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Did you just get a puppy? Or are you getting one? Did the COVID crisis finally give you the time to spend on the ever so important puppy phase?
I started thinking about what I would have liked to know with the benefit of hindsight. I also thought about what I would like other puppy-owners to know based on my current situation.
Today’s morning walk triggered maybe my number one tip (mind you, before today’s walk I had wanted to write about something else, but I feel it might not be wrong to write about his first.).
Until you know otherwise, consider every unknown dog you meet, to be a dog that potentially wants to eat your dog for supper!
(for what this means in practice scroll down or read to the end of this post)
There, that’s it.
Ok, maybe that is a bit dramatic, but if I were to write:
“Please don’t let your dog run up to dogs you don’t know”, you might not take the warning as seriously as when I impressed upon you that I actually have your dog’s safety at heart.
So what do I mean.
A little backstory
My dog, Rusty, is a little under 3 years old now (2 and ¾ to be precise), which means we’ve made it past the puppy stage and perhaps more importantly past the teenage stage as well.
Supposedly we are now entering the relatively peaceful stage of adulthood, of stability. Or so they say.
He is an Australian Cattle Dog, and pretty awesome if I say so myself. I will be the first to admit that I have often felt I had bitten off more than I could chew.
He’s great with humans and as a puppy loved playing rambunctiously with other dogs. As he got older (particularly during puberty) and his personality developed he became more dog selective.
Some of his dog friends could jump all over him and neigh break his back and it would cause him no concern. To others, often other males, he would take affront. They simply weren’t his cup of tea. Similarly, he wouldn’t do too well with uninhibited puppies and youngsters rushing up to him and crowding his space.
I don’t attribute this to any bad experiences, but just to genetic coding (and probably some of my ignorance as a dog owner when raising him).
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I like to draw the parallel to people. There are the extroverted among us who are happy to converse and chat with anyone and everyone, and then there are others who are most comfortable engaging with a select group of close friends, or who, when at a party enjoy observing everyone’s comings and goings but get all nervous when someone approaches them to make small talk.
Of course, there are strategies introverted people can apply when they find themselves in uncomfortable situations. You can learn and force yourself to make small talk at a party for example. Still it doesn’t mean you would go and seek out such situations if given the choice. This equally applies to dogs.
So why is this important. Well, just as dog-dog tolerance levels vary with age and between dogs, so do aptitude levels when it comes to inter-dog communication. Some dogs are simply clueless as to what another dog is communicating (or choose to ignore it).
When the message doesn’t appear to come across, this will (usually) lead the dog to try and clarify.
Similarly again, we humans tend to first repeat what we said, then say it a little more loudly maybe, gesticulate a bit more, only to go back to repeating what we said before, except now we’re getting a little more agitated and annoyed that the other person is not getting us, and so we end up shouting the message in the other person’s face (if we don’t have any other tools in our toolbox to deal with the situation)).
A little about dog body language
Guess, how this works in dogs?
A dog may look away first or turn his body sideways, signaling he’s not interested in interaction, but if signs are being ignored he may try and repeat the message a little bit louder by, say, issuing a warning growl, and guess what, if that’s being ignored the dog may resort to shouting the message, as in (gasp)… snap or bite.
He or she may, in other words, have the other dog for supper!
As a side note, there’s nothing wrong with a dog that growls, in the sense that it’s a dog showing restraint and communicating: “Hey I don’t want to bite you but I will if you don’t stop what you’re doing”.
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What happened
Now let’s go back to this morning.
We had two interactions very close together, really within a couple hundred yards of each other.
Since I know Rusty is dog selective and especially hates being run up to and crowded by other dogs, we have worked a lot on training. We are now to the point where, for the majority, he will check in with me when he sees another dog coming, which is the cue for him that either one of a few things are going to happen. They all involve working with me, which to him is fun. We do twists and turns, look-at-me’s, left-to-right-changes and more, whilst walking past the other dog; or we’ll step off the path and work together a little there, while we wait for the other dog to pass. In other words, to Rusty, another dog coming equals working with me to earn treats. It’s remarkably succesful.
Also, he is always on leash whilst the other dog passes as a safety precaution.
So, picture interaction 1:
Two ladies, one with two off-leash older dogs, one with an off-leash older rescue puppy (6 months maybe?) approach.
Rusty checks in, I pick up his leash and we do our thing. The two older dogs are still way off as they have found some interesting smells and the puppy is close by. Lady 2, puppy-lady, asks me: “Are we good to pass or would you like me to leash my dog?” (cue majestic music, heavens opening up and golden rays of light shining down on this lady in my mind).
“Well, my dog won’t go up to your dog, but if you’re not sure if your dog will go up to him, then I would leash him to be sure, as my dog generally doesn’t like dogs coming up to him like that”.
“Well, he’s an overenthusiastic puppy, so I will leash him”
We end up having a nice chat with both our dogs behaving themselves admirably, and Rusty even getting compliments on how well he keeps checking in with me (checking in, means making eye contact every now and then).
