corvus

I don't remember. Kivi grew up overnight when he was about 10 months old, so earlier than that. Erik is still growing up at 18 months. I'm guessing he'd grown out of on leash puppy madness at around 9 months. It seems like a long time since we had to deal with that. Might have been earlier.

I think so! I was hoping someone would tell me. I wasn't sure if HPA-axis reactivity meant bigger responses than normal or a lower threshold than normal. As if normal exists. I would love it if anyone felt like telling me interesting stuff they know about the HPA-axis. So, if an animal is described as having a high parasympathetic reactivity, what does that mean? Does that mean that animal tends to react to startling or aversive stimuli by freezing? If it has high HPA-axis reactivity and high parasympathetic reactivity, does that mean it tends to freeze at the slightest provocation?

It's not simple. You have to figure out why the behaviour occurred in the first place, but if it rarely happens, identifying the trigger can be extremely difficult. You are left feeling around in the dark trying things under controlled situations to try to replicate it and not managing to. I swear sometimes it's just the dog feels different that day for whatever reason. The park smells different, it's foggier than usual, maybe, another dog did something very small and weird you missed, the dog has more energy than usual, maybe it's more stimulated than usual... There are dozens of factors that could have contributed, making it practically impossible to replicate artificially. The "simple" answer is to keep working on your recalls as usual and keep your eyes and ears open. BTW, PF, I didn't take what you said as a personal insult. A lot of people think I'm an idiot for going to dog parks. That is fine by me. For all I knew you were one of them. Also fine by me. I was trying to say I wouldn't consider that an insult. The unfenced parks are much better, but one time I saw someone's dog drag them in as well, and was horrified when they then let it off leash. Erik was only about 5kg of puppy at the time and I was glad I had already been making a quiet and hasty exit. First thing the dog did was pounce on the nearest SWF and pin it to the ground. Yep, you guessed it, "She's just playing". It can happen anywhere. I just stay on my toes.

A momentary freeze happens all the time in prey animals as they assess what to do next. Usually when they first become aware of a predator they freeze. The sympathetic side kicks in when and if necessary. A lion that's been spotted usually walks away. Best for the zebra not to waste all that energy bolting.

That's how I interpret it, and that's what happens as far as I know. Say you have a dog that freezes with a parasympathetic spike and a dog that flees with a sympathetic spike. If you repeatedly stressed both dogs in the same way, is one going to be better off than the other? If you just did it once, is one going to recover more quickly than the other? If it's a big, sudden problem, a proactive animal copes better, but if it's a sustained problem, a reactive animal does better? If it's a problem that can be solved a proactive animal is less stressed by it, but if it's a problem that can't be solved a reactive animal is less stressed by it?

Does anyone know much about HPA-axis reactivity and sympathetic vs parasympathetic activation? Well, I know that activation of the sympathetic system is fight or flight stuff and parasympathetic is rest and digest stuff, but I'm wondering what that translates to if during a stressful situation an animal has greater parasympathetic activation than sympathetic? I have a very simplistic understanding of this stuff. I know that no two stress responses are the same, but I struggle with the idea that a stress response could be more parasympathetic than sympathetic. Maybe I'm interpreting this wrong. Maybe it's just more parasympathetic than the alternative coping style, that involves a large sympathetic activation? I don't know what this means! In terms of behaviour. Sapolsky, why doesn't your zebra book answer this question?? I'm having my own little stress response about this.

I don't know what we'd do without our dog parks. Our yard certainly isn't big enough for the boys to get a proper run. I've found the friendships I've made with fellow dog-park denizens to be quite valuable. We have watched each other's dogs grow up, been a sympathetic ear when dogs have become old and died, shared information on care and training, helped each other with young dogs still learning the rules, and watched our dogs make human and canine friends. My dogs are known fondly by a lot of people around about. I consider that a very valuable network should my dogs ever go missing. We chat, like people do, and we watch our own and each other's dogs. There are always people that are not watching their dogs, but there are always people that are not watching their kids. You look out for them as well as your own because someone's got to. We steer clear of the fenced parks because in our experience people use them as an excuse to let the dogs do what they like while they do what they like, but haven't had insurmountable troubles with the unfenced parks and beaches. People walk all the time in those, so the dogs get up to less mischief. ETA That's your prerogative, PF, and I don't begrudge you of it for a second. You are welcome to think me and anyone else who uses dog parks an idiot if that's what makes you happy. It doesn't change the fact that behaviour rarely exists in absolutes, though.

Walk. As awesome as bones are, who knows what enormous fun I could get up to without them? As far as Kivi goes, he doesn't normally have to choose. He's so bloody talented at finding carcasses when we're out walking he usually gets both.

