised to leap out.  Your hand comes off the handle.  You continue in this fashion until the dog has realized that the only way to get the door to open is to sit and wait.  You have not said anything at all.  All you have done is to watch for the sit, and open the door (or start opening it) when your dog sits.  If the dog will stay sitting until the door is fully open (you may block the opening with your body, but do not SAY anything) reward your dog by allowing him out.

Note:  The default may be lying down That is fine – just be consistent.

Step 2:  Reorienting to you once he is out.  Once your dog has learnt that he needs to stay sitting until you cue him to get out of the car, then you need to teach him that getting out doesn’t mean that he can dash off.  He needs to know that reorienting to you is what is required.  Have the lead on your dog before you leave home.  By now he should be sitting when you open the car door.  Take hold of the lead and invite him out.  When he gets to the end of the leash, he should turn around and look at you.  Click and treat.  A couple of times before releasing him.

Use the same methods to teach your dog self-control at gates and at doorways.

Be consistent.  Be patient.

 

 

 

 

 

Keeping Your Dog Busy

Giving your dog a supply of toys is one way of keeping him busy.  There are an amazing variety of toys for dogs these days.   Fluffy toys that squeak, rubber toys for chewing, and interactive rope toys for playing tug.  The problem with most of these toys is that because dogs – unlike children – do not have the right brains for inventing solitary make-believe games with their toys, very quickly tire of them.  One solution is that if your dog has many toys, do not make them available all at once.  Rotate them so that there are always one or two toys that he or she hasn’t seen in a while.

The best toys are those that involve finding food.  Dogs that are not family pets spend most of their waking hours foraging for food.  So, it stands to reason that if you want to keep your dog amused during the day when you are not home to interact with him, any toys or activity you provide needs to have food as one of the components.   These are some ideas for you to try:

Hunt for breakfast:   Instead of giving your dog a free meal in a bowl before you leave for work, make him work for it.  There are two ways that he can work for his dinner.  Either scatter it about on the lawn for him to find piece by piece, or hide small parcels around the garden for him to locate and unwrap.  Dogs love to dissect things, as I’m sure you’ve discovered when the new toy you just bought your pup has been dissected to get at the squeaker inside.

The other way you can keep him busy is to stuff a kong.  A Kong is more than just a chew toy.  Most chew toys get pretty boring after five minutes or so but there is a reason that the Kong is hollow.  This hollow is designed to be filled with food.  No, not just peanut butter, but with a whole host of combinations to whet your pup’s appetite.  If I know that I’m going to be out for a while, and so that my dogs don’t start chewing inappropriate things I layer my kongs with some mince, followed by some grated cheese, a layer of small dog treats, and finally, a couple of teaspoons of soft canned food.  I then plug up the opening with either a large dog biscuit, or a layer of peanut butter.  Then – and this is the trick – the whole thing gets popped into my freezer overnight.  When I give it to my dogs it’s frozen and I know it will keep them busy for quite a while.  The other thing one can do is to hide a couple of stuffed kongs around the garden or house for your dog to find.  He will have to use his nose to do this, and using his nose to detect scent is pretty exhausting work.

Digging is another very enjoyable pastime for most dogs.  Unfortunately they have a habit of digging your best flower beds.  If you can set aside a part of your garden where your dog is allowed to dig to his heart’s content he will probably confine his digging activities to this particular place.  You can encourage digging in his very own sand pit by letting him watch you bury toys or treats in the allocated area and directing him to “get ‘em”.

Having said all this, it is extremely important to spend quality time with your dog each day.  Set aside a part of the day for some physical exercise that you can do together, such as retrieve games or a walk in the local park.  Keep his brain stimulated by either training some obedience exercises or playing some problem-solving games with him, or even teaching him a trick or two.

If you do not have time to take your dog out of the garden every day, then make sure that he can actually see out.  His visual sense should also receive some stimulation.  If you have a wall around your property try and avoid putting up a solid gate, or identify some area where the dog can see over the fence into the outside world.

A Busy Dog is a Happy Dog

It is recognized nowadays that a dog that is confined for long periods of time without stimulation, both mental and physical, can develop behavioural problems such as chewing of inappropriate items, digging and excessive vocalization, amongst others.  Providing a large area for a dog “to run around in” is not enough, unless this area contains many interesting things to smell and to eat and to look at.  Stimulation should involve all the dog’s senses.

