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corvus

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Everything posted by corvus

  1. Will she paw your fist if there's a piece of food in it? Most dogs do. Or else you could get a larger target, like a piece of carpet or a mat, and walk her across it. Click when the paw you want her to target with hits the carpet or mat. You have to fade yourself out really fast. Try after, like, three clicks. I have been using a rubber mat with nubs on it to teach targeting with rear feet.
  2. We went for a walk to one of the local playing fields that backs onto bushland. Doggies had a little tug game in the small oval sandwiched between two footy games and then we walked around the bush for a bit. Tomorrow the tides should be right for a visit to one of my favourite places on the river. In winter it's strictly low tide only. In summer it's a nice place to swim at high tide.
  3. If it is a reaction to stress from the Kelpie, it's a hard thing to treat. I have treated obsessive habits before and IME it needs a two-pronged approach. You MUST stop them from practicing the behaviour first and foremost. If you stop them 90% of the time it's not enough. Then you have to give them an acceptable outlet for the behaviour so they can transfer it and don't have to go cold turkey. The problem with behaviours that are used as coping strategies is that they do actually make the animal feel less stressed. So they are inherently rewarding. The animal feels compelled to do it. They'll spend hours at it. If you stop them and then don't give them an acceptable outlet they can get quite anxious, I think. If it were me, I'd be looking at bitter tasting substances you can smear on the parts of your dog that are getting chewed. Or separate them at times when the Kelpie is doing the chewing. And if it is a coping behaviour, the Kelpie probably is suffering from some form of chronic stress, or is just upset by having a new dog in the house. Who knows. It might help to give the Kelpie something to occupy it. Like a Kong or a Nylabone (under supervision, of course). That's all assuming it is a coping behaviour, which is nothing but a guess over the internet. If you can afford it, I think it would be a good idea to get it assessed by a behaviourist. That way you know what's probably at the root of the problem and will be told how to treat it. If you treat the wrong thing it won't go away.
  4. I would be more inclined to think it was a coping behaviour by the kelpie. Excessive grooming is a known stereotypy in dogs and other animals. Animals start doing things like that because they are stressed and can't find a way to alleviate the stress.
  5. Well, whenever I talk to my friends that have small children they tell me stories and I can only laugh and say "My dog does that!" and "Okay, I know dogs are not children, but seriously, my dog has done almost the same thing." and "Oh yes, that happened to me once, with the dogs, naturally." It's embarrassing and I try not to say it too much, but the facts speak for themselves. Kids and dogs do a lot of similar things. They ain't remotely the same, but they are not worlds apart. They are both mammals for starters, that puts them firmly in the same world. Now consider they are both social, both dependent on human adults, and not that far apart in their mental capabilities. My OH watches kids with almost exactly the same affectionate, doting smile he directs at dogs. They hit a lot of the same buttons in us as well. I've often said what I love about dogs is it's like having a perpetual three year old that is entirely capable of looking after themselves. All the fun and a fraction of the work and supervision. It's semi-facetious. I like dogs because they are dogs, but I'd be kidding myself if I thought I didn't especially love their qualities that remind me of kids. I don't think we're going to have kids, but I don't have a problem with the practice run with a dog provided the dog is treated appropriately and fairly over the course of its life.
  6. They're just gloves. Wear 'em or don't. Who cares? It's your hands. I wouldn't hesitate to use protection wherever it seemed warranted. If you don't think it's warranted, then don't use protection.