I ask about the other lady’s dogs and she is 100% convinced they will ignore Rusty to pieces so we carry on with our walk and indeed, her dogs trot past him like he’s not there.
I’m chuffed.
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Now picture, interaction 2:
Unfortunately, a couple of seconds later, I see a similarly aged puppy retriever of sorts. Rusty is already happy to start our little thing. The youngster however barrels down the path making a beeline for Rusty. Its two owners, at least 200 yards away, apparently endeared with the happy-go-lucky behavior of their furry family member, look on cluelessly and take absolutely zero action.
I don’t know what Rusty is gonna make of this stranger dog. It could go either way obviously, but often this kind of “rudeness” does not sit well with him, so I step in front of him and yell a resounding no to the puppy (and its owners). As it goes with puppies, there is no stopping this one, Rusty twists away, growls and finally snaps at the relentless youngster who cowers back to his owners, who still are only slowly getting closer.
Amazingly the same thing then happens again. It’s as if him someone hit “repeat”.
Finally, the owners leash the dog and end up walking past us with Rusty ignoring the pup completely (of which I am very proud as I imagine that was not an easy thing to do for him), and the one owner of the pup just staring blankly at me.
I would have actually liked to talk to them a bit more, but I imagine they were still confused as to what had just happened and I was working with my dog as they passed.
My guess would be, that their pup had done a similar thing before and met very dog tolerant dogs at the other end of his sprints. This probably ended up in the dogs happily frolicking around and the owners enjoying some small talk.
Now, out of nowhere, there’s this cattle dog that just won’t have any of it… and there is its b&*$h owner yelling “no” at their lovely puppy. How is this possible?
Well honestly, when I got Rusty, I also didn’t realize there were that many dogs who don’t deal with this type of behavior well, nor did I realize that it is normal for dog tolerance levels to change as most dogs mature.
But HAD I known I would have dealt with a lot of situations differently. So, my apologies to those dog owners I may have put in difficult situations, because I too, at the time, thought my dog was so ruddy cute that all other dogs would be certain to love it.
Or that I held the false belief that “older dogs are always nice to puppies”. Or…, or…
I just don’t think I really saw the danger.
The above dog-for-supper-warning actually stems from one of Rusty’s and my trainers, Luceline, who used to tell us this over and over and over again during training.
She would say it in Dutch obviously: “Als ik een andere hond zie, ga ik er altijd eerst van uit dat ie mijn hond mogelijk wil opvreten.”
“If I see another dog I don’t know, I will always assume he wants to potentially eat my dog.”
Thinking back to those classes, I can only imagine how she must have felt, knowing from the looks on our faces that the majority of us were happy to let her talk, thinking “sure, whatever”.
I think the main reason for this is that that ideal image, of all dogs loving each other and frolicking and playing together is so deep-rooted, that it is hard for most of us to imagine that it could somehow be different. It’s just not what we want to hear or see. Plus, if there are dogs who are not of the frolicking kind out there, then it’s probably because they were mistreated as a youngster or it must be the owners’ fault somehow.
If you’ve read till here, then thank you. It’s time to dole out some practical advice, because let’s face it, when you and your pup come across another dog, thinking: “Hey you adorable furball, are you thinking of having my latest addition to the family for supper?” doesn’t provide much guidance from a practical point of view.
Practically Speaking
So what would I advise you do?
Keep your dog with you and communicate with the other owner, like the ladies during our first encounter today did… it’s actually that simple.
What helps though is to know basic dog owner etiquette. I did not know “unspoken rules” existed until someone told me about it (in this case it was during puppy socialization class), and I did not come to realize their importance until my own dog’s tolerance levels lowered.
For those of you in the Dutch speaking world there is an awesome pamphlet you can thumb through digitally that explains the “what” and very importantly the “why” of dog etiquette at hondenetiquette.nl.
They also summarize the content in ten tips, which are:
- Visibly keep your dog under control when passing equestrians, bikers, joggers and hikers
- Leash your dog when passing another leashed dog
- Leash your dog when you see someone else leashing theirs
- Do not allow your off-leash dog to approach a leashed dog
- Do not allow two leashed dogs to meet (I will probably write another blog explaining why that is at some point)
- Intervene when play becomes too rough
- Respect that not all dogs want to play
- Allow service dogs to fulfil their task and do not disturb them while working
- Understand that not all people like dogs and give them their space
- Show appreciation when someone else shows you and your dog consideration
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In addition to the tips on the dog etiquette website I would like to raise awareness for the yellow dog project. When you see a dog decked out in yellow, with a yellow leash or yellow ribbon tied to his or her leash, it means this dog needs extra space. Give them a wide berth if you can and do not approach the owner-dog team.
LINKS:
The dog etiquette brochure: http://hondenetiquette.nl/76-2/
The 10 tips: http://hondenetiquette.nl/10-tips/
https://www.yellowdoguk.co.uk/