I've spoken to a couple of people that found the no-pull harnesses didn't work. One was a Gentle Leader brand, but not sure about the others. No idea what's going wrong as I don't know much about them.

Hahaha, I know that! Both my boys used to be lovely on leash for half the walk, then spend the other half being a nutty puppy. They both grew out of it. In the meantime, I carried toys with me. When they got nutty I'd let them tug on a toy. Erik used to hurl himself at Kivi, which I didn't want because it makes it hard to walk them when they're playing! I would keep him out of range of Kivi and work on short heels, downs, and sits. Toys or food as rewards. The trick was to keep his focus. It was hard work. At that age Kivi was content to just play with a tug in my hand. Erik had a shorter attention span.

First you said once in 100, now it's once in 500. Oh please. I dont care - once is enough, like the kid across the road said when she watched two dogs rip hers apart. Oh sorry sorry. It never happened before. Too late. The kid's dog was dead. Being a brat is a far cry from tearing a dog apart. By that reasoning no one should ever let their dogs off leash seeing as 100% DOESN'T EXIST. Why, how can I live with myself taking my dogs out at all without a muzzle?? It only takes once. A line has to be drawn somewhere. I'm saying let's draw it in reality. That doesn't mean we don't pick up after someone that throws rubbish in the ocean, or that we let dogs that don't mix well with others mix to their hearts content and watch mayhem ensue. It just means we be reasonable about unlikely variables in dog (and human) behaviour. It's unreasonable to talk in absolutes when it comes to behaviour, because behaviour rarely exists in absolutes.

This is why animal libs get largely ignored by most people in power. They annoy the crap out of conservationists, that's for sure. I don't find it scary. I find it ridiculous.

You don't see police dogs getting walked around off leash much! I know of a police dog that has killed SWFs.

'Generally' isnt good enough. If your dogs arent under effective control 100% of the time, they shouldnt be offleash in a dog park. Pure and simple. Too late if you say - 'oh sorry, sorry, they've never done that before' if the other owner is racing their dog to a vet to be stitched up. It's why these dog parks polarise communities. I'm glad I dont see you when out walking as well because if your dogs behaved like brats near mine, I jolly would shout at you! I would do more than that as well. Oh, please. My point was there is no such thing as 100%. If my dogs are brats one time in 500, am I seriously going to see that one time coming and keep them on leash? Having seen that one time in 500 they might be brats, am I going to deny them of their daily off leash run for the sake of a community full of people who have less control over their dogs than I do and usually don't even realise or care if my dogs are being brats? It is so not "pure and simple". We are talking about a combination of dog behaviour, human behaviour, and environmental variables, here. Nothing could be more complex. My dogs would go mad if they didn't get their off leash run. They are not the only dogs in the neighbourhood that would. I can live with the odd bullies, dogpark brats, and socially crippled canines to share that resource, and I hope they can live with the odd ratbag moment from my dogs in return.

That's exactly why I socialised the heck out of my boys when they were puppies. They don't care if they get rushed as long as the dogs aren't going to kill them. Takes a lot of the anxiety out of getting them out of the yard. not the point, you should be able to walk your dog along a foot path without being rushed. Mine ar enice socialble dogs as well but being rushed by 5 offlead dogs would intimidate me let alone the dogs. And you have no way of knowing if you or your dogs are about to be bitten. "Should", yes, "can", no. I prefer to deal with reality myself. There certainly are ways of knowing if you or your dogs are likely to be bitten. My dogs seem to know. I watch dogs a lot at the park and beach. I learnt it's not necessary to panic every time. You get a feel for what's a worry and what's not. I'm very wary of getting into neighbourhood arguments about these things. I'd like to be reasonably confident my dogs will be safe in their yard and pissing off residents in my street is not conducive to that confidence IMO. Some people are really weird.

It is very low in fat but high in protein. My mother nearly starved her Kelpie/Boxer cross by feeding her kangaroo for a while. It was too lean and the weight just plummeted off her. It took months to feed her up enough that she didn't look like a walking skeleton anymore. She's a weird dog, though. Very active and only eats barely enough to keep her ticking over.

I'm glad I don't meet any DOLers when I'm out and about. They'd shout at me! I don't know what for, but I'm sure they'd find some reason... And they'd probably say things like "should" and "effective control" a lot. I will say this: my dogs are generally under effective control. They come when called, even when in the middle of approaching a dog to greet them. One time in the hundreds that they have greeted dogs appropriately or come away from dogs the moment they were called, they charged a pair and ignored us when we recalled them. They were being brats rather than bullies, but the dogs they charged didn't know that. My partner and I were mortified and apologised profusely. We could only say they had never done that before and are usually far better behaved. The owner of the dogs accepted our apologies and we held the boys until they had passed us. The boys have never done it since. It's difficult to control everything all the time. No matter how "effective" your control is most of the time, dogs do weird stuff sometimes. One time in a hundred they will do something completely unexpected. Let's get realistic rather than judgemental.