  7. I can't say how many BCs we have met at dog parks that resource guard their balls. Almost every one would be my guess. It seems typical of the breed to me. I've seen plenty of then get in trouble from their humans for doing it, and does it make a shred of difference? No, because nothing has changed. They still need to protect their balls from any dog that comes near them. I understand that in some places an off leash park is about the only place you can throw a ball for a BC so they can run out the crazies. I do take toys to the park, although I don't throw them because my boys aren't big on retrieving. I think you have to decide how you're going to manage this, because I expect it will happen again and again. Be very aware that if you intervene and rescue her and her ball from another dog, you will have reinforced whatever she did the moment before you intervened. If it were me, I would intervene before she ever felt the need to curl her lip. I'd teach her a good recall and take the ball myself while there were other dogs around. I wouldn't come down on her for protecting her ball. IME it's not going to change anything, just make her more anxious. As far as moving her around goes, again, she's just communicating. I've never had one of my dogs curl their lip at me, but I don't think that's particularly because they see who is calling the shots or controlling the resources. I'm just careful about not pushing them much. Erik especially, as he really does not like being restrained. I dealt with this early with desensitisation and counter-conditioning him to being handled. He gets lots of massage and we regularly play games where he gets a tasty treat for letting us touch his paws, his mouth, or grab him from above. It's not fair, I think, to expect a dog to automatically accept being handled against their will. You wouldn't expect a person to put up with it. Targeting is a good way to reframe moving a dog around so it no longer looks to the dog like something they don't want to do. Erik will move to where I indicate with my hand, but if I happen to pull on him or push him he digs his heels in and often automatically drops to the ground and refuses to move. I am fine with that. If I stop trying to force him and just tell him where I want him to go he is usually quite happy to go there.
  8. Erik usually barks. He has a "Hey, play with me!" bark and will sit there barking until I look at him and then he wags his tail and looks cute. If he wants to go out, he scratches at the door. He has also been known to poke you with his nose, paw, perform a lovely down while looking up at you brightly and wagging his tail, performing a lovely sit whilst looking up at you brightly and wagging his tail, poking other things with his nose, and various other vocalisations. Kivi sits in the yard and barks incessantly until you physically go and get him. He often does this when he has dug a hole and feels you need to come and see it. Inside he tends to whine if he wants attention. He will also paw. He has us well trained.
  9. Do you have a dog that is often active doing things on their own when you are having down time? Erik entertains himself for a while, but often ends up trying to get me to interact with him. Kivi on the other hand will just laze all day. He is only active when we are doing something. He was more active and busy as an adolescent, but seems to have grown out of it.
  10. When Kivi met his first British Bulldog he really didn't seem to understand what the heck that dog was doing. It kept bouncing around him making gruffy noises. He was all like "Er... Is this good or bad?" He has met the same dog since and still doesn't really get him, but the bulldog has a habit of walking around behind Kivi shoving his head between his legs and actually almost lifting his rear end off the ground. I'd be bewildered, too. Kivi has met other bully breeds including Aussie Bulldogs and was fine with them.
  11. I suggest anyone who wants to explore this further should have a read of Alexandra Semyonova's non-linear dog theory. http://www.nonlineardogs.com/, and check out Patricia McConnell's blog entries on dominance theory http://www.theotherendoftheleash.com/the-c...ed-as-dominance. Semyonova is purportedly a raging Pitbull hater, which is a shame, because otherwise she has some very interesting things to say about why dogs behave the way they do. If you can get through the complex theories she draws on.
  12. Not that anyone wants or needs my input, but I always found it scary having an animal chomp on me even if I had gloves on. You can feel the pressure, which is uncomfortable, and there's always the fear that it's going to start hurting any moment, which it would if the animal was big enough. I always treated them as a backup rather than something to make my hands invincible. I'd handle to avoid being bitten and the gloves were there so I wouldn't flinch, drop the animal, or get injured if I made a mistake. Confident handling is good for any animal, I think.
  13. When I was dealing with wild gliders on a regular basis, which are small and delicate and squirmy but have teeth designed to chisel holes in eucalypts and are insanely keen to use them in defence, I had an expensive pair of riggers gloves with articulated knuckles. They came in a number of sizes and a small fit my hands quite snugly. They gave an excellent balance between feel and protection. They were still a bit clumsy for bats, I found, but perfect for rats, gliders and possums. I got nailed by all of them and the gloves protected well. You would certainly feel a dog bite through them, but it would be unlikely to draw any blood at least. And you'd need a hard bite to get bruised through them, I think. You can get them from Bunnings. They cost about $50. Tragically, I lost one of my riggers gloves somewhere on the south coast.
