Managing Your Reactive Dog

The Importance of Management

Anyone that claims or even subtly implies that he/she can get your dog "fixed" or "cured" of its aggression is trying to sell you on his services.

It is much more realistic to start with the idea that you may not be able to cure his aggression, but with proper treatment and training you may be able to control your dog's aggressive tendencies, and reduce the behaviour. This means that managing your dogs behaviour in order to prevent any possible "incidents" is essential.

Apply the management and safety planning according to what your dog reacts to.

Avoid what sets your dog off

If your dog growls when you pet him on top of his head, don't pet him on top of his head!! If your dog growls at others, keep him away from others.

Desensitization and other techniques may be needed for many aggressive problems, but you need to know exactly how to do this for your particular dog. Until then, there is no point is setting your dog off. That goes for any of your dog’s aggression problems. The more your dog lunges at your neighbour’s dog, the more you strengthen and encourage that response, and the more difficult it will be to undo that reaction. You must try to prevent all aggressive outbursts or situations completely.

Crates/kennels

Invest in a crate. If you don’t normally use one and feel guilty, reassure yourself that a crate is actually similar to a den, and dogs can eventually feel safe in there. Decorate it with blankets or whatever else will make you feel better about it. It is the ideal thing when you need a break from your dog or need to protect guests. However, it should not be used for more than a few hours at a time. Trainers who rely on excessive crating to "cure" aggression, could be relying on a psychological condition similar to "learned helplessness" or depression.

A crate ought to be a safe den for the dog. Ask guests to ignore the dog when the dog is in there. Otherwise, move your dog to room where children can’t open it. Put a sign on the door for adults. Don’t rely on a baby gate. Dogs have been known to jump them, or chew through them. The benefit of a crate is that you can have your dog in the same room with you. Note: excessive crating can cause more behavioural problems

Leads

If your dog is likely to bite you or anyone else who might have to deal with it at anytime, keep a lead on it, even in the house. See headcollars in combination with leads below. It’s possible to purchase lightweight cloth leads, and snip the handle so that it doesn’t catch on anything while your dog is allowed to roam free within your house. This will allow you grab the lead instead of its collar or its body if you need to pull your dog away from anything. It will allow you to avoid getting to close to those teeth. Note: Tethering of animals may expose them to increased stress and danger.

Muzzles, head collars and harnesses

If your dog is likely to bite, you should consider investing in a muzzle now. Don’t assume that your dog will behave appropriately with a muzzle, however. A muzzle will do nothing to prevent aggressive behaviour. A muzzle will only prevent a bite. You should also condition your dog to wear it so they feel comfortable wearing it.

A head collarmay be useful (ask your trainer). This is not a muzzle. Your dog can still breathe, drink, eat, even bite if not controlled, but it makes control easy, and it is easy to prevent a bite simply by pulling on the lead.

Harnesses will not prevent biting and if the dog is aggressive it could be dangerous reaching around the neck to fit the harness. However, it is good for dogs that pull or lunge and the no-pull front attach harnesses offer more of a humane control for dogs with short snouts, where head halters won't work or where the dog hates wearing a head collar.

 

Freedom (off lead activity)

Freedom is tricky. As humans we believe that our dogs should be free to roam as they please. We avoid using crates, leashes, etc. But ask yourself; are you avoiding the use of tools like those mentioned above because of guilt or laziness? If so, reconsider what kind of threat your dog poses to others. You will feel much worse if your decisions result in your dog causing enough harm to have it put down. Remember, if your dog is behaving aggressively, whatever is provoking the aggression is also stressful to your dog.

Sometimes dog-aggressive dogs benefit from having more exercise if they are the kind of breed that needs a lot and they are not getting enough. A dog aggressive dog does not need to make friends. If you want your dog to get running exercise, consider getting it a long lead, and taking it to an area where you will not meet other dogs, or walk your dog with a head collar and lead.

Similarly a dog that is aggressive towards people should not be free to growl or snap at people, even strangers. Don't take any chances. It’s far better to be cautious then to need to put your dog down because you thought it "might be okay".

• Invest in muzzles and/or head collars.
• Under no circumstances should you dog ever be given the opportunity to escape. If the door is going to be opened, always put your dog on a lead secured to something; put him in a crate or another room.
• Ensure strangers coming to the house will not have to confront your dog however accidentally.
• Make sure your garden fences and gates are well secured. If your dog escapes anyway, you will be held liable.
• Examine any open space your dog is allowed to run in, and make sure there is no danger of anyone or anything accidentally coming into this space. Don't assume that is you are there you can ask people not to come in. Sometimes they will not listen or believe your dog is a threat. If you are at all unsure, use a long lead, and a muzzle.
• Check your leads, collars, etc. will not break.
• Never ever leave a young child alone with any dog.
• Always keep your dog in another seperate area of your home when there are other people who may potentially get bitten.
• Use a locking mechanism or hook on the doors of rooms and crates, where people cannot accidentally invade your dog’s space.
• Children have been known to open the doors of dog crates even when asked not to, so it is best to keep your dog in an area where children are not tempted.
• Children may gain unauthorized access to a fenced area where your dog is kept. Never leave your dog outside without supervision.
• Get stuck in to training your dog so when your management accidentlaly fails (it probably will at some stage) your dog will be better equiped for the situation they may find themselves in.