Feral or Village dogs spend about 80% of their waking hours hunting and scavenging for food. Domestic dogs have been helping and working alongside us for thousands of years, and most are bred for a specific purpose, such as hunting, farming or protection. For example, retrievers and pointers were bred to locate and fetch game and water birds. Scent hounds, like coonhounds and beagles, were bred to find rabbits, foxes and other small prey. Dogs like German shepherds, collies, cattle dogs and sheepdogs were bred to herd livestock.

Whether dogs were working for us or scavenging on their own, their survival once depended on lots of exercise and problem solving, all in their quest for food.  Do we provide all this for our pets?  The common scenario for most dogs is that while we’re away at work all day, they sleep.  When we come home, we serve them free food in a bowl—no effort required from them.  They eat more calories than they can use.  The result is dogs who are bored silly, often overweight and have too much energy.  To alleviate this boredom and to get rid of all this excess energy, our pet dog will often indulge in totally unacceptable behaviour such as shredding the outdoor furniture (or even the indoor furniture if she’s confined indoors), tipping up the dustbin (guaranteed to keep her busy for hours), digging holes in a newly planted flower beds.  Her welcome home behaviour will also be a little over the top because she’s so pleased that her boring, unproductive day has come to an end.

If you spend a little time giving your dog “jobs” to do while you’re away, there will be no unpleasant surprises for you when you get home, and you will also have a calmer, more relaxed and “fulfilled” pet, without having to start taking up sheep or cattle herding, or hunting ducks and geese.

In my next post I’ll discuss some ways that you can keep your dog “busy” and happy.

Loose Lead Walking

For competition obedience heeling, you need a dog who is focussed on the handler, close to the left-hand side of the handler and with his withers in line with the handler’s knee.

This, however, takes a great deal of concentration and effort from both the dog and handler, and cannot be maintained for very long periods.  Loose lead walking is a way of walking out with your dog in a relaxed, comradely fashion – much like strolling through a park holding hands with your best friend.  This type of walking can be maintained for long distances without any stress and, for a companion dog is all that is required.

But… you have a dog that pulls at the end of the leash as if his life depended on it.  How does that behaviour convert to loose lead walking?  The first thing that you must realise is that pulling is a habit – it has been reinforced, possibly for years and is not going to be “cured” overnight.  The very first thing you have to commit to, if you’re serious about this exercise, is NEVER, NEVER let your dog pull EVER AGAIN!  That’s easier said than done, but if you really want a dog that walks on a loose lead you must persevere.

Step 1:  I know that this is the most difficult part, but, if you must take your dog for walks, one option is to fit him or her with a head collar (Gentle Leader or Halti).  The head collar is a very humane way of stopping the dog from pulling.  Most dogs don’t like it in the beginning, but if you desensitize for 15 minutes and only use the collar when going for walks, your dog will soon associate the “nasty” head collar with good stuff, and will willingly put his head through the noose!

The other option is to get a no-pull harness and use that in the same way as the head collar.  Jean Donaldson (author of Culture Clash) demonstrates how to desensitize Buffy to the head collar.

Step 2:  Meanwhile, at home, you will start working on teaching your dog that having the collar and leash on doesn’t mean he has to pull.  Most dogs (and people too) will push against any pressure.  If someone pushes against your chest, for example, you will tend to resist; if you try and make your dog sit by pushing against his rump, he will push against your hand and resist sitting.  What you are going to do is teach him that giving in to the pressure of the lead is REWARDED!

Find a quiet spot in your home – a spot with NO distractions.  If you have other dogs put them away in another room or outside.  I want you to be relaxed, so you are going to sit down, call your dog to you, and clip the leash to his collar.  Have 10 treats in a bowl within easy reach, and, if you use a clicker, have it ready.  He is probably looking at you with a puzzled expression on his face.  (At least he’s not pulling!).  Now you simply put a little pressure on the leash – pull it to one side or the other so that the leash is not hanging in a loop and there is a LITTLE pressure on the collar.  One of two things might happen:

1.  Your dog might resist a little and tighten the leash more.  Don’t move, simply sit and wait.  At some point he might give in to the pressure, loosening the leash, even just a suggestion of giving will be enough to make you click in the beginning.  The moment he does that you will mark that, either with a click or your verbal marker, and give him a treat from the bowl.  As soon as he has finished eating, put a little pressure on the leash once more.  Again, as soon as he gives in to the pressure, click and treat from the bowl.  Continue this way until all 10 treats in the bowl are finished.