1. Some people are filthy, lazy pigs. We usually end up picking up after them. That's life. She obviously doesn't care what you think of her, so I would leave her to her ways and just lead by example. Next time I saw her ignore her dog taking a dump I'd hand her a poo bag then offer to take it to the bin for her. It's not that big a deal. 2. I'm sympathetic of joggers. I'm sure dogs are the bane of their existence. I jog and have had dogs rush out of yards to try to chase me. It can be scary, but to be honest, it's extremely irritating to have your running rhythm disrupted. I blew up at a woman once for flagging me down when I was on a jog to tell me how she was doing a door knock in the area for some political reason she was going to describe to me in some detail. She had no idea how enormously annoying it is to have to stop. This is why we avoid routes with traffic lights! It sounds really petty and selfish, but man, it is just that annoying. Anyway, I just tend to call the dogs over and put them in sits when a jogger goes past. Neither have ever chased joggers, but it's a courtesy. I'm saying "It's okay, I've got them under control." No idea if it ever gets noticed, but that's okay. 3. What can you do? Keep out of the way, warn other people, leave if you see the dog. You've already reported it, so I don't know that there's much more you can do.

Yeah, I know where you're coming from. My previous dog was attacked several times on our own driveway by the dog next door. It was a battleaxe block. Every time we walked up the driveway we had to go past this dog we knew would try to nail her if he got the chance. Never knew if he would be chained up or if we would have to rely on the owners to stop him. He eventually bit my mother while she was trying to protect my dog and a fence finally went up. That dog was nowhere near as thoroughly and extensively socialised as my current two boys, but it didn't turn her into a fear biter. She was always on the cautious side with big dogs after that, and it took her about a year to start being comfortable around bigger strange dogs again, but she did it, and for the rest of her life behaved quite normally around strange dogs. Cautious, but only a little bit. Very confident and collected. I trusted her 100% to stay out of trouble and she always did me proud. I know someone whose dog was nearly killed by a much larger dog they met on the footpath. It took them over a year, but eventually that dog was relaxed about strange large breed dogs again. Even after such a traumatic event. If the unthinkable happens, it needn't be the end of everything. A well socialised dog has a lot of buffering. They know not all dogs are dangerous. They don't instantly forget every good experience they have ever had. They can and do recover.

That's exactly why I socialised the heck out of my boys when they were puppies. They don't care if they get rushed as long as the dogs aren't going to kill them. Takes a lot of the anxiety out of getting them out of the yard.

Erik eats any fruit or vegetable you care to toss his way. He especially like zucchini and cucumber. If you start eating an apple he follows you around relentlessly until you finish it and give him the core. Kivi thinks he's mad.

I think Black Dog do a very light long line that is 10m long. It's good about not getting snagged on things, but that includes fingers. Cuts like a knife if it gets pulled through your fingers. I have another thicker nylon one that is 5m long. No idea who makes them. I use it in training loose leash walking. It doesn't hurt as much if it gets pulled through fingers

Who cares how to accomplish it? Nothing is going to work for every fight. Obviously you're not going to stand around windmilling staffies with a leash going "how's this gonna work...?" You'd use it where it was appropriate, like you would any piece of information.

What are you training?

I would honestly rather not think about it. I've been told by behaviourists that the best way is to grab the back legs and pull up and back if you have two people. If you're alone, leash tied under the belly (loins), walk them back to an anchor point, then get another leash or rope under the other dog's belly and walk backwards. That one came from a Pyr breeder - obviously it's a little hard to pick up an adult male Pyr. This is what I would do. If there were no anchor points somehow and I was on my own, I guess I'd have to think of something else. If we're talking about a very small dog in a very big dog's mouth and time is of the essence, good luck to me. I'm a cool head in a crisis, but there's only so much you can do. There's a story in Kicked, Bitten, Scratched about a trainer that got himself sat on by a peeved camel. He nearly died, but one of his students had the presence of mind to belt the camel with a very hefty piece of wood or something and it saw fit to get up and stalk away. He'd be dead if there had been no hefty pieces of wood lying around. I daresay my dog would be dead if I couldn't find something that worked quickly enough. That's just circumstantial. There's nothing I can do about it. It's like worrying about what you'd do if you got mugged. Whatever you can to protect yourself and loved ones. I know some self-defence moves and don't take stupid risks. That's the best I can do.