Welcome to the Spring issue of the Newsletter. In this issue I have included an article on Dominance, a term which is used a lot to describe dog behaviour and usually incorrectly, I hope you will find it interesting. The article is going to appear in the Spring issue of 'The Dog Trainer' which is the APDT magazine. As usual I have also included all the club updates, and information about new courses. Remember to check the website regularly for new features and information about new courses.
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How many of you have described or perceived your dog as being 'dominant'. How would you define that? What behaviour is the dog displaying which brings you to that conclusion. This article will hopefully give you a better understanding of where the concept of dominance comes from and the truth about your dog's behaviour. I recently went to see a 10 week old Jack Russell puppy, the owner had been advised to contact me by the vet because the dog had growled at her during the consultation and advised her that she need to 'get on top of the dominant behaviour' it was displaying. As it turned out the puppy was completely terrified of the car, had been ill on the way to the vet, had a thermometer stuck up its bottom on arrival and then received its vaccinations. As a consequence it briefly became terrified of people, was unwilling to approach the husband when he returned from work that evening and was also terrified of me when I turned up for the assessment and had spent most of the previous 24 hours hiding in its cage. The owners had spent all evening accidentally reinforcing the behaviour, worrying about its dominant streak and were on the point of returning the puppy. I wonder exactly what the vet had meant when she described the puppy's behaviour as dominant. The Oxford dictionary defines dominance as 'power, influence and having a controlling influence over'. Did she mean that this puppy was trying to have control, power and influence over her whilst in the consultation? Unlikely. However, did she mean that she identified that his response to a stressful situation was not ideal and that gaining some advice on how to counteract this response might be a good idea? Well maybe. The problem is that the word 'dominance' seems to have become a catch-all phrase to describe any aspect of a dog's behaviour which is deemed as unacceptable.
Part of the problem seems to come from the continued misuse of these terms and incorrect diagnosis of behaviour by some prominent television personalities. Whilst these programmes have raised the profile of dog training in a way which I see as mostly beneficial, in many of the dog training programmes I have seen recently, the word 'dominant' is still used to describe behaviour and 'pack leadership' and 'pack rules' have been part of the programme of behaviour modification. Of course these programmes show or appear to show successful modification of problem behaviours giving credence to the explanations given and justification to the methods employed.
The idea of dominance comes from the observation of pack hierarchy within wolf packs where there is a clear Alpha female and Alpha male led structure. This model was then applied to the dog within the human family, giving rise to the need for us as owners to apply pack rules and giving an understanding of dog behaviour in terms of its struggle to become pack leader.
The more recent research into this area however has shown that this is a misconception and we are totally misunderstanding our pet dogs and potentially damaging our relationships with them by applying this model to explain their behaviour.
It is true that our domestic dogs are descended from wolves. Thousands of years ago, certain wolves became more tolerant of humans and started scavenging from village dumps. The less fearful wolves became more isolated from the wild population and became more a part of human communities. It was only the wolves whose behaviour characteristics were less fearful and those which did not show predatory or dominant behaviour towards humans which would have been allowed to stay near to the villages by the humans, any other would have been driven away. Over time and through many generations of breeding, selection of particular dogs by the villagers to assist with hunting or to be companions changed these animals from wolves to dogs. It is the very fact that the dogs developed into animals without the wolf characteristics that they were able to become domesticated. So it is clear then that when we apply our pack theories to our domestic dogs, they are just plain wrong.
The old fashioned view of dominance is represented in the following quotes:
'Learning how to communicate to a dog whereby we show ourselves as proficient guides and pack leaders is therefore important. No forceful dominance is necessary...'
'All fondling, coddling or solicitous behaviour toward the pet must be avoided. This helps the owner assume dominance over the dogs involved'
'When a dog sleeps in your bed, this can lead to dominance issues.'
'No matter if you own a domestic dog or a wolf, dominance is the key to happiness. Obtaining and maintaining your Alpha position is everything when dealing with a domestic dog, wolf/dog or wolf, unless you want to be ignored, growled/snapped at, picked on, or in extreme situations, even attacked.' 'The article briefly discusses the background to pack hierarchy and how instability in this can result in dominance aggression. This article looks at the positive actions you can take to establish yourself as the packleader and bring harmony to your pack.'
The correct approach is represented in the following statement:
'We don't have to be Alpha, dominant or pack leader, and neither does our dog. All we need to be is an owner responsible for guiding our dog, shaping and influencing its behaviour through correct socialisation and training so they can live in harmony with us.' 'Over the years the word 'dominant' has taken on negative connotations and is quite often used as a cop-out to describe dogs who are merely running riot, lack sufficient training, under socialized (therefore under confident), or extremely fearful'
I would therefore encourage you to view your dog's behaviour differently.
I think it is fine to have some boundaries for your dog's behaviour. For example, you might not want the dog to go upstairs or on the furniture as I don't. However if you do let the dog sit on the sofa with you occasionally, don't worry it isn't going suddenly try to 'take over the pack'. Set the rules and boundaries which are appropriate to your individual situation.
'My dog growled at me, is it being dominant?' Very unlikely. Look at the individual behaviour and consider why it is doing it. Most often it is simply 'resource guarding'. Dogs will protect things of value to them such as toys, bones, a place to sleep or even a person. Consider how you respond to the behaviour because you may be accidentally reinforcing it. (Please contact me for help to resolve and understand instances which are specific to your situation).