2.  Your dog might not resist at all and give in to the pressure right away.  That’s great, because you can click and treat that giving immediately.  Continue as for 1. until you have finished all 10 of your treats.

Once you are happy that he understands the concept of giving in to the pressure, you can repeat the exercise in a slightly more distracting environment.  You can add movement and changes of direction.  The secret of this exercise is that you are not going to yank on the lead or pull back on it.  Your dog has been conditioned to respond to this by pulling harder – so your pressure on the lead will be with the lightest possible touch while still getting through to your dog.  I have heard this method referred to as “Silky Lead” and feel that this is a wonderful description.  Furthermore, if you have ever watched a really skilled dressage rider control his horse, he also uses really light touches on the reins to control and communicate – no yanking or pulling.

I’ve often had people ask me if their dogs are allowed to sniff and explore interesting smells along the way.   Of course they may.  This is a stroll with a friend, remember.  However, I do want the dog to realise that going to sniff a lamppost so that he can catch up on the latest gossip (for example) is contingent on polite behaviour.  Suddenly lunging towards the lamppost, taking you completely by surprise is definitely NOT what I would call good polite behaviour.  This is a great opportunity to use Premack!  Check out my article on how the Premack Principle can be used to get your dog to do what you want so that he can get what he wants!

The Premack Principle and the Recall

Both these photographs show dogs that are exhibiting high-probability behaviours. David Premack, a psychologist, proposed the rule that high probability behaviours can be used to reinforce low-probability behaviours.  We can use this principle when training dogs very successfully.

High-probability behaviours are activities which are performed voluntarily and which are enjoyed for themselves without the intervention of the handler or owner.  Some examples of this would be playing with other dogs (if your dog is a social butterfly), chasing monkeys or squirrels, barking at the neighbour’s dogs through the fence, sniffing interesting smells.

Low-probability behaviours, on the other hand are behaviours which are often the learned or trained behaviours, such as the recall and walking on a loose leash.

The Premack Principle works extremely well if applied to the recall.  In a familiar, non-distracting environment your dog’s recall is probably faultless.  He comes to you at full speed whenever he is called, and you reward him with lavish praise, or a treat, or a game.  You think that you have a great recall.  But, then you take your dog to the local dog park, or to the beach and you probably find that your recall is awful.  Your dog might eventually come to you, and what do you do?  You promptly put him on lead, walk him to the car and go home.  You have not used premack.  What you have done is effectively punished your dog by removing something he wants.  The way Premack works in this instance is that instead of putting your dog on leash you send him back to sniff, or play, or indulge in whatever activity he was doing before you called him.  If you repeat this a few times you will find that each time the recall becomes more and more enthusiastic. Your dog has learnt that to get what he wants (high probability “stuff”) he has to do what you want (low probability “stuff” under the circumstances).

You can use Premack to strengthen any learned behaviours.  I am sure you can think of a few instances where Premack would be useful.  Calling your dog out of a play situation, barking at the neighbours dog through the fence, chasing seagulls on the beach.  The list goes on….

Try Premack next time you take your dog out with you to make his learned behaviours stronger.  You’ll be amazed at the result.

Fear and Aggression are Two Sides of the Same Coin

On many occasions a fearful dog that has acted aggressively in the face of a trigger is euthanized.  The really sad thing about this is that often the dog’s owners are totally ignorant of the fact that their dog is actually afraid and is simply behaving the way it does as a means to survive.  If the warning signs had been recognized and appropriate action had been taken the death sentence could have been avoided.

Fear is a distressing emotion induced by a perceived threat.  Fear, which is a survival mechanism, occurs when pain or the threat of danger is presented to the dog.  Fear will cause the dog to either retreat from the threat, or confront it – fight or flight.  In some cases, especially when flight is impossible, the dog will resort to confrontation in the form of very specific ritualized displays, such as growling, barking or air-snapping – all designed to make the fearful thing go away.  These “warnings” are often misinterpreted by owners, and the dog is punished, either by shouting, popping the leash or smacking.    There are always dangers associated with punishing fear-aggression, in that the dog may associate the discomfort or pain with the stimulus, thus aggravating the fear-aggression.  Another danger when using punishment to treat aggression is that one runs the risk of punishing the aggressive display, (growling, barking, baring teeth, etc.), which are all warning signals. We know that punishment decreases behaviour, but does not modify it, so the dog may stop exhibiting aggressive displays or warnings (designed to increase distance between the dog and the stimulus) and go straight into the bite or attack phase.