  14. We love cow hooves, here. They come out when me and OH want some time to ourselves. Wouldn't ever let them chew on them when we aren't nearby, though. They get down to a size and malleability where they can get stuck in the roof of the dog's mouth between the two rows of teeth. It happened to Erik one day. So ours only get them under supervision and they go in the bin when they get small.
  15. IME the street is more risky. It might be that there are fewer dogs, but they are at their homes. They are highly likely to be territorial. A territorial dog that challenges or attacks a strange dog trespassing on their turf isn't a weird dog to me. It's a pretty normal dog. A dog that attacks strange dogs at a dog park is a weird dog to me. I have had too many scary moments with a territorial dog on the streets to count. I've been in our local dog park when there has been close to 30 dogs there. I find it's actually less worrisome when there are so many. They tend to keep to their own pack more. It's very easy to walk away and the dogs are easily distracted. I can walk the perimeter of our park when there's 30 dogs there without attracting any attention from any of them. They are too busy playing ball or whatever. If there's just one or two dogs it's almost inevitable that they will come over. Not that I mind, but there's no dilution effect and the dogs are much more focused. The member's only dog parks overseas are only as good as the management. Some are brilliant, undercover areas with agility equipment. I would so love to have a facility like that. I'd sell a kidney for membership to such a place. I keep thinking about putting it to council. Maybe I could get a petition together. Maybe if I become rich I can build my own.
  16. I just bought the Great Sydney Dog Walks book. It's very good. We like the beaches in Wollongong best. The dogs do, too. ;) The dogs also love going for bush walks. So much to smell! They stay on leash so they don't upset the wildlife. There are some nice State Forests just outside Sydney where you can camp with your dogs.
  17. How old is he? Animals with dementia act weird. There's a DOLer who is studying dementia in dogs. Assuming I remember correctly, I believe dogs with dementia have the part of their brain that would normally tell them what is appropriate and what isn't deteriorate, so they do things they would normally be inhibited to do and just don't realise it's inappropriate. Alternatively, if he is not feeling as strong as he used to it's possible that he's feeling social tension or anxiety in situations where he didn't used to. If I were right about humping sometimes coming up in response to social anxiety, that is.
  18. I don't know how I would (legally) give my dogs the chance to really stretch their legs and play the way they want to without them. Our yard isn't tiny, but it's not big enough for a good, wild run and play, and the neighbours don't like the noise the dogs make when they play. I love our local dog park. I know a lot of people and their dogs from there. We very rarely have any problems. I find the dog owners are in general on the ball and intervene early if anything odd is going on. I have been to a lot of different dog parks and beaches and I think you have to be confident and on your toes. You need to be prepared to act on a hunch and be reasonably confident with the body language of your dogs and others. I do find it's an environment where you can learn an awful lot about dogs if you keep your eyes and ears open. And I LOVE having very well socialised dogs. They are so damn good at staying out of trouble it cuts down on my worry factor quite a lot. If there is a way to avoid trouble they will have found it. Nothing much phases them. We tend to avoid fenced dog parks.
  19. I've worn a collar. And that's why I use harnesses. I don't fit into the harnesses to try them. I was very careful about my selection, though. Rubbed my fingers against the hardest bits of the harness I could find and imagined where they would sit on my dogs and whether they would rub uncomfortably. I found when I looked for designs I thought would be comfortable I had ruled out most of the options. I seriously have 5 or 6 brands of harness knocking around because several I tried I decided looked uncomfortable. Needless to say, I would be a desperate person to decide to use a prong. I think what a dog "requires" to learn something is one of the least variable things in dog training, really. They all learn in much the same way. Which tool you use is surely very much dependent on what you are prepared to do and your own skill as a trainer, I think. Which is more about you than the dog, wouldn't you agree?