Why has training not worked for your reactive dog ?

Why has training not worked for your reactive dog ?

There are lots of reasons why our dogs might be slow to respond to training or behavioural modification. By incorporating the tips and training methods found in this blog and from the trainers at Sussex County Dog Training your dogs behaviour can improve. Your daily interactions with your dog and your dogs interactions with the world around them will become as you understand your dog more and are able to better shape your dogs behaviour.

There are several barriers to improving your dog’s behaviour these include:

Using the wrong methods - to improve a behaviour on a permanent basis the root cause of the behaviour must be addressed. If the diagnosis of the cause is incorrect or training is simply addressing the symptoms then the real cause will go unresolved and the behaviour problem will continue. Common incorrect diagnosis often include dominance, guarding the owner and being a "bad" dog. Finding out why the dog is behaving in a certain way is step one, identifying the reward to the dog (the dogs reinforcement for performing the behaviour) is step two. Once we have done this we can look at how to reduce or prevent the dogs reinforcement and use appropriate methods to treat the dogs behaviour based on the root cause (such as fear).

Lack of Practice – our dogs may need more practice to become fluent. Dogs need far more practice than most of us realize to really ‘get it’. And, they need to be trained in a variety of environments with a variety of distractions before they understand how to apply knowledge to any situation, this is called generalization.

Lack of Relevance – our dogs can question the relevance of our requests. We need to help them understand that our requests have meaning and consequences to the dog. This may be that a word that means reward or a behaviour that leads to a consequence.

   

Punishment - our dogs may have been consistently punished when s/he behaved in a set way. A good example of this is when your dog barks at someone we punish the dog with a lead jerk and a firm “NO” – if the dogs outburst was caused by fear we have paired an aversive or negative feeling with the person the dog had barked at –not improving but damaging the dogs expectations of future encounters with people. Even if the dog stopped barking it has probably only suppressed its feelings rather than learnt not to do it in the first place. Be aware that using "training" tools which also punish the dog such as check chains, prong collars, citronella collars and electric or e collars will also suppress the behaviour of a dog without curing it. They can cause further mental and physical damage to the dog and carry a heavy negative moral burden.

Lack of Focus– our dogs may not be focused on us enough to hear our requests. They may be under too much stress, suffering from sensory over load or worried about what is going to happen next.

Lack of Impulse Control – our dogs may not have learned how to control their impulses (or self control) around certain distractions yet. If we can improve impulse control we can often reduce reactivity.

Trouble Shooting Counter Conditioning

This video is from Emily Larlham.  Her site www.dogmantics.com has many more great video's. I have chosen this one today as it trouble shoots problems that people have when using Counter Conditioning. When people tell me that their dog isn't responding to Counter Conditioning (the process of pairing something nice with the appearance of something they previously or currently find unpleasant or scary) I often have to find out why this is. This short video explains many of pitfalls that people will have. Including when the dog hasn't associated that the apperance of the "scary thing" triggers the rewards from the handler. When the dog is over aroused by the rewards, when the dog has incorrectly paired the rewards with the clicks or the marker work "yes".  If you are interested in seeing more of Emily's videos search "Kikopup" on You Tube. 

Happy Watching, Miranda xxx

Reading Your Dogs Body Language

Understanding what our dog is feeling is an essential skill when assessing why dogs perform the behaviours they do and preventing bad behaviour.
Look for all the signs that your dog is under even a little stress and take appropriate action to reduce the stress and reward the dog for coping with what ever was stressing them. This will improve the performance of all dogs and prevent almost all socially unacceptable behaviours.

In this photo the dog is guarding her chew, notice she has stopped chewing, is staring hard at the person with the camera, you can see the whites of her eyes, her ears are back and she is very still.

In this photo the dog has been asked to do a dog trick, he has half done it (it is also not a natural play bow but a taught one on cue) but rather complete it he becomes stressed, note the closed mouth, worried expression and head turn away from the camera.

For more examples please look at the following two links:

This link is to the Turid Rugaas website – the person who has globally done the most research in to calming signals. http://www.canis.no/rugaas/onearticle.php?artid=1

This is another great video on body language, it can also be accessed from our You Tube site

Appropriate steps to reduce mild stress might be:

• Putting more distance between what ever is stressing your dog and your dog, i.e. move further away.
• Distracting your dog with a favourite toy or treat to take their mind off the stress.
• Trying to lower the intensity of what is stressing them. For instance if your dog was sensitive to noise try to shut out the sound of the thunder storm by shutting all the windows and moving the dog to the centre of the house. If the dog is sensitive to movement or energy levels ask children to walk not run when near the dog.
• Ask your dog to perform things you have trained them to do and reward them for it. This must be a pre-trained cue that your dog understands and enjoys.
• Comfort your dog and in some cases you could pick up your dog.
• Prevent what ever is stressing the dog from getting closer, louder, faster etc.

Appropriate steps to reduce major stress would be:

• Remove the dog at once from the situation or the thing that is stressing them.
• Remove the stressors (e.g. people, children, dogs, mower, bike, cat) at once from the dog.

Body Language of Fear in Dogs

This poster is a resource from Dr. Sophia Yin's website www.drsophiayin.com