Some of the experiences which could create a fear response in a dog would be:

• A traumatic experience involving either dogs, people or situations, particularly if they occur during the two fear periods of a dog’s development.  The picture below shows a potential for disaster in this pup’s life.  Already clearly afraid of the water he is being dragged in.  What is even more sad is the owner’s apparent lack of concern at the pup’s fear.

• Insufficient exposure to various types of humans (children of all ages, different males and females, large groups of people, etc.) and novel experiences during the critical period of development.
• Early imprinting by an aggressive or nervous dam
• Abuse from previous owners

The important thing for any owner when dealing with apparently aggressive behaviour in a dog is to establish, first of all, if the aggression is in response to fear or anxiety, and, secondly, what the triggers are.

You can help your fearful or anxious dog face its fears.

You can tell by learning to read your dog’s body language whether it is afraid or nervous about something.  These signals include dilated pupils, drooling, lowered (pinned back) ears, cowering, fleeing, growling or biting.  There are many video clips and websites covering the subject of dog body language (www.youtube.com/watch?v=00_9JPltXHI is quite a good one).   Understanding what your dog is afraid of and just how afraid it is, is key to beginning the process of helping your dog get over its fears.

The first thing you would do is identify your dog’s triggers.  Would it be someone reaching out to touch or just a person coming into its space, or is it maybe another dog?  Once you have identified what it is that’s making your dog fearful, you can embark on a programme of Systematic Desensitization and Counter-Conditioning.

This sounds very complicated, but all it means is that you gradually, by little bits of exposure, make the dog less sensitive to its triggers (Systematic Desensitization), and at the same time change the dog’s conditioned emotional response (fear) to one of calm acceptance by presenting it with something it wants and likes when confronted with its trigger (Counter-conditioning).    With severe cases this can be time-consuming and requires ample patience on the part of the owner.  Most people do not have the time or patience for this and often the dog is re-homed, or, worse, euthanized.  Surely, as your dog’s guardian you will do whatever you can to make his or her life with you a better place.

More Talking about Walking

In the previous post, what you saw was a dog without any self-control.  Self-control is the key to a calm walk with your dog.  Until you teach your dog about self-control walking with her as you visualize it will never happen.  I would go so far as to say, that unless your dog has learnt how to control her impulses, any obedience is difficult to teach, if not impossible.

A trained dog understands that the way to get what she wants is to control herself, and a trained handler knows that true control of an animal must come from the animal herself, not from the handler.

The first thing you need to teach your dog is that the only way to get what she wants is to control herself.  Since you control all the resources that your dog wants, teaching her self-control is simply a matter of withholding the resource until she shows a measure of self-control.  When we look at the scenario in the previous post, all the undesirable things that your dog exhibits have been reinforced by giving her what she wants (to go outside and walk) no matter what her behaviour is.  She jumps up when you take the lead out; she grabs hold of the lead; she won’t stand still while you try to get the lead clipped on; she rushes out of the door; she pulls constantly, but she still gets to go for a walk.

You start teaching her about self-control at dinnertime.  Dinner is withheld until she is calm and (preferably) sitting.  Jumping up and mugging you for her meal simply makes the dish with her dinner go further away.  The only way to get the dish on to the floor, is to be calm!  You say nothing – the only thing you do is make dinner go away if she is behaving like a hooligan.  You’d be surprised how quickly she starts learning about self-control around dinnertime.

The next step in your journey to teaching your dog self-control is to get the lead on without all the fuss and bother.  The first thing you do is identify the trigger or signal.  Is it putting on your walking shoes? or opening the cupboard where the leads are kept, or is it something you say?  If it’s putting on your walking shoes, they don’t even get onto your feet until she’s calm.  Once she stays calm while you’re picking them up, the next step is for her to be calm while you’re putting them on.  She will learn that behaving like a lunatic simply makes the shoes come off.  And so on…

Once you know how to manage the environment and take control of the things your dog wants, you will become a much better trainer, and your dog will learn how to control its impulses.