  20. There is usually room on the couch for him as well. He rarely humps if he can pile onto your legs or chest without risking falling off the couch. Group cuddles are much more common on the bed than the couch, and he doesn't seem to hump on the bed as a general rule. Kivi is a serial morning snuggler in the bed, and Erik doesn't seem worried by some serious Lapphund spooning. He's happy to stretch over everyone or wedge himself in somewhere. Erik seems to get humped a lot by bigger dogs at the dog park. As long as he's not trying to get away and the other dog isn't getting obsessive I don't see a need to intervene. Maybe I'm weird, but I don't think it's particularly rude for your dog to hump a dog they don't really know. It's only a problem if the dog humping won't stop, or if the other dog hates it.
  21. How did you draw to that conclusion, Corvus? Observation. Context and body language. I asked him and he just licked me. Go figure. In human terms, my guess is he sees a group activity occurring and he wants to be a part of it. Kivi is a dog, like he is, so he feels directly in competition with Kivi for resources including attention from the non-dogs, but he is very close to Kivi and avoids conflict with him. He values cuddles highly and if there is not enough room on the couch for me, Kivi, and him and he's the last one to arrive he feels conflicted about simultaneously wanting more social contact with his family, which includes Kivi, and feeling in competition with Kivi for that social contact, and this conflict results in anxiety related to a social situation, thus, social anxiety. It is not strong enough to result in a proactive behaviour, so he uses a displacement behaviour to alleviate his anxiety. It's not always humping. Depends on the intensity of his anxiety, which is related to his emotional state, one assumes. And his position. He rarely goes out of his way to hump. No. The (invented) phrase is as descriptive and accurate as I could make it.
  22. I would keep my nose out of it. She's not doing anything illegal or cruel. If she's already lining up homes for them amongst people she knows, that's quite responsible, really. You have given her all the info at your disposal for her to make her own choice and she has obviously made it. But personally, I would casually tell her about the poorly bred dog my parents have who I love dearly but has had a life of compromised quality due to health problems and how I feel that the breeder who so carelessly brought him into the world is guilty of cruelty to me and I would dearly like to make them responsible for that dog's suffering. That's all I'd do, though. It's her dog and her choice.
  23. Says who? Did a dog that has worn all of them tell you which one he preferred? Aversive is aversive. There is always "more to it" when it comes down to use and individual animals, but I didn't comment on the "more to it". I said they work because they are aversive, which they undeniably are. Or they wouldn't work. Not all training tools "apply discomfort". And we all know there are degrees of discomfort dependent on the individual dog's pain and fear threshold, the circumstances in which the discomfort is delivered, the opportunities available to control the discomfort, and the "level" of discomfort delivered by the one comfortably standing at the other end of the leash. We can't quantify a lot of those variables. But we know it suppresses behaviour, therefore, it must be aversive, and that's about the only thing we really know about it.
  24. Erik is what I call a "social anxiety displacement humper". Whenever he feels a little bit socially anxious he is likely to turn around and hump Kivi. If Kivi is lying down, that is. It almost always occurs when I have closed a door on him so he can't follow me. I come back and he's humping Kivi. I tell him to get off because Kivi doesn't really love being humped and I'd rather he came up with a more universally acceptable way to cope with me leaving him. I take it to mean my leaving him causes him more anxiety than it should in the first place and I'm working on that. The other time it occurs is if Kivi is trying to cuddle with me. Not always, just sometimes. I interrupt it because again, I would rather he found another means to cope with this kind of stress. I tell him to down and then make room for him to cuddle with me as well. I take the humping to mean he's not comfortable, but I am also aware that it's not a behaviour that is universally acceptable. He tries it with my mother's Sheltie and she will attack him for it. She hates it. I don't like my chances of teaching him a more acceptable way to cope with mild social anxiety, but I can try!
  25. Well.... I know a lot of US folks that are VEHEMENTLY against prongs because you can basically walk into any pet store and buy one and you do see people misusing them. When you look at pictures of these things they look like medieval torture devices. OH asked me once what a prong was and I pulled up a picture and he went "That looks cruel and painful." I had to agree. It does. Whether it is or isn't, it sure looks like it is. I don't blame people for knee-jerk reactions against them. They only work at all because they are aversive. It's a fair assumption given the look and the purpose that you would never want to use one. You would have to be introduced to them carefully to think otherwise.
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