We do need to be able to give our dogs some guidance in the same way as we would to children. They need boundaries to their behaviour so that they fit comfortably into our lives and they need you to be consistent in applying these. For further information on this subject I recommend the following books:
'Dominance: Fact or Fiction' Barry Eaton
'Dominance Theory and Dogs' James O'Heare
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It is essential to continue socialising your young adult dog very extensively. Around puberty in dogs, which is when their hormones change, at around 7 months onwards, dogs go through what is known as a secondary fear stage. This is often displayed as fearful behaviour towards things or sometimes people that they have never reacted to before. The fear may show itself as avoidance behaviour - i.e. they look scared but try to avoid the object or person, or it may show itself as a nervous aggressive response whereby the dog thinks if it barks at the object it will make it go away.
When my young male dog Jake was a puppy I used to take him to a local garden centre for environmental socialisation. They used to have a large brass coloured ornamental pig outside the entrance. Jake had walked past this pig with no reaction several times as a young puppy and then suddenly one day he decided it was the scariest thing he had ever seen. He growled and barked at it and darted at it then cowered away - it was actually very amusing to watch although not from Jake's point of view, he was genuinely terrified. How did I deal with it? I just stood there and waited until he had calmed down - as the pig didn't react Jake got braver and eventually crawled on his tummy towards it until he was able to give it a sniff and realise it wasn't going to hurt him. I can honestly say he looked embarrassed at that point!
How you deal with a dog who becomes reactive towards familiar things is extremely important. It is human nature to want to comfort our dogs when they appear fearful but this is extremely dangerous. If we give the dogs attention or stroke them when they are being fearful, then we are effectively reinforcing it - giving them the impression it is the correct way to act. This makes the behaviour much more likely to be repeated. So although it appears unsympathetic, it is best to completely ignore your dog's fearful reaction and once they have recovered and are acting normally again then give them lots of praise and attention. As it is the 'brave' behaviour which gets reinforced this becomes the behaviour they are most likely to repeat in the future.
Continued environmental socialisation and exposure to all types of people and dogs at this age is critical. Take your dogs to lots of new environments such as markets, town centres or car boot sales etc. Make sure you don't just stick to familiar walks, be adventurous. You will end up with a dog that you can take anywhere with you if you put in this work now.
If you have any concerns about your dog's behaviour please do not hesitate to get in touch and we will help you or recommend a 1-2-1 lesson.
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Unfortunately due to bad weather the January/February courses had to be postponed. We are looking forward to getting back to training again in March, hopefully with some better weather.
I am extremely pleased to be able to announce that I have a new instructor, Kate, who is going to start running some courses for me on a Wednesday afternoon. There will be a beginners course at 2.00pm and a course for more experienced dogs at 3.00pm. Please contact me for more information if you are interested.
I am currently looking for an assistant to help Kate on Wednesday afternoons and an assistant to help me for an hour on Tuesdays from 12.30pm to 1.15pm. If you feel you can help and/or are interested in training to become an agility instructor, please let me know.
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I am pleased to welcome to the clubs Linda, and Carol who are my new assistants. Both Linda and Carol are helping at the Amersham Club. All three of them would like to become APDT qualified in the long run. Welcome to you both.
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I have introduced a resocialisation course on Thursday afternoons for dogs who have had issues socializing with other dogs and/or people. All dogs in the group will have similar issues and all must have completed a 1-2-1 lesson with me prior to starting the course. The aim of the course is to give handlers a better understanding of their dog's behaviour, to gain new handling techniques to make the behaviour feel more manageable and to improve the dog's behaviour through controlled exposure to other dogs. If you are interested in this course please let me know.
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Emma's Outdoor Courses have proved to be a huge success and we have introduced an advanced outdoor course for dogs to progress onto. The advanced course runs at 11.30am with two beginners outdoor courses at 12.30pm and 1.30pm.
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We now have a secure area of the site for dog club members. In the secure area you will be able to access booking forms and in the future, handouts on a range of subjects. There is a password required for this area, if you haven't received that by email, please contact me. It is also now possible to pay for your course via internet banking, please contact me for the bank account details if you need them.
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| Monday evenings at Bledlow Ridge | |
| 6.30 pm | Puppy Course |
| 7.30 pm | Pet Course |
| 8.30 pm | Advanced Course |
| Tuesday Daytimes at Saunderton Lee | |
| 9.30 am | Agility Course |
| 10.30 am | Agility Course |
| 12.30 pm | Agility Course (Note: Start Time Changed) |
| 1.30 pm | Agility Course (Note: Start Time Changed) |
| Wednesday Daytimes at Saunderton Lee | |
| 2.00 pm | Agility Course |
| 3.00 pm | Agility Course |
| Thursday Daytimes at Saunderton Lee | |
| 11.30 am | Advanced Outdoor Course |
| 12.30 pm | Outdoor Course |
| 1.30pm | Outdoor Course |
| 2.30 pm | Resocialisation Course |
| Wednesday Daytimes at Amersham | |
| 9.30 am | Puppy Course |
| 10.30 am | Pet Course |
| 11.30 am | Advanced Course |
| 12.30 pm | Pet Course - Newcomers |
1-2-1 lessons are available with Pauline on Monday mornings, Wednesday afternoons and Thursday daytimes. 1-2-1 lessons are available with Hannah on Thursdays and Wednesdays and with Emma at various times during the week.
Recall workshops will take place either Wednesday or Thursday daytimes.
Clicker workshops are held occasionally.
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Children are very welcome at the dog clubs and I encourage them to learn how to handle the dog correctly and be involved in the training. They must however be supervised by an adult at all times to ensure the dog is under control (and the child! For small children it may be best to bring a game or book for them to sit quietly with. Do not allow children to touch any dog which it does not know without checking with the owner first - even puppies.
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Pauline Whittaker
Tel: 01844 342334
Email: pauline@paulinewhittaker.co.uk
Website: www.paulinewhittaker.co.uk
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